Thursday, August 28, 2008
As of April 24, the Canadian Airlines Canadian Plus and American Express Membership Rewards partnership has ended. The partnership allowed Membership Rewards members to transfer points to Canadian Plus miles. According to our contact at American Express, the contract between the credit card company and Canadian Airlines was ironed out months ago and set to go through the end of 2002, but Canadian wanted to negotiate changes. Perhaps larger conversion increments than the allotted 3,000 points were the point of contention. Plus, effective May 1 each time Membership Rewards points in Canada are transferred to a participating frequent flyer account, a fee of 3,500 Membership Rewards points will be assessed. Canadian may have not been pleased with this development as well. Canadian walked out of the negotiations on April 20, severing the partnership. Canadian Airlines was recently taken over by Air Canada. Canadian Plus and Air Canada's Aeroplan program are supposedly not effected by the change, however the Canadian Plus program seems to be in a constant state of upheaval. This development won't serve to assure members that all is well with Canadian Plus.
