mrships

Where; ORD to MAD on AA or One Wold

When: I need to be in Madrid Monday evening April 10th (I can depart as early as April 7th)

Return: April 13th after 7pm (don’t need to be back at ORD until April 15th)
Cost: $1050 but willing to spend up to $1600 to build a MR/mileage accumulation

Note: my dates of departure and return are flexible and looking to the team of experts to help me build creative routing

Thank you

SpammersAreScum

So, your goal is to maximize RDM (and therefore EQD), rather than EQM? If you're flying AA-marketed, then of course no amount of "creative routing" is going to change the RDM/EQD earned.

Staying under $1600 almost certainly means flying Econ, and discount at that. The earnings on partner-marketed flights in those fare classes is low enough that in this case you'll probably be better off sticking to AA-marketed if you can.

A little poking around in GF tells me that anything ex-ORD in the under-$2k range involves BA/IB-marketed but EI-operated flights, which don't earn.

From DFW, though, there are AA/BA options -- no EI involvement -- at $1000-1200 depending on use of LHR or not; for example, DFW-LHR-MAD-LHR-DFW is $1166, 11046 mi -> 2762 RDM if you buy BA-marketed, and maybe close to 5000 AA-marketed.

Maybe there's a BA/IB-marketed routing, not using EI, which doesn't jack up the price, but either uses a higher fare class or doubles the distance, but I'm not expert enough to find it.

If you spend another $300 before taxes on ORD-DFW-ORD, that adds 1500 RDM. (All RDM numbers before status bonus, of course.)

Another option to consider is AAVacations. You'll probably find something earning 50% rather than 25%, which would beat the AA earning but not by much. Coincidentally, it was just noted that MAD is a good destination for this. Have a look.

fedechat

Buy O/W to MIA, then buy a R/T from MIA to MAD for $500~600, lot of options are available and the return you can do an stopover in ORD.

mrships

I now have a spend of $2,700 MAD from ORD and back. New to arrive by Monday April 10th by 10PM but can depart as early as Friday 4/7. Return to ORD from 4/14 to 4/16. My goal is to maintain my EXP status for next year. AA metal so I can use my SWU's.

Thank you.

fedechat

To be more specific, you need to 2,700 EQDs right? and how many EQMs do you need?

mrships

Hi,

I would like to max out the EQMs

nk15

One idea is to do ORD-EZE and EZE-MAD on separate nested tickets, for $2700, all AA metal, if you feel adventurous and can make the dates/times work.

https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...-15;a=ONEWORLD

https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...-13;a=ONEWORLD

Another option is YYZ-MAD in premium economy with BA for $1500.
Or YVR-MAD for about the same price.

https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...=ONEWORLD;eo=e

nk15

Ok, I found the best deal for you, which you may even improve further.

1. Book a rt ORD-MAD for about $1k, and you only use the outbound (throw way the inbound or leave it open for future use). Try to make distant connections on the outbound, via DFW or even force more connections to maximize EQMs.
https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...=ONEWORLD;eo=e

2. Book a separate MAD-CAI one way with RJ for $260.
https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...t=o;a=ONEWORLD

3. Book CAI-ORD in Business! for $1k, this will rack up a lot of EQMs and EQDs, as it connects (backtracks) through AMM.
https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...c=b;a=ONEWORLD

Damn, that's how you do it, baby!

Another variation of this is you book the return part via OTP for $1500 roundtrip in business, which allows you all AA coded flights for 2x EQMs (or you can book all BA coded for same price to maximize EQDs and RDMs). AND of course you should save the return ORD-OTP in J for future use, do not throw away!!!

https://www.google.com/flights/?f=0#...5-27;sc=b;a=AA

I am jealous of these fares...Basically you capitalize on the current CAI/OTP J fares to North America....

mrships

Thank you all so very much for your help,

Now I need to learn what tools (other than GF) to use so I can do the work myself. Any guidance would be greatly appreciated.