United Airlines has just launched a partnership with Turo, allowing MileagePlus members can earn miles for car rentals.
Earn 1-5x United MileagePlus miles on Turo rentals
United MileagePlus members can now earn miles for renting with Turo:
- MileagePlus members can earn 5x miles per dollar spent on their first Turo trip
- MileagePlus members can earn 1x miles per dollar spent on every Turo trip thereafter
Turo is the world’s largest peer-to-peer car sharing marketplace, offering a selection of over 1,600 makes and models. Turo offers a variety of delivery options, including airport, neighborhood, and doorstep delivery.
In order to take advantage of this, MileagePlus members must link their United MileagePlus and Turo account. Only one MileagePlus number can be provided for each Turo account.
This is valid for all bookings worldwide, and all dates and trip durations are eligible. Incidentals, fees, and other charges made after the trip has ended, aren’t eligible to earn miles. It can take up to 60 business days after completion of a rental for bonus miles to post to an account (that’s… quite some time).
How valuable is this collaboration?
Personally I value MileagePlus miles at 1.1 cents each, so to me, this partnership offers an incremental 5.5% return on the first rental, and an incremental 1.1% return on subsequent rentals.
If you’re going to rent from Turo, you might as well pick up some bonus miles. However, the value of this seems really marginal, and I can’t imagine this will do much to influence consumer behavior in the long run.
I suppose that perhaps the 5x miles on the first rental might be an incentive for people to give Turo a try once. I assume the hope is that MileagePlus members try Turo once, like it, and then keep using it in the future, even when the rewards are reduced significantly.
I at least appreciate the lack of restrictions when it comes to geography, length of rentals, how one needs to book, etc. The partnership is straightforward, if nothing else.
For what it’s worth, United MileagePlus is the second US frequent flyer program to partner with Turo, as Delta SkyMiles has a similar collaboration. However, the value proposition is a bit different — you earn 2,000 bonus miles after your first rental, and 500 bonus miles on subsequent rentals. So the United collaboration would be better on expensive rentals, while the Delta collaboration would be better on cheaper rentals.
Bottom line
United MileagePlus is now partnering with Turo, offering bonus miles for car rentals. You can earn 5x MileagePlus miles on your first rental, and 1x miles on your subsequent rentals. While this isn’t the highest value partnership in the world, it’s better than nothing, so if you rent with Turo, you might as well register.
What do you make of the new United & Turo partnership?
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