Air Canada’s Aeroplan, a Star Alliance member, is offering a bonus of up to 30% for transferring in points from hotel programs through April 17.

American Express Membership Rewards is excluded from this bonus (it isn’t a hotel program). But Starwood points transfers (and other hotel programs) are eligible.

Here’s the bonus earning chart:

The bonus is on the cumulative miles transferred across all hotel programs during the promotion period. You can transfer from several hotel programs or move points in several transfers. No registration is required.

Normally 160,000 Starwood Starpoints will transfer to 200,000 Aeroplan points. That will get you a bonus of 60,000 Aeroplan points and you’ll have a total of 260,000 in your Aeroplan account. That’s an effective transfer ratio of 1.625 Aeroplan points per Starwood point.

Let me show you the math on 141,000 points for 2 business class tickets.

• 141,000 Starwood points normally transfer to 176,000 Aeroplan points (since each block of 20,000 Starpoints moved to Aeroplan receives a 5000 mile bonus).

• Transferring 176,000 Aeroplan points generates a 25% bonus of 44,000 giving you a total of 220,000 Aeropolan points.

• Two roundtrip business class awards between the US and nearer Europe costs 220,000 Aeroplan points.

Marriott’s travel packages are an even stronger play with this promotion.

• Transfer 90,000 Starwood to 270,000 Marriott Rewards (or just start with Marriott Rewards). That transfers to 120,000 Aeroplan miles. Add the 25% bonus and you’ve got 150,000 Aeroplan miles plus a 7 night hotel stay in a property up to category 5.

• In fact, do this twice. 180,000 Starpoints is 540,000 Marriott Rewards. That transfers to 240,000 Aeroplan miles. And you get a 30% transfer bonus yielding 312,000 Aeroplan miles and two 7-night hotel stays.

You’ll have enough Aeroplan miles for 2 roundtrip business class tickets to (most of) Asia, Africa, or India and you’ll have up to 14 hotel nights as well.

With Aeroplan you can even have a stopover (visit a city along the way to or from your destination) on a roundtrip award and an open jaw (either come back from a different city than the one you arrive in, or return to a different city than the one you started in).

Aeroplan does add fuel surcharges to award tickets on some of airlines. However you can book award tickets on Star Alliance partners without fuel surcharges if you stick to travel on the following airlines:

• Air China
  
• Air New Zealand
  
• Brussels Airlines
  
• EgyptAir
  
• EVA Airways
  
• Scandinavian
  
• Singapore Airlines
  
• Swiss
  
• Turkish Airlines
  
• United

Fuel surcharges are whatever would be charged on a similar, paid itinerary. LOT fuel surcharges are low, so booking an Aeroplan award on LOT Polish isn’t very costly.

Aeroplan doesn’t put awards on hold, and transfers are Starwood points are not instantaneous. So you can’t lock in an award with available space now, and then make the transfer. You have to make the transfer, wait for all of the points to post, and then book an award.

I find though that I use Aeroplan quite frequently (at least as a Membership Rewards transfer partner) for 55,000 mile business class one-way awards between the US and Europe.

Here are the terms and conditions of the bonus offer:

Offer is valid only on the exchange of eligible hotel partner loyalty programs points into Aeroplan Miles made between March 13 and April 17, 2017 (11:59 EDT). Bonus Aeroplan Miles will be issued by Aeroplan as follows: when the total Aeroplan Miles earned by exchanging points from any combination of eligible partner programs during the promotion is between 2,500 and 99,999 Aeroplan Miles, the bonus miles deposited will represent 20% of the total miles earned from the exchange; OR when the total Aeroplan Miles earned by exchanging points from any combination of eligible partner programs during the promotion is between 100,000 and 199,999 Aeroplan Miles, the bonus miles deposited will represent 25% of the total miles earned from the exchange; OR when the total Aeroplan Miles earned by exchanging points from any combination of eligible partner programs during the promotion is greater than 200,000 Aeroplan Miles, the bonus miles deposited will represent 30% of the total miles earned from the exchange,

BONUS MILE CREDITING: Bonus Aeroplan Miles may take up to 4-6 weeks to be credited after the promotional offer end date of April 17, 2017.

(HT: Frequent Flyer Bonuses)