Some links to products and partners on this website will earn an affiliate commission.

I have previously written in detail about why UK ‘travel hackers’ (and particularly BA/oneworld elite status chasers) might want to consider switching their focus to American Airlines AAdvantage. Basically, for about £2,500 you can earn two years of Oneworld Emerald status (equivalent to BA Gold) and have enough redeemable miles to book return First Class flights to the Maldives!

I won’t rehash all the details here (everything is in the article linked above), but it’s all possible due to the way that American AAdvantage now credits redeemable miles earned from Rocketmiles hotel bookings as status qualifying miles.

The other quirk you need to know about is that Rocketmiles doesn’t care if you show up to the hotel! I have tested this extensively myself and have received AAdvantage miles for several no-show stays. All that I needed to do was prepay Rocketmiles for my hotel stay (don’t use the Reserve Now, Pay Later function available at some hotels).

Put those two things together and suddenly hated ‘resort fees’ are actually your new best friend…

Resort fees are good now? Really?

If you are somewhat familiar with Las Vegas hotel pricing, you will know that room rates can appear to be very cheap midweek. Unless there is a big conference or sporting event, Las Vegas casino hotels are nowhere near full. As a result, you will see room rates that appear ridiculously cheap. Casino hotels offer such low rates because:

• You will also pay a resort fee to the hotel
• You will probably do some gambling at the casino
• You will probably eat in or around the hotel

But for the purposes of this travel hack, all you care about is the fact that Rocketmiles pays almost nothing for that midweek hotel room, allowing it to apply a mark-up that coincidentally allows it to offer you far more miles. But if you don’t ever show up to the hotel, you don’t ever pay the resort fee!

Bottom line

So, in this (admittedly slightly obscure) situation, resort fees are great! Because the hotel has shifted most of the room rate into a concept that will only be payable if you actually show up, it allows you to pick up AAdvantage Loyalty Points on the cheap, without leaving home.

Remember that Advantage Loyalty Points are both redeemable and elite qualifying…