What To Do If Your Points or Miles are Stolen

We may be months from Halloween, but my colleague (and Going’s spokesperson), Katy Nastro, recently shared with me a very scary story. She had her American Airlines AAdvantage miles stolen from her account.

Katy had just landed at the airport and was sitting in an Uber on her way home after a recent trip. As she sat in the car, she opened her American Airlines app to check her mileage balance. 

“I started thinking about my next trip (as a travel obsessive does) and noticed within my app profile my mileage balance was significantly lower,” Katy said.

Over 50,000 AAdvantage miles were missing from her account.

(Like Katy, I also often check my miles account after flying. I’m anxious to see the miles earned from a recent flight posted to my loyalty account.)

Katy’s experience had a level of cruel irony because as our company spokesperson, she had recently been asked about the topic in media interviews several months before. 

“At the time, my knowledge on the topic was sparse since it's not something you frequently hear about,” she said. “Yet, low and behold, it had just occurred to me!”

Who–and how–to report stolen points and miles

If this happens to you and you notice missing points or miles from your favorite credit card or airline account, the first thing you should do is contact the airline, credit card issuer, or travel loyalty program from which you earned the points. 

When Katy noticed the missing miles, she contacted American Airlines right away. She was still in the Uber on her way home from the airport when she reached out, trying to understand what happened.

“I was hoping this might have been a system error since I redeemed a few miles a couple of days prior,” she said. 

Instead, the representative from American Airlines confirmed that they had been redeemed for a ticket. “Someone with a name I have never heard of had a ticket redeemed using my miles.”

Credit card companies

Travel rewards credit cards often come with a robust set of protections against fraud, but this primarily applies to purchases made with your card. If your points were stolen from your credit card account, contact your credit card issuer immediately. They will still treat this as theft and an account breach, but the card issuer may not restore your points as swiftly as they would reverse a fraudulent charge. 

What do hackers do with stolen points?

Unfortunately, what happened with Katy’s American Airlines AAdvantage miles is fairly common: A quick Google search and scan of Reddit brings up others’ stories of stolen miles used to book a flight. 

Just like Katy’s situation, one of the telltale signs of a fraudulent redemption is that the reservation is in someone else’s name. American Airlines shared with her the name on the ticket, but she didn’t know the departure, destination, or the purpose of the trip. 

“All I know is this was not a ticket to Asia, which was what I was hoping to utilize the miles for,” Katy told me.

Other key signs of a hacked redemption are that the reservation is made at an IP address (computer’s location) somewhere geographically distant from you, and/or the flight origin is not near your residence. 

When it comes to stolen credit card points, I’m told that the points are often redeemed for gift cards or merchandise through the card issuers’ shopping portal. 

I know, very unexciting. I would hope they would try flying off to a warm beach or somewhere relaxing! 

How to get points and miles back

After learning that someone had used her precious airline miles for a ticket, Katy’s call was transferred to the American Airlines fraud department. 

“Thus began a harder inquiry,” she said. Two weeks after that initial call, Katy received an email from American Airlines informing her she had 30 days to file a police report with her local police department and send a PDF of the report to American Airlines’ customer service email. 

“It was annoying because I had to physically go to a police station and utilize their time to write a police report,” she said. “The whole process took about 20 minutes, but that's because they had no one there. I felt guilty for having to use the resources of the police.”

Katy said filing the report was frustrating because she had to go to a physical police station and then email a digital version of the report to the airline. Others who were victims of mile theft also reported that American Airlines asked them to do the same. 

A representative from American Airlines declined to comment on the process.

Although a police report with your local department is likely not going to start a Law and Order level investigation, this helps create a paper trail.

Katy told me that the issue is still unresolved. 

When she shared this, I was shocked by how long the process takes. I had assumed, naively, that once she reported it and there was evidence of a flight bought in some stranger’s name, the miles would be restored immediately.

Ways to prevent hackers from stealing your points and miles

As part of the recovery process, American Airlines told Katy that she needed to change her email and get a brand new AA membership account. 

“It was kind of a bummer since this was my first loyalty account/number ever,” she said.

Katy also told me that shortly before the miles theft, she had been receiving a lot of spam in her Gmail account. She can’t prove the two are related, but it is possible that is how hackers got her information.

Don’t have Katy’s story become your story. Here are some steps you can take:

Change your password

The first one is probably the most obvious. Change your password to something more secure. Sure, this isn’t Fort Knox, but also try to use something different than your dog’s name and the year you were born.  Also, don’t use the same password on your credit card account that you also use for your Netflix and Amazon accounts. 

Use a password manager

Not only can password managers store your passwords securely, they can also suggest custom passwords for each account. You know, something like gh3-tyxm-sd3d8. This is going to be much more secure than even 94b@nana$.

Check your rewards balance monthly

Katy spotted the theft because she checked her American Airlines app and noticed the balance was oddly low.

That method, however simple or unscientific it may be, is often the best and quickest way to notice signs of theft. 

This also applies to credit card points. Did you know that your monthly credit card statement bill includes your rewards to date? When you go to pay your credit card statement, also check the awards balance to see if it is consistent with what you’ve earned or redeemed in the last month. This also makes paying your credit card bill more fun!

Track your points

AwardWallet is a free phone app that allows you to connect your credit card accounts and track points. The app says it offers “bank-level encryption” and allows you to track points from credit cards, airlines, hotels, and even retail shopping loyalty programs. Linking my accounts was slightly tedious, but once it’s done, it’s fun to see them all in one place.  

The major drawback I noticed is that major domestic airlines, including American, Delta, and United, do not allow you to link or display your mileage balances in AwardWallet. So if Katy were to rely on checking AwardWallet, she would not have noticed the missing Advantage miles. 

Take it easy on the public Wi-Fi

Public Wi-Fi is ubiquitous these days, but it is also an easy way to make yourself susceptible to data breaches. If you want to be more secure, use a VPN or stay on your phone’s 5G. 

What happened to Katy’s miles?

After over a month since she first contacted American Airlines, Katy finally got her miles restored to her account. 

Editor's note: Katy's miles got restored after this article was initially published. At the original time of publication, Katy did not have her miles restored. 

“I was assured if they find that this was, in fact, fraud, I will have my miles reinstated,” she said. “I feel pretty confident it will be [found fraudulent], but the process is not speedy.”