Boston based flyer - need your wisdom!
 

Hello, I've lurked for some time and will be starting to fly quite a bit for work and pleasure. I would be interested in hearing your thoughts on the best program for me.

Background:
- Will be flying around 75-100k miles a year
- BOS is my home airport
- most segments will be east coast/canada (business)
- most miles will come from MRs/Leisure trip/s to Asia and Europe (play)
- point wise, I have a couple hundred K miles at both AA and UAL, but no current status (expired a couple years ago when not traveling)
- new to BOS, so not sure what the best MR here are
- favorite cities to fly to (Asia): SIN, BKK; (North Amer): LAS, LAX, SFO; (Europe): UK, Italy, France;


What I'm looking for:
- primarily use points/status for a decent shot at upgrades, including intl. flights
- leg room when in economy
- stability/health of program
- Availability of mileage runs/deals
- quality of lounges and service
- little to no BS charges to book alliance flights, upgrades, etc
- less important, but important is the ease of booking alliance rewards

obviously AA and UAL are the front runners due to size, but I'm open to a foreign programs in either OW or SA alliance.

What I would like to hear is what you would recommend and why (based on the above).

Thanks and I look forward to your response!

My hometown (not current unfortunately) is Boston and I have to say I'm envious! With that being said, my recommendation would be AA. You said you already have miles booked with them, and they do fly to the majority of your popular destinations. Since you fly 75k-100k I would recommend taking the Plat challenge (If you can get the 10k points within the time allotted) to give yourself back some status instead of slowly climbing through Gold and then Plat after 50k miles. Once you get status picking exit rows in coach is enough leg room for most folks. I'm 6'1" and have plenty of legroom in an exit row in coach. If you can hit EXP (100k miles in a year) you should have a great shot of hitting domestic upgrades (assuming you don't have too many last minute bookings) which will be free for yourself. As Plat and higher using OW clubs is FANTASTIC when traveling internationally. Additionally, getting those SWU's once you hit EXP are great to have to use on yourself or friends/family for international flights. Lastly, being in BOS sets you up for the potential of great MR's to SFO. Again, AA is just my personal recommendation.

I agree with Zantaine. We have had a good deal of luck getting award travel on OW partner Iberia from BOS to MAD and using MAD as a gateway to other continents, although they don't fly the route every day. It is disappointing, though, that the only award travel to London is on AA, with no access to the BA flights.

Take a look at Aeroplan. award redemption looks low.
Beyond that I'd go UAL since you already have miles and they seems the best fit airline wise for you and via the *Alliance you have access to just about everywhere you'd want to go...with fair mileage earning on partners. I think OW's biggest kink in the system is mileage accrual on partners and blocking of routes..ie US-lHR

Zantaine-- yes, I'm going to be starting the plat challenge once the date rolls over to 6/15 given where we are in the year. No worries about that, I'll easily have 25K+ EQPs over the next 2-3 months. Also good point on the exit rows, I'm happy with exit row seating on on both UAL/AA. More to my concern is I've seen very tightly booked flights transcon/overseas, and dont want anything less than an exit row. I was a plat on AA several years ago and I didn't recall many upgrades and even when i put in for upgrades with my 500 miles coupons, it was very much a long shot as a plat. Do the odds swing in my favor substantial or if I hit the Exec Plat?

Milesmark- thanks for the idea. Once thing that I have a concern over with AA is coverage in APAC. Perhaps that is because I normally fly across the pacific and not via the atlantic (not a fan of Cathay for economy).

Armattheus - yes, from a routing perspective UAL and *A flights fit great. On the downside, the influx of continental FF does concern me as upgrades, reward seats, etc were a challenge before let alone after the merger. Also, from Boston, AA seems to have a few more MR options.

One idea I'm toying with is maintain both AA Plat and UAL Plat Exec. I can probably swing doing the miles/segments for both at the 50k/yr level with a little effort. I've got to weigh that against going for 1K or Exec Plat by concentrating on one.

I would go with United and while they do *Net blocking, the flights to Europe and the west cost are more available than AA in my opinion. There are 2 LH flights a day, one Swiss and you can get to the left coast in E+, as well. Its not perfect.

Alternatively, you can maintain 50K levels on both this upcoming year and see how the merger goes.

I'm US Plt and am considering switching to United... the only advantage to US is you can book most *A Euro trips cheap if you use the ANA tool! The domestic redemption stinks!

Why would US trips trips to Europe on *A be any cheaper than lets say a membership on UAL? I'm guessing because US's penchant for miles promos... Also, I would assume the same logic would carry over to US booking cheap trips to Asia using the ANA tool?

When i was PLT i got some of my upgrades, as EXP i get upgrades almost all the time, unless i book last minute on busy commuter flight or take a different flight standby. This year i got 12 SWU's and i'm not even sure i'll be able to use them all.

For me AA becomes a wonderful domestic airline once you're EXP. For long haul's i prefer partners unless i plan on using my SWU's. LAN is better for Y tickets to latin america, etc..

Ditto that. If you can only make 1 top tier outa BOS, I would vote AA. Which ever way you go, for long haul's that advice applies for either *A or OW, our foreign partner carriers know how to take care of business.