An Alaska-Virgin America Deal Is A Big Win For American Airlines

[MAH4546]

If AS wants to go all-Boeing, Boeing will make it happen.As far as AA, AS, and DAL.... AA and AS have extensive codesharing and FF reciprocity.I suspect the DOJ will not object to them taking over the gates, but I'd be very surprised if they'd allow either codesharing or FF reciprocity to apply to routes in/out/thru DAL (similar to the restrictions AA & BA had with LHR).

No such restriction ever existed. AA and BA were allowed to codeshare, and they were allowed FF reciprocity, They opted not to because they didn't want to codeshare without revenue share. They did indeed codeshare outside of U.S.-London routes, including trains-Atlantics from Canada and Mexico City, where one could book tickets on an AA code and earn AA miles. AA was always afraid, rightfully so, that a full codeshare scheme would drive away premium passengers, especially because back then BA's product was vastly better than AA or just about any European airline. Most have since caught up.

 

[eolesen]

No such restriction ever existed. AA and BA were allowed to codeshare, and they were allowed FF reciprocity, They opted not to because they didn't want to codeshare without revenue share. They did indeed codeshare outside of U.S.-London routes, including trains-Atlantics from Canada and Mexico City, where one could book tickets on an AA code and earn AA miles. AA was always afraid, rightfully so, that a full codeshare scheme would drive away premium passengers, especially because back then BA's product was vastly better than AA or just about any European airline. Most have since caught up.

I never said the government imposed the specific restriction on US-UK routes accruing mileage or being sold as codeshare. It was clearly a commercial decision between the two that dated back two years prior to the launch of oneworld, and US/BA didn't have those restrictions imposed on it when they had ATI.

Conventional Flyertalk & A.Net wisdom (not always 100% accurate) has always preached AA feared losing premium traffic, but that's a bit of a red herring, since a lot of those folks were already participating in Executive Club to begin with.

The bigger concern internally always seemed to be avoiding any perceptions of collusion and not wanting to be put in a position where they'd be forced to give up huge numbers of slots in order to get ATI approval while Bermuda II was still in place (go back and look at the slot forfeiture demands on the two aborted attempts in 1997 and 2001).

All a moot point in the context of what will happen with AA/AS's program and getting approval for the merger. Because AA agreed to give up operating at DAL, I'd be very, very surprised if the DOJ were to passively sit back and allow AA's customers to earn miles flying out of DAL on AS.

What's less clear is if AS would be forced to codeshare that with DL. They've got a very punative (towards AS) agreement that can't end soon enough from AS's perspective.