Originally Posted by
ashill
I wouldn’t look so much at the redemption side as the earning side to compare the value of crediting to AS vs crediting to AA. In AS’s program, you earn miles as a multiple of miles flown (a multiple that is always at least one for AS-marketed flights but can be much less than one for partner-marketed flights). In AA’s program, when flying AA, you earn “miles” as a multiple of dollars spent. That can result in wildly different earnings, far more different than the 10% difference in redemption cost you mentioned above. So I’d do your best to compare earnings in Mileage Plan to earnings in AAdvantage based on flights you’re likely to fly.
I would agree with this, but status bonuses are a huge part of earning on both airlines, especially with high status. And AS has made extremely difficult to earn high level status if you don't live in a place that is served well by AS.
I would continue to credit everything to AS if I could maintain my 75k status (and maybe try to keep AA EXP with partner spend alone) but I don't see how I can fly 12 AS metal segments in a year (never mind 24 segments for 100k). Once you lose that status bonus, the earning side does not look as good any more. It's hard to believe that you will get better value crediting to AS with no status bonus than you will crediting to AA with a 120% EXP bonus.
Plus if you don't have AS status and you are crediting to them, you don't get free checked bags, you aren't on the upgrade list, and can't pick MCE seats for free (and paying for MCE every flight adds up really fast). Plus with AA status you can pay for basic economy and still enjoy all those benefits.