UA Fan

LAX looks like a focus city, so it might work. My wife used to work in PHX, I am based in DFW and my parents are in PHL. I used to make frequent weekend trips to these places. So I paid for a one-way flight to PHX on a Fri evening and then booked a one-way award from PHX-PHL with a stop in DFW. As there are no non-stops between PHL & PHX, DFW is a reasonable connecting point.

I flew PHX-DFW on Sun evening and a few weekends later flew DFW to PHL on a Fri eveing. My return was also a BA award from PHL-PHX with a stop in DFW. Did the PHL-DFW on Sun evening and DFW-PHX a few Fridays later. The same with the return from PHX on Sun. So with 25K miles I made two trips (PHL & PHX).

If flying from one hub to another, you might even be able to stop in non-AA hub cities. E.g., aa.com shows JFK-LAX shows some routes thru places like LAS, which is not an AA hub. You might even be able to get that. One of the benefits from flying from a hub to another hub. I have not tried that, but it looks reasonable. With AS if you fly from DFW to FAI, as.com shows some of the routes that go thru SEA,PDX,ANC, so I think if you mention that as.com shows this route, you can stop in three places. The key is to ask for a reasonable route. You prolly cannot do JFK-DFW-PHL.

Cons of BA are that you cannot make any changes (incl a date change, or even if you pay a fee) to an itin within 24 hrs of the first segment. E.g., if the first segment is on Aug 2, 4PM, you cannot make any changes to any part of the entire itin after Aug 1, 4PM That is why I book one-ways always, so that even after I start the outbound, I can still change the return. Twenty four hours before the first segment you can only make date changes, and not routing and this costs $70ish if done over the phone, but free online. The mileage redeposit fee is low at $70 though.

Note you will have to book these flights over the phone, as ba.com is not able to book aa awards with stopovers. If you ask politely, you can get the phone fee waived.

Also the 25K domestic awards are to be used only on one airline i.e. AA or AS. You can mix both, but the miles required will be higher as BA will use a distance based award chart. BA has different award charts for the number of carriers you use.