Hi, I have been a loyal flyer of American Airlines for many years, but now wish to "look around" and see if I have been missing out on anything!

I have found, with much excitement, that the OnePass program has a very generous reward chart. For example, flying from the States to Asia costs only 50k miles, as opposed to 70K on AA Partner, CX. AA itself only flies to NRT at 50K.

As I will be flying a lot between Canada and Europe/Asia within the next few years, I wish to select the FF program that best suits my needs, and at this time it seems that OnePass is a good choice.

How is CO's network to Europe and Asia? And is NorthWest WorldPerks membership somehow equivalent to and interchangeable with OnePass since they are rather close partners?

With AA Platinum, what's the likelihood of getting comped on CO? I want to transfer all my flights to CO immediately, and not have to start from scratch.

Thanks for any help!
Maple

I just made the switch myself.
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum20/HTML/002057.html

I'm plat on AA and CO comped me gold in a matter of hours. CO's upgrade program far exceeds AA's. I just got an email confirming my upgrade for a flight tomorrow. I didn't have to ask for it and it didn't cost me any miles or coupons, they just did it. Enjoy!

If upgrade awards on international flights are important to you, it's probably OnePass' achilles heel. Other than that, OnePass is a great program.

There have been endless discussions about the international upgrade issue here but the long and short of it is that you can't confirm upgrades on international flights prior to 30 days in advance of departure, and in general they are very tightly controlled.

Regarding the difference between OnePass and WorkldPerks, they're pretty small.

I'd suggest a search on either of theses two topics for more information. They've both been discussed many times.

If you are a plat on AA then CO will make you a Pat on Co.

I have tried CO and am now looking to try AA. ALthough, I am not interested in awards so to speak, more on international upgrades based on FF level.

No. AA's Platinum is mid-tier equivalent to CO Gold.

Between NW WorldPerks and CO OnePass, I have found out a major advantage in the former.

All qualifying flights on many partner airlines (including Alitalia) go towards elite qualification, very much like the OneWorld network. On OnePass, all flights have to be either CO, NW or codeshares with CO flight numbers. I project to fly a lot on Alitalia, so I must favour WP over OP.

Award travel and elite benefits are equivalent for both programs. Finally, NW has a more extensive network to Europe and Asia, compared to CO.

Thanks for all your input.
Maple

Unless you are counting the KLM codeshares with NW, CO actually has a much more extensive European route structure than NW. Most trans-Atlantic flights operate via Newark, with some service from Houston and Cleveland.

I have wondered to myself if I made the best decision to get comped with NW rather than CO. I fly primarily international to Europe and Asia.I feel that NW code share partners are very beneficial to travel many more routes than CO.

I do like the automatic domestic upgrades which I'm notified by email that they are in place. This occurs without me asking and is on cheap vacation package tickets. If DL were like that I never would have begun flying as much with NW.

It's my intention to maintain my status with DL and NW for 2001 and make my decision 1/1/02 to transfer my loyalty to NW instead of DL.I will have earned Plat with NW for this year by 4/10/01. I should have my PM status with DL for 2002 by 10/1/01.

[This message has been edited by FFAddict (edited 03-21-2001).]