Originally Posted by
njvandy
DL may be a better option in the immediate term as they will match your status but I would keep AA in mind long-term, as most people would agree that AAdvantage is a better program and seems more committed to its elite customers.
The more and more I think about it, the more I tend to lean towards this line of thought. It would seem beneficial to maintain silver or gold on DL, but it appears to me that I should strive for Plat or EPlat on AA in the long-run. Just doing a quick recap of the DL forum threads pertaining to SM devaluation can cause one to have nightmares. On the other hand, AAdvantage is the oldest and largest FFP in existence for a reason.
This all begs the question: how much effort needs to be put into booking flights during a challenge? Would you schedule the maximum number of segments or book the highest possible fare class?
Fare class appears the winner in my book. An increase in segments would contribute to an increased risk of ops or weather issues, and might not be necessary unless the increase in segments correlated to an increase in EQMs. However, full fares collect 1.5 points per EQMs, which would make it much easier to fulfill the challenge requirement.
Sorry to all for the back and forth mentality; choosing a FFP is much more difficult than I could have expected!
