TAB_Geneva

End of this year I will be relocating from Europe to New York City. I am currently SEN at LH/Swiss and Executive Club Gold with BA. For my new job, I will probably have 5-8 trips/year to Europe and 2-3 trips/year to Asia and a few trips to the West Coast.
Wondering whether I should try requesting a status match for my BA Gold with UA and for my LH Sen with AA and distribute trips among the two. Any experiences whether a cross alliance status is even possible (the status match thread wasn't that clear about it.
Or should I focus all on AA, assuming they have better connections from NYC airports than UA?

emma dog

Welcome to FT!

With your TATL travel, why not just stick with BA and/or LH? If you're going to Asia, skip AA and go with UA.

FYI... UA and CO are merging, so if EWR is viable, then UA >>> AA in terms of overall flight options.

danpeake

And with the TATL BA/Iberia/AA "merger" approval, you'll soon be able to earn BA miles on AA flights. Just stick with BA.

SteveinA2

I think the advice to stick with BA could be flawed

If you can choose carriers and fly F or J then I agree BA is probably as good a choice as you avoid re qualification and there are few benefits to being AA Exp platinum that you don't get on a F ticket

If you have to fly Y then AA would give you 8 System wide upgrades once you have 100,000 miles which you should easily reach on your trips.

If you have to fly Y domestically then I'd go AA too. I imagine 6 hours to LAX is not much fun in Y and you won't get upgraded as BA Gold

All the advice may become meaningless if the FF programs are changed later this year, so I'd hold off on the decision.

emma dog

I guess I'm thinking the OP would be using UA/CO from EWR or JFK to the West Coast and Asia. They could also use UA/CO to Europe. On the off chance they wanted to fly BA/IB/AA TATL, they could maintain BA for the time being until the merger/antitrust worked itself out.

mvoight

Unless your employer has a corporate agreement, AA won't do a status match.
Whether or not AA is the best option for you depends on personal tastes, and where you are flying. if you maintain elite status on BA, you will have OW lounge access even for domestic flights on AA. As noted, AA will give you 8 confirmed system wide upgrades and unlimited domestic upgrades. I don't know what BA gives you for the same status. I just did a status match on UA and I know they also have free domestic upgrades, but I don't know how hard they are to get. If your destinations are easily covered by OW, then I think it is easier to earn benefits on AA than BA. I don't think the majority of responses you may get in this forum are going to be pro-AA.

AAerSTL

Welcome to FT. You've come to the right place. Currently, AA has significantly more service in NYC than UA however all bets are off with the UA/CO merger. CO doesn't serve JFK altogether, and has a very small presence at LGA with flights to IAH and Express flights to CLE. UA on the other hand has a decent presence at EWR and LGA; however JFK is only their p.s. service to the West coast and UAX to IAD.

Depending on your Asia travel needs, AA only serves Tokyo-Narita (and soon Handea) from JFK while CO serves places like Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Delhi, Mumbai, and more in Europe. AA is increasing its presence in the NYC market and the new ATI with BA/IB should also open up new options.

i_fly_AA

Like someone else already said, I think that if you'll be traveling in paid business or first class, then stick with BA, since you'll be able to travel AA across the atlantic and earn miles, as well as redeem miles on AA flights across the atlantic. And for travel to asia, you'll be able to fly AA or CX or JL from NYC and earn BA miles. If you're mainly going to be flying on economy fares, then I'd suggest switching to AA, mainly because of excellent award availability and the 8 yearly systemwide upgrades.

All American Flyer

If your travel policy doesn't allow First/Business domestically then I would suggest going with AA (If you're BA Gold/LH Senator then I assume you fly F/J internationally). Flying coach domestically is such a hassle.

If you get to fly First domestically then having BA Gold will save you the trouble of buying an Admiral's Club membership and will give you access to the Flagship Lounges even while flying domestically (there's one in JFK so even if you're just flying to BOS for the day, you'll be able to use the FL). As others said, if you're already flying First/Business Class, there's not much that elite status on AA can do for you.

Nonetheless, the other thing to consider is that having AA elite status can make your personal trips much more pleasant. If you're not someone who enjoys shelling out $2000 for a domestic First Class ticket, then the upgrade benefit will really come in handy. You can also upgrade a companion. If you're traveling internationally, you also get 8 System Wide upgrades that can be used on almost all economy fares. You can give them to family/coworkers, etc if you don't need them yourself.

NA-Flyer

For the time being and until you can earn aa miles while traveling on BA directly from USA and if you want to change to AA program and still fly BA across the atalntic you can do your trip via Canada YYZ or YUL and still earn full mileage on AAadvantage

elitetraveler

1. If you can fly domestic F/J within the US, stay with your current programs. I am an LH SEN/BA Gold with the similar TATL and TPAC patterns you mention and am also NY based. There is no reason to switch to a US program unless you need domestic upgrades.

Also, your BA Gold gets you AC/FL lounge access on AA (a $450 value) and Club access on CO, UA and US (they each charge about $400 for club access) and both come in handy for my domestic/Canadian/Mexico travel.

dsg10715

Agreed, plus if you runshort one year you canhit a coupe mileage runa as an AA elite as opposed to spending tons of cash as a ba member to move up the ladder.

TAB_Geneva

Thank you very much to all of you for your quick and detailed advice. Given most my travel will be intercontinental in C/J Ill probably stick with what I have with LH and BA and endure coach on the few domestic flights I'll be doing...

NA-Flyer

You may take adavntage of your status with LH and fly UA domestically as UA will offer you upgrade vouchers that can be purchased on check in and can upgrade you to first class on domestic flights.

elitetraveler

Are these the standard .bomb upgrade offers when you check-in? How do the vouchers work?