While Hertz was the first car rental partner in the American AAdvantage program back in 1981 — it was only an award redemption partner. The first car rental company to award miles for car rentals was Avis in 1984. And, as part of AAdvantage’s 20th Anniversary celebration, Avis is offering an interesting bonus promotion. Here’s the deal: when you make a qualifying rental of three or more days, including a Saturday night, Avis will award you with 100 bonus miles for every year you have been an AAdvantage member. While it is possible to earn up to 2,000 bonus miles (it is the 20th Anniversary), your bonus will likely be somewhat less than that. To find out what you are eligible for, you’ll have to call the AAdvantage Service Center. For us, it’s a 1,600-mile bonus, and that’s certainly a good enough reason to choose Avis when our next car rental fits the profile for the bonus. The bonus miles offer is in addition to the standard 50 miles per rental day and customers must rent before Aug. 31, 2001.

To earn bonus miles, customers should mention their AAdvantage/Avis Worldwide Discount Number (AWD) K817118 when making an Avis reservation and provide their AAdvantage membership number at the time of rental at any participating Avis airport location worldwide. This special Avis/AAdvantage bonus miles opportunity can only be used once during the promotional period and the offer may not be combined with any other offer, coupon or promotion. Customers should allow six to eight weeks after the promotion ends (Aug. 31) for bonus miles to appear on their statement.