American Airlines and British Airways have just rolled out reciprocal upgrades as of today, and I’d say this is a pretty exciting development.
Continue reading: Details: American & British Airways Reciprocal Upgrades
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Like most things in life it's not great but it's better than a sharp stick in the eye
“you can’t use AAdvantage miles to upgrade on British Airways”
Yes you can from some of the higher fare buckets.
Am I reading this correctly that upgraded are NOT available for award tickets?
@Ben, can you explain why you think this is "exciting" and that is an impressive reciprocal agreement? Honestly?
Because this isn't really that impressive: it requires a mix of AA metal and BA metal - so the AA flight is transatlantic. SWUs were already valid on those flights. All that is being added is the connecting flight. Which is nice, I guess. But exciting and impressive. Still can't use SWUs on BA metal across the Atlantic based upon what you wrote. But it sounds BA fliers can use on AA metal? So fewer upgrades for AA elites? Or can I use an SWU on transatlantic BA metal if I have an AA segment in the US? And buy PE?
Listen, it's nice that if I am flying PHL-LHR-BER on AA/BA and use a SWU, I get J class from LHR to BER. But as you repeatedly point out, intra-Europe J class isn't that great. Blocked middle seat. (That said, recent AY and BA J flights had food much better than anything that AA, DL, or UA offer domestically.)
I just cannot figure out why you think this is so good?
But if there is never any confirmable upgrade space on AA, how would this ever matter? Maybe that is part of the agreement? Maybe... not holding my breath though.
Executive Club members get an upgrade from Y to J on AA, while AAdvantage members only get Y to PE on BA? That's not most people's idea of reciprocal...
In his example, Ben pointed out that you can use BA metal over the Atlantic as long as you have domestic connecting flight on AA.
Not a fan. As an Exec Club member, I couldn’t care less about getting American upgrades but don’t want less availability on BA (which is usually very good, especially short-haul).
I've seen nothing about the new upgrade vouchers for BA golds on the website or anywhere else. Am gold with BA and curious to spend.... can someone help me please?
Ben just followed up w BA about this
The BA gold upgrade vouchers are NOT for all gold members. They are ONLY for gold members who attain 2,500-3,500 tier points in a calendar year (well above the gold threshold of 1500 or so)
The announcement is confusingly worded so I get the confusion, but thought it would be helpful to clarify.
I just flew on American Airlines/British Airways partnership flights. It was American Air out of Boston to Heathrow and then Heathrow to Rome the return flight was in reverse Heathrow was a nightmare and both American Airlines and British airlines had awful business class service and accommodations.
It was a bit confusing for people that you had to give your flight information to because you were flying American Air you had American Air flight numbers but it was also British Airways
I’m not sure there are really perks in this arrangement
just booked IST-LHR-SFO-LAX LAX-PHX-LHR-IST booked double connections to get AA segments, called to u/g and was informed needed to be on AA ticket stock??
So just clarifying something here:
"This is only valid for tickets that have at least one American Airlines marketed segment on them, so the tickets need to include travel on both American and British Airwasys"
1) The ticket actually does NOT need to include travel on AA, the BA flight(s) can also have an AA Codeshare. So an entirely BA itinerary, booked as an AA codeshare CAN be upgraded. I can confirm as I have done this directly. To re-summarize, AA's language is correct there needs to be an AA Marketed (but not necessarily operated) flight on the PNR.
2) If booking Premium Economy to upgrade on Business if your fare on BA is sold in "W" class, it's actually a better deal to upgrade using miles since it's only 12,500 miles and no co-pay.
3) You misspelled 'Airways' in this section.