I have been a loyal member of BA using them exclusively for transatlantic and inter European travel now for the past two decades. For my money they are the best airline in the world (and I have done the majority of my miles in economy, some biz class travel no F travel).

I am still doing a lot of transatlantic travel and plan on doing a fair amount of travel outside the US in the next two decades to all parts of the world(between 6-8 long hauls a year) However, my home base will be in the US though not sure where yet (will likley be somewhere on the West Coast/Pacific NW).

If I flew on AA I would be an EP, or on UA I would be a 1K, but because I fly on BA cheap fares with no tier points just miles and do domestic travel on AA(very comfortable) also on cheap fares for BA miles I am still a lowley blue (blue is right ) tier BA memember and I can't even use their lounges. Also no upgrades in the mail or inflight. No bonus for earning a million miles in your account etc.

I know Merry always says that BA doesn't much care for people like me who pay for these discount tickets and I don't blame them as we are not that great a source of revenue but given what I could get from other airlines I am starting to wonder if I am just being stupid to stick with them.

Upgrades for domestic travel is nice but not that important to me but being able to upgrade long hauls (especially on fares cheaper than Full fare economy) is very important to me as I am starting to do US to Asia travel next year.

Would anyone care to share why they think I should switch from BA and to which Domestic carrier? Also a comparison between BA's and that carriers biz and F class service for international long hauls would be helpful as that is the product that I would be really be switching.



[This message has been edited by Mvic (edited 09-13-2000).]

Are you stupid? No. Are you wasting a lot of potential? Yep.

The advantages of UA: 1k will get you (for the time being) 3 int'l round trip upgrades from even the lowest of fares (the famed 1k Systemwides). You'll also enjoy 80-100% first class upgrades on continental US flights using certs.

See Premex's The Unofficial United Help Desk for the insider's scoop on being elite on UA.

OTOH, the last thing I need is another 1k to compete for upgrades with .

As for why you ought to switch from BA, isn't that obvious??? It's British

I suggest you go for AC

Unlike UA's 1K, as a Super �lite at AC you start the year with 8 sytemwide upgrades, confirmable at res, good from most economy fares (not Q or L, the deep discount and seat sale fares). Further, you get two more for every 10,000 miles you fly (which is another pair for every transatlantic journey).

You could probably get AC to comp you to �lite based on the amount of flying you do with BA. But you would have to get through your first 100,000 miles to get the SE benefits (but that is the same on UA, or just about anyone else).

Downside: If your travels go mostly to the US, you have to connect through one of the Canadian airports. But most have US preclearance stations, which mean that you have less aggro than you would arriving direct.

If you are doing US to Asia, YVR has sterile transit (no Canada customs clearance required) on AC/CP flights to the major Asian destinations.

Please act on the advice of everyone here - your wasting the points on BA. When I got hooked onto FlyerTalk a while ago it took me a while to act on the advice and I regret it now.

You could be an EP, 1K or similar in AA, US, etc. If you do biz class travel and get gold on BA it has its own advantages but otherwise, for economy travel stick to AA, UA, AC, etc.

Thanks for your replies and thanks Kokonutz for your first comment ACSE, AC sounds good and I visit Quebec city several times a year but AC's fares seem higher than most and they don't fly to nearly as many places as the US domestic carriers. Also I suspect that I would have a much harder time doing cheap domestic mileage runs on AC than I would with AA or UA for example.

Thanks Premex for that great site too and thanks Koko for bringing it to my attention.

Any AA FF or CO FF want to chime in as the way I see it my choices are basically AA or UA but the CO FF's are always talking about how great their airline is so many be one of them could offer an opinion.

Also, does UA have a good lounge in London airports and does AA fly any metal to Asia from London or do any code sharing with BA or other one world carrier to Asia from London?

Sorry Mvic, for some reason I assumed you were in the UK, not the US.

I would take UA over AA or CO, personally. You have the advantage of a bigger alliance network on which to earn/burn, and a bigger network in Asia. (Both their own, and their partners)

I suggest AA too. I fly AA-LHR and BA-TLV frequently. Miles accrue on all segments. Don't fly Iberia,besides never posting...they really are a last ditch (no pun intended) carrier. OneWorld has been very good to me, my hub is MIA. CO has been also good in the past and I use them to bank BWIA and KLM-Northwest miles as a secondary option when needed. Good luck!

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MRKEY

Why not just change FF program instead of carriers?

But if I was you I would be tempted to plump for UA or AA.

