Should I switch to AAdvantage? Thoughts please
 

Dear veterans of MPO:

Currently my job allows me 55,000 miles travel per year. I've always been given the cold shoulder by MPO that refuse to upgrade me to Gold, and recently I've been reading how AA has a better mileage reward (such as 135,000 for First class!) Thus I want to check with you guys if I switched to AA - which lands me Platinum (One World Sapphire), would that be better for me?

Some awesome benefits I saw:

1) 500 miles upgrade with Full Y fare (Y is what my company pays for)
2) 100% elite mileage bonus
3) Pretty much all the benefits of One World Sapphire

Just want to know if MPO members here can correct me on what I may be missing if I stay with MPO. Thanks!

one thing to note is that, full Y (and all J/F fares) would actually earn you 1.5 points per mile. you can get Platinum for either 50,000 miles or 50,000 points, and Executive Platinum for 100,000 miles or 100,000 points.

so, your 55,000 miles of full Y flying would actually get you 82,500 points already. you only need 66,667 miles of full Y or J/F fares to get 100,000 points and you'll then be oneworld Emerald and get F check-in / F lounge access / etc.

that's exactly what I did, when back a few years ago my annual flying was more around the 70-90k miles range (but all in full Y or J), and so it's enough for CX Gold, or AA Exec Plat. I opted for AA Exec Plat for the F check-in and lounge access (besides the 100% mileage bonus etc of course).

Will your company be paying Full fare economy class for you even if it it international travel? Sometimes Y class is almost in the same fare level as the discounted business class.

If no, only a small portion of the economy class with CX can earn you AA mile.

For most US residents, the AA programme is much better. You can get 1.5 EQP per base mile on full fare Y and above. You can get elite bonus miles. Once a while they have some other offers such as AADER and DBEQM. You can take a Platinum Challenge and become a PLAT in one trip.

If you can close to but cannot make MPC Gold, AA Plat should be a very good alternative.

Ok, thanks for the inputs. Will decide whether or not to switch. I've been loyal to Cathay but AA seems to offer better and better program...

Once you join AA you can do a platinum challenge and make platinum level quickly. you still have to build up 100,000 mile or points to get to Executive Platinum. If you go the AA forum they have all the details on platinum challenges.

I was actually somewhat in your shoes last year and is in the transitioning stage this year. Travel is usually 75000-80000 miles per year. So by the end of this year, my CX GLD and AA GLD become AA EXP because of DBEQM.

For 1) The 500 miles only apply on US/Canada/Caribbean routes so this highly depends on where your based.

As well, you'll have to make sure your company buys you Y/B/H fare. Good things for AA is their mileage is quite redeemable on AA, their accumlation rate is better and they do provide Original routing credit. Bad for AA is you'll have to pay for admiral club, good investment to have if your fly their routes, and service can be hit or miss. All in All, it comes to down to where your-based and what your most frequent routes are. The benefits are only as good if you can actually use them, which for most AA members included myself will be the sticker upgrades.

If OP cannot get to CX Gold, he will not have access to AC based on status. So if OP likes to have AC accesses on domestic itinerary, he will have to buy an AC membership anyway.

The cost for AC membership is lower for AA elites.

Despite this whole AA EXP thing bothering me as a CX DM (AA EXPs seem to fill up the HK F lounge when many CX DMs fly double or triple what they do to achieve similar status - and sometimes spend far more, upwards of 3-4x), you have every incentive to. You can't achieve GO on CX (also surprised they didn't bump you up with 55k), when you definitely will make OW Sapphire and possibly even OW Emerald becoming AA EXP if you fly enough full-fare Y or J. No need to be "loyal" to the program if you're going to be stuck on SL, especially given the enormous mileage benefits of the AA program versus CX.

Also, if your company is paying full Y on international flights, the mileage upgrade on flights to Asia will be low on AA (15k miles each way, I think, with no co-pay).

Unfortunately it seems that OP often flies CX to Asia.

and if you indeed can get to EXP, you'll get 8 one-way VIP upgrades. if you can use them, of course it's good; if you can't, I think you can exchange them on coupon connection too, usually each could be worth 20-30k miles (at least as of a couple of years ago, not sure now)...

so you're in effect, for say 67k miles you fly each year, getting 8 x 20-30k + 67k (100% bonus) + 67k (base miles) = 300-380k miles worth of awards...so it could be like a 400-500% mileage bonus...

(but of course to do coupon connection you'll need to have mutual needs of some awards at the same time, it's not like a simple transfer of miles)

One other thing that AAdvantage has going for it is that miles don't expire as long as you have some type of activity in your account every 18 months (airline, credit card, bonus from staying at hotel et al).

The Platinum Challenge used to be free, but in the past year or so AA now charges a fee to take it.

Entry to Admirals Club is gratis as long as you are on an int'l itinerary. You could have several stops domestically, but as long there is an int'l portion to it, they will let you in.

Four 500-mile upgrade vouchers are given for every 10,000 flown miles. These actually come in handy if you have to fly in the domestic network. In addition, these vouchers don't expire (unlike the system-wide upgrades) and can be used as long as you remain an elite member.

I think AA is the superior program (well, for me at least). The only weakness compared with CX Gold is that CX Gold has higher priority in operational upgrades. As an AA Platinum (OW Sapphire member), the number of opups I've received since CX re-did the pecking order a year or so ago has dropped dramatically. Of course, YMMV.

Not quite a disadvantage - I have not had an upgrade on AA yet as a DM. At least AA PLAT/EXP can still get op-up on CX.

Well QRC3288, what in your mind do you believe they or their employer should spend before achieving OW EM seeing I'm joining the ranks of AA EXP next year. Of course I could try to keep the AA Plt and CX Gld (both OW SP) during conflicting period, only one as OW SP and the other program OW RB either AA or CX, but what good would that do other than 2 guest in J class lounge and free AA domestic lounge access? Shouldn't people look for the program that rewards them the most even though qualifications for each one is different. In the case of the OP, AA Plt>CX Slv, mine AA Exp>AA Plt, CX Gld