British Airways Gold Elites Can Now Confirm Upgrades On American Airlines

by Gary Leff

With American Airlines systemwide upgrades now available for one category upgrades on British Airways for flights between the U.S. and London and for intra-European flights, British Airways Gold members and higher are being given upgrade certificates valid for travel on American Airlines too.

  • 2 certificates valid for upgrade from premium economy to business class, or business to first class.
  • No upgrades from coach to premium economy, because American Airlines doesn’t offer this with upgrade certificates or miles.
  • No waitlisting.
  • Valid on any published fare, including for domestic flights valid on basic economy (for upgrades from coach to domestic first or short haul business).

This information comes to us by aviation watchdog JonNYC.

This is a real benefit for British Airways Gold members, indeed some Golds will find it better to buy premium economy on American Airlines and upgrade versus traveling on BA – though with BA’s upgrading of its business seats (on those planes where this is complete) and introduction of internet it’s no longer always a better inflight product to fly BA over AA in the same cabin.

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. But there must be award inventory to begin with. AA has notoriously split A inventory into A revenue and A award. Unless there is A award inventory, first class upgrades aren’t going to happen.

  3. @Gary,

    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, but the upgrade vouchers are NOT for any gold members.

  4. I don’t see this as being too big a deal as AA doesn’t release many business upgradeable seats at booking. And if no wait list I only see a small handful of people who would ever get the lucky upgrade. They might as well give away lottery tickets at least a better chance to win.

    Would be happy to be proven wrong.

  5. One remaining question is domestic upgrades for AA EXP or PLT Pro traveling in US on AA metal but on BA-marketed flight (i.e., BA ticket stock). Any comments?

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