Nick

Consider LH M&M while flying UA in the US. Fly LH international, as any fare ticket can be upgraded, (it seems to me your primary objective is upgrades of heavily discounted tickets).

After you get 35K miles in M&M, you will get a 25% bonus on all miles earned (every UA flight will earn a minimum of 1000 miles). You will get double miles for business class. After 100k on LH (LH SEN), UA will usually comp some status as well. US west coast to Europe and back in Business class will net over 20k status miles.

Merry makes an interesting suggestion. If you switch your ff program to AA and fly BA as an AA member, can you then upgrade on BA using AA miles while also earning AA miles? I seem to have some misty memory of Merry carping about having to deal with AA upgraders on the "red carpet." But you'd need a onworlder for the answers to these questions.

Again thanks all for the useful suggestions. My first thought was to switch to AA as I do most of my domestic mileage run on them anyway and still fly BA internationally. The big drawback is that I also do allot of transatlantic travel and if I changed programs but not airlines I wouldn't earn miles for those flights in my primary program (you can't earn AA miles on BA transat flights). Another draw back is that I would want to then use BA for the long hauls using AA awards or upgrade awards but the cost of BA awards in AA miles is rather high unless one travels to the UK to start the award, for example with BA one can get F class RT. from US to Asia with free stop over in London for 150K miles, on AA's Plan ahead award the same trip costs 240K miles (though UK to Asia is 140K).

Frankly, I would like to stay with AA and thus BA and one world but it seems that with BA's recent move's the alliance may not be as strong as we have been led to believe? Are AA ExP allowed to use the BA First class lounges in London? I know that ExP also get system wide upgrades, anyone know how many? Also one major drawback with AA is that they only credit you for .5 miles per mile flown for discount fares. Might just be time to throw in the towel and start seriously looking at UA and the Star Alliance. What lounges do 1k's have access to in London? Do they have showers?

[This message has been edited by Mvic (edited 09-14-2000).]

Mvic,

AA gives 1 mile per mile flown on all economy fares. If you fly 100,000 miles on 1 World (excluding BA transatlantic) or AA marketed code shares you will qualify for ExecPlat. There are faster ways to qualify, but only by flying First or Business.

Last year we received 4 VIP2s which were good for a 1 itinerary 6 segment max upgrade from any fare to the next class of service. These upgrades are not subject to any capacity controls (a plus over UA System wides), but may not be used on codeshares (a minus since AA only flies to Tokyo in Asia relying on codeshares with OZ, JL, and Eva Air for many other destinations).

The other advantages over UA are: use miles to upgrade any fare, get elite bonuses (100 percent) and electronic upgrades on all 1 world flights worldwide, and effective triple miles if you give up your domestic upgrades and fly primarily internatinal.

In answer to your direct questions, AA ExecPlats have access to BA First Lounges in London. However they cannot upgrade on BA anywhere using miles or certs.

Also why would you go to Asia via London? You could use CX to get there faster for a more reasonable amount of miles. However if you must, AA has a 1 world award that would let you fly in first SEA-LHR-HKG-SEA for 180,000 miles. You could use BA and CX for all flights execpt transatlantic.


Having said all that you could also investigate Alaskan. The will give you miles on NW, AA, and BA. They also offer BA awards at what appeared to me to be the same mileage level as BA Executive Club.

rich




[This message has been edited by RichLond (edited 09-14-2000).]

Rich, I am sold. I basically wanted to go with AA anyway (their taking seats out program has made the economy seating very comfortable even for a tall guy) but had my facts wrong (maybe it is .5 miles on discount fares on 1 world partners). I will have fun blowing my BA miles over the next year whilst starting the ascent to ExP and Million mile status (using BA every chance I get of course ). I know that if you total a million miles earnt you will get Gold for life. I saw mentioned in a thread that there was the possibility of getting EX for life at 2 million, has this been confirmed?

Thanks again to everyone, you have all been very helpful. My decision does not in any way say anything about UA and its program but has more to do with my comfort with 1W and my lingering loyalty to BA.

BTW the reason I would go through London is because I would do a free stop over and visit my parents and relatives who live in Europe.

[This message has been edited by Mvic (edited 09-14-2000).]

Check with a 1W FTer about that, as there seems some doubt about BA transatlantic travel earning AA points http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/Forum83/HTML/000268.html

Mvic: Good luck with your decision. I think it is the best you could make.

And not just because I didn't want to have to compete with you for upgrades on UA !

I do predict, however, that the advantages of staying on AA metal will lure you further and further away from BA...

ENJOY!