Estate planning as a Aeroplan account holder

Aeroplan is Air Canada's frequent-flyer rewards program. Members earn Aeroplan points by flying Air Canada and Star Alliance partners, using co-branded credit cards, booking hotels and car rentals, and shopping through the Aeroplan eStore, and redeem them for award flights, upgrades, hotels, car rentals, and gift cards. Although Aeroplan has a large United States footprint and U.S. co-branded cards, it is operated by Air Canada's subsidiary Aeroplan Inc. and governed by Canadian terms. Unlike most airline loyalty programs, Aeroplan publishes a dedicated Estate policy: while points cannot be willed in the contractual sense, a named beneficiary of a deceased member's estate may request that the member's points be transferred into an Aeroplan account, and an executor may make that request on the beneficiaries' behalf. Aeroplan publishes a dedicated estate mailbox for these requests.

After a Aeroplan account holder dies, points can be claimed by the estate. The transfer requires a death certificate and may require additional legal documentation depending on the account balance.

Aeroplan offers a family or pooling feature that allows members to share points with other program members. Aeroplan Family Sharing lets up to 8 Verified Family Members pool their points into a single shared balance while each keeps an individual Aeroplan account. All points earned by pool members, including their existing balances, go into the shared balance, and points are redeemed proportionally from each member's account. Members with redemption privileges can redeem from the shared balance for themselves or anyone else, with no transfer fees. The person who creates the pool is the Family Lead, who must be 18 or older and an Aeroplan member for at least 6 months; the Family Lead can invite up to 7 other Verified Family Members and can set each member's redemption permissions. To create, join, or invite to a pool, a member must have been an Aeroplan member for at least 6 months, must not have been part of another pool for at least 6 months, and (as of February 2025) must be a Verified Aeroplan Member. There is no minimum age to join an existing pool. Family Members must stay in a pool for at least 3 months before leaving. As of the July 2026 verification, Aeroplan states that the ability to CREATE a new Family Sharing pool is temporarily unavailable; existing pools are unaffected, including adding and removing members. Estate note: the Aeroplan Terms and Conditions (Section 7) provide that on the death or incapacity of a Family Lead, Aeroplan automatically dissolves the pool, and the Family Lead and each Family Member retain the points that remain in their own account at that time. Outside of Family Sharing, a member can transfer points to another Aeroplan member for a fee; Family Sharing is the no-fee way to combine points within a household. Members can also redeem points for award travel for any passenger, including people who are not Aeroplan members.

What happens at death

Aeroplan publishes a dedicated Estate policy. It states that although Aeroplan points cannot be willed, a named beneficiary of the late member's estate may request that the member's points be transferred into that beneficiary's Aeroplan account. The request is submitted by email to estate.solution@aircanada.ca and must include the late member's first and last name, complete mailing address including postal code, telephone number, email address, and Aeroplan number, together with a scanned copy of the late member's death certificate and a scanned copy of the portion of the will that names the beneficiaries. The same identifying details are required for each beneficiary; a beneficiary who is not already an Aeroplan member can enroll to receive the points. If there is a sole beneficiary, that person receives all the points; if there are multiple beneficiaries, the points are divided equally among them unless there is written, signed documentation stating that one or more beneficiaries do not want the points, in which case the points are divided equally among the remaining beneficiaries. The executor of an estate may request the transfer of points on behalf of the beneficiary or beneficiaries, providing the same information for each. Points may not be donated directly from the account of a member who has passed away; the points must first be transferred to the beneficiaries' Aeroplan accounts, after which a beneficiary can donate them to a participating charity. Regular expiry rules apply to a late member's points: if the points expired before the member passed away, the 18-month expiry policy applies to them; if the points expired after the member passed away, the transfer may be requested within 6 months of the expiry date. Separately, the Aeroplan general Terms and Conditions provide that Aeroplan membership terminates upon the death or personal bankruptcy of a member (Section 9), and that Aeroplan points and other benefits are personal to the member and cannot be assigned, traded, bartered, willed, exchanged for cash, or otherwise transferred, except as may be authorized by Aeroplan in its sole discretion (Section 12, "No Property or Vested Rights"); the Estate policy is one such authorized exception. No estate-transfer fee and no deadline to use transferred points appear on any official Aeroplan page, so neither is asserted here (see data quality notes).

Frequently asked questions