American Sends Out Concierge Key Invites

As of 2023, I just completed 19 consecutive years of Executive Platinum status. Out of these 19 years, I only received 1 invite for CK status for the year of 2022. My lifetime miles with AA are 7.2 million. Average miles traveled each year is around 250k. Even with 550,000 loyalty points in 2022, the concierge key status was NOT renewed for 2023. Needless to say I was very disappointed. This supports the conversation of qualifying for 2 airlines instead of one which I have done in previous years. This is what doesn’t make sense to me with AA not publishing CK level requirements. What’s the point of continuing to fly with AA after you reach EX Plat status knowing that you may or may not be in the running for CK status. It’s my belief that if there is a goal to reach you will be more motivated to chase the goal. So why not set a milestone for flyers to chase? Otherwise, AA loses out on customer dollars from their most valuable flyers as they will chase status on other airlines. I believe you are better offer to throw your business to another airline so you can enjoy status with 2 airline alliances instead of one. This can be easily achieved for any frequent traveler logging over 200k air miles annually. For example, I am “senator” with LH which is comparable to EX Plat with AA. Therefore, I have a wider range of options while traveling through Europe and still continue to enjoy the perks of upper level airline status.

I am a bit disappointed I flew over 350k EQM’s and around $60k spend but no invite! Whaaaaa! To top it off I book a family trip to Hawaii for Christmas months ago and selected bulkhead seats but they changed planes and bumped us into crappy seats! Customer Service team does not care. I am going to start booking Delta!

I get all of this sturm und drang. It's actually very entertaining. Blogs are a numbers game. I don't blame Lucky for vilifying AA: What brings people together better than anything is a common enemy. Keep em' talking... And in front of those ads ;) As any airline will tell you, those who complain the most are those who are clearly flying minimums. People want to achieve status and then when they get it, they flog it like a central American donkey. Hand out, reaching for anything they can get. It's not that I want to be treated like crap by my airline, but I almost universally 'get' why it happens when they do. I can follow the breakdown and have learned not to take it personally. As others have said here already, if you're constantly unhappy with a business, vote with your wallet and move on. You've got options and clearly, you're probably not making too many friends with AA's management team.

My typical routes are full of CKs. Even though I spent $20K in ~140k mikes. I seldom get upgraded. My company won't pay for bis:/first class tickets. What makes no sense to me is that, after chatting with tens of CKs, at least 1/3 of them get upgraded all the time, those upgraded were clearly not true influencers either. So the program is obscure and corrupt. I am willing to 'buy up' premium cabins at a reasonable price and Im wondering how UA's 'buy confirmed upgrades at booking' works for you. My second homes are NYC, BOS, SFO, (NRT, PVG), Any UA experience you could share?

The bitching about AA is right on. I had so many delays and poor experiences with them that after more than 5 years with them, I recently switched to Alaska. So far, Alaska is so much better. They’re better at communicating if there’s a delay.