UPDATE: The match.com deal appears to have expired. Clicking through the portal produces an error that says, “Invalid Publisher Code, Offer, or Publisher – Advertiser Partnership Status”. We will keep you updated if there is any news to report. eHarmony may still be alive.
A follow-up on this morning’s post about the incredible British Airways portal promotion: Readers have pointed out that you can un-bundle a Match.com subscription to earn even more Avios!
Why do I want to subscribe to a dating site?
I can’t say whether or not you want to subscribe to a dating site. But, as we reported this morning, you can earn a boatload of miles for doing it:
As you can see, Match.com is offering 150 Avios per $1 spent. We initially reported that a 1-year subscription costs about $200 for a total of about 30K Avios earned. We’ve since learned that you can do better.
Unbundling
As reported by One Mile at a Time, you can un-bundle your Match.com subscription and pay separately for a number of pieces. First, you choose a basic plan:
Then, you can bundle as many add-ons as you want. For our purposes, we would add all of them:
The final price should be $548.57. At 150 Avios per dollar, that should earn you 82,285 Avios! Note: There was $42.93 in sales tax in New York State. You do not earn miles on the sales tax.
To put that in perspective, that would buy you THREE round trip economy class saver tickets from the West Coast to Hawaii or from Boston to Dublin. If you want to fly business class, it would buy you a round trip business class ticket up to 3,000 miles each way (if the flights are direct). For example, you could fly round trip in business class on Qantas from Sydney to Bali (normally $2200+) or Cathay Pacific from Hong Kong to the Maldives (a route where cash prices are typically very expensive — a quick glance shows about $3600 for that route). Not a bad trade for ~$550!
For more ideas on how to maximize the British Airways shopping portal promotion, see our original post as well as the comments section — where readers are sharing finds like this!
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[…] caught fire and consumed the Internet when Greg hinted at the chance to earn a lot of miles by signing up for a dating site. Soon enough, the Wall Street Journal was writing about the frequent fliers who bombarded […]
Well I signed up for the promotion for 6 months, paid, added pics to the profile, and started getting messages from members. But then apparently match.com has summarily canceled all subscriptions that took advantage of their promotion.
WTH? Bad business. Didn’t honor their promotion.
So I purchased the Match.com base plan for the 30k points before the whole add-on business, so that didn’t really affect me. I signed up for Match for a friend who is single and gave him the use of the membership as he can use it and it won’t be a total waste. But he is saying my account was canceled and that it’s asking for me to pay for a subscription, so maybe I won’t even get my Avios? For reference, my 30k points are pending in the Avios portal, I think I have to tomorrow for the 5 days to be up? Anyone else having an issue?
Match.com seems to be proactively cancelling all accounts created through the British Airways 150x offer, whether we did the add-ons or not. I (and many others) received an email saying that my entire payment would be refunded.
looks like match.com is gone from the BA shopping portal
Posted this on the other post detailing this deal but thought I would leave it here as well so people don’t waste their time with the eharmony deal…
Since the Match offer was dead I went through and tried to sign up for the eharmony one. It seemed like a decent deal until I read over the terms more carefully:
“I agree that I will be charged $79.80 today and 2 subsequent monthly payments of $79.80 each, for a total of $239.40 for a 12 month term; my subscription will automatically renew on these same terms until I cancel; I authorize eHarmony to charge my card now and upon each monthly payment and each renewal; and a cancellation will be effective on the next renewal date of my subscription.”
The terms for Cancellations is where they get you:
“If you purchase a subscription on an installation payment basis (such as three-part pay), cancellation will not affect your obligation to pay the total contractual amount due on your subscription and your credit card will continue to be charged the scheduled payments until the remaining balance is paid in full. ”
So in effect you will be required to pay $239.40 for 10,374 Avios giving you a price per point of $0.043. Ouch! Not a great way to buy Avios. Just thought I would give people the heads up so they don’t go through the trouble of setting up an account just to spend way too much on purchasing Avios.
[…] update on the ability to take advantage of a specific deal for Match.com that would enable you to buy Avios at the effective rate of about .67 cents per point. Initial results are a mixed bag at […]
“Please note: the stated reward is for first-time Match.com paid subscriptions only”
That is the totality of the terms. I can completely see BA trying to claim that would apply only to the subscription component of the charge. BA in general has some of the vaguest terms of any shopping portal. Good luck to those who try to fight.
Yeah, I decided to bail out instead of fight. Called Match.com and they gave me a refund.
Yes, The entire package is part of the subscription. There is no reason they shouldn’t be honoring it, but apparently they don’t want to.
Did anyone take a screen capture of the purchase conditions? I thought I did, but can’t find it.
It just said it’s only available to new paid subscriptions. The add-ons per month certainly sound like a subscription to me since it’s monthly just like the main subscription is.
I just looked at the terms of service. Match.com says they won’t refund you for any reason. Looks like I may really regret this. Anyone got an idea on how to cancel and get a refund?
Ughh, $572 for 34k points. That’s $0.18 per point 🙁
Oops, 1.8c per point. Could’ve been worse I suppose. Gotta risk it…
I went to match.com > account settings > subscription status has it all broken out. The base subscription amount (which varies by individual) x 150 = points pending at BA portal. I have taken no steps yet at it is early on the east coast and I am still having my coffee.
@secstate
Where did you find the breakout? Did you try to cancel your addons?
Just to update I found the breakout I was looking for and they paid out the 150 points on the base subscription only not any add-ons. The math work prefectly.
I didn’t expect this to go smoothly and sadly my expectations are being met. Pending Avios for my Match.com transaction are 28,784 I wish I had saved the breakout of consts but I think that might be in the ballpark of my subscription rate (it varied for folks) without all the add-ons.
I see the error too “Invalid Publisher Code, Offer, or Publisher – Advertiser Partnership Status”. It will be interesting to see whether this is a temporary glitch or if match.com put up a roadblock on purpose. I wouldn’t blame them if so.