Originally Posted by champignon

Before AS became a full member of the OW Alliance, I had "enjoyed" silver status with BA for several years. With the various changes related to Covid and its aftermath, such things as aircraft retirements (especially 747s), reduction in First Class long haul seating on BA, very rare to nonexistent opportunities to get First Class long haul award seating on BA, either through the AS or BA FF programs, my whole model of booking tickets changed in response. BA currently has a mix of a good long haul business hard product ("Club Suites") and a poor one, the old sort of Club World, aka "dormitory" configuration. I refuse to fly in the latter, and at present you could book the former and due to last minute or earlier changes of aircraft end up involuntarily in the latter/dormitory cabin. So, for the moment, I am only flying long haul 1st with BA, and the reality is that I have to buy those seats most of the time, albeit when the prices are acceptable (to me). This by default gives me gold card/OWE status with BA.

If I flew longer segments on AS than I do, and if I was looking to save money on airfares, then having status with AS (as opposed to BA) would matter to me. On a 1-2 hour flight I can tolerate the back of the plane if I choose not to pay for the front, it's just not that big of a deal to me, hence the lack of importance (to me) of AS status, with my own flying patterns. Others have different flying patterns and will make differing choices.

Originally Posted by AkGirl59

I remember how appreciative I was during Covid times, to have additional chances to retain status. ~J.