SFO Lounge Access for AAdmiral's club members
 

Hello, I'm an MVPG 75K and flying AS 1-2 times a week out of SFO. Last year I actually purchased an AAdmiral's club membership instead of the Board Room since it seemed more flexible (and I could use the AAdmiral's club lounge at SFO) while still giving me good access when flying AS. I'm not flying AA much these days.

Now that it's renewal time, I'm trying to decide if given upcoming changes (Big 3 requiring same-day flights and Alaska opening their SFO lounge) make sense to switch to a BR membership (even though I'll find myself lounge-less at SFO for some undetermined period of time this year. Do we expect AS to lockout Aadmirals club members from the new Alaska lounge?

Your advice is appreciated.

Thanks!

We won't know for sure until the lounge opening date is even announced (and with Alaska's stellar timing on promises -see SQ/AL refreshes- who knows), but considering their partnership and all other ALs allow AC members in, I see no reason it would all of a sudden change. You do currently have access in SFO to the CX lounge, although you'll have to clear security twice and take the skytrain. If you do renew the AC membership, remember to look into the Executive mastercard with the 450$ fee as you will also get 10 authorized users which comes in handy. Also if you have no AA status it will be cheaper than buying the membership outright.

Only real benefit now with a AL membership is if you're MVPG+ then the membership fee is $150 less, and you have access a few other places outside of ACs. But again the AC rules will be changing Nov 1. so it will come down to your flying patterns.

Thanks for the quick reply! My concern stems from the fact that currently AA blocks access to the SFO Aadmirals club for Alaska BR members. I wonder if AS would return the favor in this case.

I'm in the lucky position of working for an employer who covers the cost of lounge membership so the cost isn't a factor.

I would highly doubt it, the best usecase is to look at LAX, which has a big AS/AA operation and you still can access the AL/AC interchangeably with the lounges being in different terminals and the AS lounge being tiny. But again, this is all speculation. Looking at the opening dates it seems AA won't fully move out of T2 until March 2020. So, speculatively, worst case scenario you'd be without lounge access for ~2 months that you paid for it if you bought it in the next few weeks and the AC closes at that time, which isn't to say that AS will have their lounge up either though.

I recently traveled to SFO Alaska terminal and it was so quiet and full of space I didn’t actually feel all that bitter about not having a lounge (my home base is SEA).

The Mexican restaurant was actually pretty good.

But if it’s not on your dime then I would get the AS Boardroom for your arrivals to other cities that have AS or codeshare lounges.

If you have an Alaska boarding pass and are an Admirals Club member, you should have access to the SFO AC even after 1 Nov 2019. Per AA's website, "boarding passes for same-day travel on American Airlines or partner airlines" is defined as:

https://www.aa.com/i18n/travel-info/...lub-access.jsp

American Airlines will continue to allow access to AC members flying Alaska Airlines after November 1st. Nothing is changing with that regard.

I guess what I'm really saying though is that the new Board Room opening up (soon?) looks fantastic and I'd much rather have access to that than the AC. But I suppose I'll probably roll the dice that they'll let me in as an Aadmirials club member and re-up one more time.

Other than having access to SFO AC, what is the benefit of having an AC membership over a AS Lounge membership? Isn't the AS membership somewhat less $$?

Your AC membership should cover both AC AND BR lounges at SFO, so there shouldn't be any gap in lounge access.

I don't think anyone here knows if AS and/or AA will change their policy; obviously no such change has been announced. But to me, it seems more likely that AA will stop blocking AS lounge members' access to the Admirals Club in SFO than the other way around. For AA but not AS to have a lounge AS lounge members can use in AS's hub is not tenable; the lounge capacity compared to the passenger capacity on the two airlines is too out of balance. But once AS does their part by having a lounge of their own in SFO, there shouldn't be a particularly egregious imbalance like there is now (and AA won't be in the AS terminal, though I can't remember if or how much overlap there will be) so I think there's a decent chance reciprocal access will resume, like at LAX.

But again, that's pure speculation.

It kinda makes sense that right now they don't offer reciprocal lounge access at SFO between the two lounges because AS uses the Cathay Pacific Lounge. But once AS has their own lounge, it wouldn't seem like that policy would be required anymore. They offer reciprocal lounge access at LAX & JFK after all.

That being said, obscure and obsolete rules get left on the books all the time because inaction is always easier than action :)

The bigger issue was AS use to operate out of Intl A, and then with the VX acquisition they moved most/all of their operations out of T2, which was putting a huge influx of people into the AC.