flyte

I felt this would be the best place to get an informative answer to my question.

For someone who travels 1-2x a year for pleasure, and wants to use the cards to get the 1st checked bag free, which airline card / loyalty program would be better to have long-term? In terms of the following:

1. This is probably opening a can of worms, but which airline has better planes and better service overall? I'll only be flying coach.
2. Which program is easier to earn miles and in which ones are the miles worth more? Which one would give me more bang for the buck?
3. United Priority boarding vs AA Group 1 boarding. Is one better?

Thanks!

PS. I can't get CSP for another couple of years of so because of the 5/24 rule. I'm aware of the primary CDW with United Explorer.
PPS. I don't know if hub matters, but I'm going to be in Milwaukee for another year or so, and then relocate to one of the coasts.

sdsearch

Well, on the one hand, United has the worst reputation of the majors for service reliability in recent years (since its semi-botched merger with Continental). On the other hand, it has way higher a percentage of planes with Economy Plus than AA has of planes with Main Cabin Extra (if using extra legroom seats for a price is important to you).

Award availability on both is tricky to generalize, because it very much depends on the routes, whether you're more concerned with using the fewest miles vs paying the least in fees, etc, etc. (The latter applies to international award travel, not to domestic award travel.)

Plus, things are constantly changing. AA just announced a bunch of changes for 2016 and 2017, including to award charts. United last changed their award charts a couple years ago, so they might them again right around the time you've accumulated some miles. Trying to gauge who's better on anything except "right at this second' is very difficult, but of course building up miles takes time and so if you don't the miles yet, the redemptions will be in the future, not "right at this second".

On thing of note: Cit not having anything like 5/24, you can apply for more different Citi AA cards than at Chase, where if you lave out UR cards there aren't nearly as many Chase United cards that earn signup bonus miles. At Citi, you can get 50k from a Citi AA Plat personal, 50k from a Citi AA Plat business, 25 from a Citi AA Gold personal, and 50k from a Citi AA Executive (though you'll pay very high non-waived annual fee for the latter). At Chase, I think there's only the personal and business United Explorer cards, and that's it, unless you add UR cards. (IIRC, the United Club cards, which are their closest equivalent to AA Executive cards, don't have big signup bonuses of redeemable miles.)

flyte

Thank you! I guess I haven't thought about churning. I usually just get a card and keep it open for years. Leg room also isn't a big factor for me I guess. But I didn't know United had a worse reputation than AA in the reliability department! Clearly I don't fly enough!

garykung

Neither.

AA miles are easier to earn. At the minimum, Citi offers a variety of products to earn AA miles, including banking account (opening bonus only). On the other hand, Chase's offer is really limited.

UA miles are worth more. UA miles is not about the cost, but its ability to redeem in the last minute.

AA miles will give you more bang for the buck for now. But after 03/26/16, they are all about the same.

UA. None of them gives you the true "priority" boarding. UA mixes credit card customers with the lower-tiered elite (which has pissed many elite). AA put credit card customers in front of the general boarding. So UA, in some sense, has provided "priority".

flyte

Very valuable info, thank you. I also noticed SPG Amex transfers 1:1 to AA and 2:1 to United making me think United may be more valuable (or Amex doesnt have the best relationship with UA).


This is also very useful. Thank you.

Are they getting devalued on 3/26/16? Are the award charts changing? Curious. Also wonder if AA will be added as a transfer partner to Citi's TY cards if that's the case.

mia

UA miles are harder to earn with credit cards, but that doesn't make them more valuable when redeemed.

The Starwood Preferred Guest credit card earns Starpoints. These are automatically deposited in your Starwood hotels account. When you transfer to an airline you are transferring hotel points, not credit card points. The contract between Starwood and the various airlines determines the transfer ratio. American Express is not involved.

flyte

I'm learning a lot here! Thanks mia.

sdsearch

Actually you don't need to fly more to know such things, you just to read more. I know about UA's reliability because it's been both all over FlyerTalk and all over any business press that covers airlines (on and off, since the UA/CO merger of a few years ago). It was all over the business press* recently, in fact, when UA changed CEO's a few months ago.

I haven't flown UA since the UA/CO merger either. I've used UA miles since, but only for partner redemptions.

* By business press, I don't mean special publications necessarily, but you need to be glancing at the business section for any stories dealing with airlines. They're not likely to be in the main section, or on the TV news headlines.

flyte

So I guess there isn't one good major airline an infrequent traveler could stick with!

But it's also hard to ignore the benefit of the free checked bag! If only the Ritz card with the $300 incidentals refund had better benefits, I'd just get that instead (as tortuous as that logic may sound).

deltame

If you only fly 1 or 2 times (round trip) each year, your saving from "free" checked bag benefit is approximately $50 to $100 per year (assume a $25 fee for 1st bag) ~~ why would it attract you to maintain an $95 annual fee credit card? Sure, you get annual fee wavier for the first year but you'll likely pay the annual fee in subsequent years (especially UA as its rare for Chase to offer such retention).

One benefit of an AA card, is that you get 10% of the miles back if you redeemed AA miles for award travel -- albeit its capped at 10K miles each year.

iKacper

I think beyond what people have mentioned previously with regards to point values and benefits, a good thing to consider is where you fly from. Obviously, all things being equal, it is worth sticking with one airline, and if your home airport (or the places you wish to travel to) are more United-centered, vs American-centered, this should be part of your decision.

In my case, I find that United tends to have more convenient schedules and flights to the places I choose to fly. (Not based on any actual data or anything, just general feeling developed over many years) This is why I have the United Mileage Plus Explorer card. The lounge access and checked bag is worthless if American had more convenient/cheaper flights, especially if you don't travel so often.

xxxxxxx

Good luck.