AA Platinum Challenge & flying with them
I've just completed my return trip to the USA with American, 8 flights in 7 days, and I've confirmed my status is now Platinum (a la Gold QFF) for the next 18 months.
The American Airlines app was really brilliant in keeping track of flights and my status, and due to a 4 hour delay got a bonus 4000 miles although getting to your hotel at 3am before a 9am meeting wasn't really what I would have liked...
Thanks to those who let me know about this, the only down side is that the American Airlines Admirals lounges are pretty lame with no meals to speak of except for occasional free soups, or purchasable sushi in addition to cheese and crackers, and miscellaneous raw vegetable matter.
One thing I noticed with AA is that most people know the rorts that go on, like checking your luggage at the gate to avoid fees, etc. So the delays at the gate are substantial...
I've also noticed that AA staff are not very forthcoming with information about delays, in the case of my 4 hour delay, it was not clear why the plane was delayed. The plane was on the tarmac, and it seemed it was out of fuel??? For 4 hours??? This occurred at Charlotte International Airport on a regional flight to Tri-cities Airport. In a Dash-8 prop driven aircraft. That said the plane was in very poor condition, with folded paper inserted to try and stop rattling. It was bizarre to then fly a QF Dash-8 a day later and find that there were no rattles, and the interior was much better cared for.
With the flight from Sydney to LAX, I purchased the onboard wifi, only to find that after an hour it failed to work at all. I emailed the wifi provider in Germany (the only customer service option) after arriving in LA and received a refund same day. Obviously its a known problem.
I used the onboard wifi for all of my internal flights, and it worked really really well - fast and reliable. It was $45 for a month, which I thought was a reasonable way to be able to continue working on emails / iMessages during the flight.
I flew back to Sydney on a Qantas bird on an American ticket, and the downgrade in service was noticable. No wifi was offered either...
Mike