Does USDM have a yearly limit? ie if I got 50K + 50K in the recent promotion will this one still work?
There are no annual limits for buying/gifting/sharing miles.
There are limits for
bonus points received per promotion period, which is often set at 50k. This means you can keep on buying points, but once you receive 50k bonus points, you won't receive any more bonuses on purchased points in this promotion period (i.e. you'll be effectively buying points at twice the cost, or rather the "standard" cost).
As
cove mentioned, and stated in T&Cs, accounts which are less than 12 days old are not eligible to receive buy / share / gift miles.
Not surprised at all - last week information was released that indicates it will likely be into 2015 before DM is absorbed be AAdvantage.
I wonder what that fully means. That's an awfully long time.
Anyhoo, I'm skipping this - hoping for another "Share" promotion which normally have a better miles/$ ratio.
I thought it is more expensive this time
"...... Miles are sold for $0.035 per mile plus a tax recovery charge of 7.5%....."
The cost turns out to be - once you factor in the taxes and fee (for a purchase of 50k miles + 50k bonus) - 1.88 US cents per mile. The full whack that will max out your bonus at a shade under USD 2,000; or a decent shade over AUD 2,000 due to the exchange rate. :-|
It's certainly not as good as sharing miles, however Share Miles promos are more rare (though we may just see another one if US DM seems to continue their rather generous spree) and only work on accounts with some mileage in them (and decent mileage for that matter). For those topping up miles to make an award (particularly as a promotion afresh usually only affords you 100k miles, not quite enough to fill some popular awards) or those with 0 points balance, Buy Miles promos are useful. The cost isn't overly prohibitive either once you translate your award to a cash cost; it's just of course much better value if you used shared miles.
Anyway, all depends on your situation.... and for some of us, I think that's also a financial decision (viz. credit cards, the Ministry of War and Finance, etc.)
While it does say that... you certainly seem to be able to buy miles with a fresh account.
Some spotty evidence yes, some no. I'm not that prepared to take that risk.
I believe the portal immediately will not reject a new account attempting to buy miles, however once the transaction goes through the system will pick this up and the transaction will not proceed.
Do I need a US address to buy points?
No.