Credit Card Programs - aa citicard or thank you card(fee or no)

I have a aa gold card I have been using since 03, now I see a premier pass? card is available with TY points. is it better than what I have? I could not get any FF seats for our annual trip to the Caribbean, even tho I started 6 months ahead of time. We charge everything we can, but it takes about 15 months to get the 30000 points it takes to get the one "free" seat that we like to use. BTW we now have 60K points since we couldnt "score" this season.
In short we charge EVERYTHING possible, food, gas, Dr.bills, phone, internet service,restaurant meals, etc. Should we change to the new citi card? If so , should we go to the no fee or the $75 "premiun "one with a higher redemption for money charged.
Thanks

It depends on how much you fly. The best benefit from the premierpass card is that you can match your spending points with flight points. If you just want to get thankyou points but don't fly that much, you might be better off getting the diamond preferred card (5 points on everyday items) and/or the professional card (3 points at restaurants).

Also, keep in mind that the reward levels are higher for thankyou points than airline FF programs. Caribbean costs 40,000 points in thankyou network right now.

You may be better off switching to the starwood amex. 1 starpoint per dollar spent on the card, and the points can be converted to aa miles at a 1:1.25 ratio, once you accumulate 20k points.

wow, thought Caribbean was 25-30000 TY points like AA awards. we ONLY fly to the Caribbean ONCE a year for about 2 weeks, and turn in 30k aa points for 1 ff seat as we dont accumulate enough for 2. This year we couldnt even get 1 seat....guess I will have to check into the others as we dont travel any other places for work or pleasure.

the starwood amex is probably your best bet. since it converts 1.25:1 to most ff programs (except UA and CO), you could check availability first and then transfer the points once you find a ticket. the annual fee on the spg card is only $30 (vs. $50 on the citi aa gold card), and the spg card doesn't cap out at 60,000 like the citi aa card.

http://www.starwoodhotels.com/preferredguest/starpoints/transfer/airline_partner_list.html

To me the Premier Pass card is the best since you can earn 2 TY points per dollar spent on general (non gas/grocery/etc) purchases with matching flight points. No other card offers that.

To me the Premier Pass card is the best since you can earn 2 TY points per dollar spent on general (non gas/grocery/etc) purchases with matching flight points. No other card offers that.

I agree it's great if you fly a lot, and the lack of blackout dates on the TY points makes them quite valuable for some. However, the OP said in his reply that he only flies once a year, so premierpass is not the card for him.