Hacking Our Way to Elite Status: Navigating AA Platinum and Hyatt Globalist

Hello fellow travelers! In this edition of Hackers Travel, we're focusing on our current elite travel statuses – American Airlines Platinum and Hyatt Globalist. Let's delve into the benefits of these statuses, their synergistic partnership, and how achievable they are, even for those with busy lifestyles.

American Airlines Platinum: A Suite of Benefits

As AA Platinum members, we enjoy numerous perks. The ones we value are: 

- Complimentary Upgrades: Access to Main Cabin Extra or Preferred seats. This may be our favorite benefit of having airline status. This allows us to secure main cabin extra seats at booking at no additional charge. We value this because it comes with extra leg room and these seats are located at the front of the plane! 

- Bonus Miles: Earn 60% more miles on flights. This one is pretty self explanatory, but more miles equals more free travel.  

- Oneworld Sapphire Status: We just used this for the first time in Doha! Our status with American Airlines, a member of the Oneworld alliance, allowed us into a lounge in Hamad International Airport. While I normally wouldn’t be too excited about one time lounge access, this was a lifesaver during an 8 hour layover. 

- Free Checked Bags: 2 free checked bags. Again, this is not something we normally use. Even on our 15 day honeymoon we only brought carry-ons. However, we have run into plenty of situations where we needed to check a bag and not having to pay extra fees is awesome. 

In all reality, we feel like AA platinum status is the sweat spot in the American Airlines status chart. This is because AA platinum is the lowest status level that allows you to book Main Cabin extra seats for free. While we do value free upgrades, we haven’t seen many of them over the past year, but we do get a lot of value out of guaranteed extra leg room.

Also, AA platinum has been generally achievable for us. We have not had to go out of our way to achieve it. Here are some tips and tricks we have picked up along the way to make earning this status easier. 

Earning AA Platinum status requires earning 75,000 Loyalty Points in a year, here our the ways we accomplish this:

• Flying with American Airlines or Partner Airlines: This is the most straightforward method, if you fly with American Airlines you earn loyalty points. 

• AAShopping: This is one of the most underrated ways to earn loyalty points. Well, I guess not underrated, but maybe less known. If you install the AAShopping Browser plugin and sign up for an account. Then you can start earning miles and loyalty points for the online shopping you are already doing. This has been an easy way for us to rack up miles and loyalty points that count towards status.

• AAdvantage Dining: By simply enrolling in AAdvantage Dining and adding your credit cards, you can earn additional miles and loyalty points when you dine out. Just pay the bill with an enrolled credit card and you will earn extra points if the restaurant participates in the program. 

• Spending on an AA Co-branded Credit Card: For every dollar spent you will get a loyalty point. This is not the best return on spend and often the opportunity cost of spending on an AA branded credit card is too high, meaning you can earn a lot more miles and points on other cards. However, we still do spend on these cards to contribute to help us earn status in specific situations like for American Airlines Airfare, but by no means are these cards our daily drivers. 

Yes, I know that there are many other ways to earn loyalty points. However, in our circumstances they do not make sense. 

We also acknowledge that there are tons of ways to accomplish earning status, but this is how we do it for our situation. 

Hyatt Globalist: The Pinnacle of Hotel Loyalty

Our Hyatt Globalist status unlocks exceptional benefits:

- Room Upgrades: Availability of better rooms, including standard suites. This is the best perk ever! If I had to estimate, we probably get upgraded around 80% of the time and often to suites. 

- Free Breakfast Complimentary breakfast for your stay. This has been an awesome benefit when traveling internationally and in the US. When you are a globalist you get complimentary breakfast at every hotel. I will say that this is better at full service hotels when you can get free breakfast at the hotel or affiliated restaurant (sometimes even a Michelin destinguished!).

- Late Check-Out: Flexibility with a 4 PM check-out. We use this at almost every stay and we have never had an issue securing 4 PM checkout. 

- Waived Resort Fees: Savings on both award stays and eligible rates. I think we can all agree that resort fees are the worst. Nothing is worse than when you checkout and you see all those resort fees on your bill. The good news is that Hyatt Gloablist's don’t have to pay any resort fees on stays booked directly with Hyatt. 

Reaching Globalist status involves 60 qualifying nights or 100,000 Base Points in a year, achievable through a mix of work travel, personal vacations, and using the World of Hyatt Credit Card. 

Earning Globalist Status is pretty straightforward and there are not too many workarounds to it. You have to stay 60 nights a year paid or on points, but with the Hyatt Credit card you start the year with 5 nights and for every 5,000 you spend on the card you are awarded 2 nights toward your 60. 

There is one hack I should mention and that is through your employer. Many employers have a promotion with Hyatt that allows you to earn global status for your first year by staying 20 nights in three months! We took advantage of this for our first year earning globalist. 

The Value of Hyatt Points

Hyatt points are a high-value currency in the travel world. They offer generous redemption options for hotel stays, requiring fewer points for luxury accommodations compared to other hotel loyalty programs. In a future blog I will dive into this more and show just how valuable these points can be. We solely switched our loyalty and travel plans to Hyatt so we can travel to the Maldives on points. 

The Synergy: American Airlines and Hyatt Partnership

A crucial aspect of our strategy is leveraging the American Airlines and Hyatt partnership. This alliance allows us to 'double dip' - earning miles and points across both brands. Staying at Hyatt properties earns us AA miles, and flying with American Airlines garners Hyatt points. You do have to have status at both American Airlines and Hyatt to enroll for this perk. This synergy not only accelerates our rewards accumulation but also provides a seamless travel experience.

Practical Tips for Achieving These Statuses

For those balancing full-time jobs and other commitments, attaining these statuses is about smart, strategic planning. Use branded credit cards for everyday purchases, take advantage of promotional offers, and align your travel plans to maximize point and night accumulation.

Final Thoughts

American Airlines Platinum and Hyatt Globalist, especially when combined through their partnership, offer a world of travel benefits. These statuses enhance our travel experiences significantly, proving that strategic travel hacking can lead to luxurious journeys.

Remember, elite status in travel is not just for the few; it's achievable with the right approach and a bit of savvy planning. Happy travels and happy hacking!

The Hackers Travel Duo