(1) home airport - MXP and GVA

(2) miles flown each year & in what class? - 200,000 in business

(3) types of fares bought - discount business

(4) choice of airlines/cabins. work and/or pleasure? - always my choice for both work and pleasure

(5) routes flown most often - HKG/GVA on RJ, MXP/LHR/HKG on BA - MXP/LHR/MIA on BA - MXP/MAD/LAX on IB

(6) current FFP status - BA - GOLD/EMERALD, UA - 1K (dropping UA altogether), BD - highest, A3 - (considering using them for Star)

(7) What is most important to you in a FFP? good award redemption rates, ease of redemption (unlike BA)

(8) Preferred Airlines - BA, CX, LX

So here is my dilemma, I am BA gold but after all the changes with AVIOS, it seems like I have to pay 9000 more miles for a business flight back to my home airport. I think this is highly unacceptable.

My question is would be better off going with AA? I never fly them except for trips like MIA/PLS for work and PLS/LAX, always in paid business or first. I find that AA codeshares with BA are on the whole usually $500.00 more expensive that just booking straight BA flights.

One of the big things that attracted me to the AAdvantage program was RDM bonuses for Oneworld flights based on status. This means that if I fly business class from LAX to NRT on JL in business class even booked as JL flight number, I would get 5500 miles, plus 25% COS bonus, plus 100% Executive Platinum bonus. Please correct me if I am wrong but if this is the case, then this program beats BA hands down.

Thanks so much for this Sticky. Its what i've been looking for.