Hi,

I am an AA Exec Platinum and am totally fed up with AA (old crappy planes, pretzels in first class, no direct flights to anywhere I fly don't get me started)

Anyway will CO match my AA Elite status if I switch my allegience?

Welcome to FlyerTalk.

CO is known to comp a warm body (or even a cold one) much less somebody with the highest status at AA so I would think your a lock to get Plat.

You will love the clean planes and the comp upgrades. But you will be required to keep reading here to learn the ropes of One Pass. Welcome to the club.

Wow I am new to flyertalk, thanks for the prompt response. I will be calling CO shortly

Welcome to CO/OnePass!

I think generally you will find a superior experience to AA, particularly on your domestic travels, and particularly if you are comped to Platinum.

The one main issue with OP is the difficulty/expense of obtaining international upgrades, but that gap has narrowed somewhat with the recent changes to AAdvantage.

In terms of international premium class travel, CO BusinessFirst beats AA Business by a mile, and the only drawback in a comparison to AA First is the lack of truly flat/horizontal sleeper seats. But given AA doesn't even offer FC on that many routes anymore, it isn't such a big deal.

About two weeks ago, I wrote to CO to get comped to Plat, and they comped me to Plat. I used the following from a post as a guide:

Continental

Will match status, generally to equivalent level up to Platinum (top tier)

They seem concerned about fraud, so require a bunch of information:
A copy of your current elite status card.
A copy of your latest elite statement.
A copy of your current One Pass Membership Card.
A copy of your current One Pass statement.

Along with a note explaining you'd like to shift your busy to them if they'll match your current status.

Mail To:
Continental Airlines
One Pass Service Center
Attn: One Pass Match Program
P O Box 4365
Houston, TX 77210-4365

The key is that your EQM on the AA statement must be over 75K for them to comp you to Plat.

I find CO to be far superior in BF and Coach to AA.

You don't mention where you are based or what your normal flying pattern is. Check your routes and make sure you won't be stuck on RJs too often.

As someone who is AA EXECPlat and CO Plat I wonder is this the right thing to do. No VIP upgrades in CO and, depending on your regular routes, domestic ones can be harder too.

On comparable domestic routings I have much higher upgrade success with AA than CO.

Now, once you are up there, CO is a good bit nicer

I am very mobile and temporarily reside in Las Vegas. I fly all over the US, including to quite remote places (flying to Eureka, CA this week, Thu, upon my return trip from Buffalo, Tue-Wed) and that is an advantage of AA as they do seem to have a lot of flights. I mostly fly to NYC and prefer LGA to EWR for proximity but AA has no direct NY-LAS flight and two crappy segments on AA can kill ya. I swear if I see the same "CBS eye on american" 5 times a week (their MD80 no video and I don't know what's better no videe or repeats of that)

I fly 5-6 times a year to Europe mostly Zurich/Geneva, Swiss/AA share code is great as lots of flights and you can get on Swiss metal which is SO MUCH better than AA 767s. I also fly 3-4 times a year to Tel-Aviv and CO's direct from EWR is a blessing.

Sorry I don't now what a VIP upgrade is.

Any chance of getting a COMP on the presidents club? (I paid the Admirals $400 already)

THANKS, loving this site

Newbie

....enjoy!

I cannot help but observe the phenomena of gushing praise of CO from people with less than 100 post counts (very often less than 10) but only a relative few seem to survive in CO to reach a high post count.

I wonder why that is.

I do have a few theories....

What planet am I on?