There was a huge debate at work today regarding which airline to choose and why. Between the two carriers, which one would you select and why? I personally, would choose America West because of the ability to use the electronic check-in kiosks to save me time, newer Airbus planes, option to purchase a meal, and for the all important low fares that DO NOT require a Saturday night stay!

Not to mention the fact that the HP frequent flyer programme allows you to redeem miles on both BA and VS

Where are you going?Most of Southwests fares are one way as well.They actually invented the one way discount fare.But if you live in or travel in parts of the country where you dont encounter Southwest, you might be unfamiliar with them.I always just go straight to the gate.Check in is far easier than any other airline.But I'm not really picky about a seat either.Or a meal.Their planes are realtively new 737's.and for me their FF program is tops.I get a free ticket to use anywhere on SW after 4 round trips.Thats a month's worth of travelling.So I get a freebie each month!!

Isn't Southwest's FF program only good for one year? <BR>

COairBoy, there are time limits on SW's Rapid Rewards program. All 8 flight segments must be earned within one calendar year, but that's not a problme for truly frequent fliers. The coupons for a RT flight (actualy, two one-way flight coupons) are sent automatically when the required credits are earned and are good for only one year. There are often speciasl like double credit for internet booking, and there is an affinity credit card available. It's a pretty good deal.

Southwest Rapid Rewards are based on earning &quot;credits&quot; during a 12-month period,not a calendar year.The real cheesecake is the 50 credits or 25 round trips in a 12 month period and you get a FREE companion ticket for the next 12 month period.This is in addition to the 1 free ticket for every 4 r/t credits--if yoou book on the internet.

B-Boi, my apologies, you are correct - I should have written &quot;12 month period&quot; rather than &quot;calendar year.&quot; See what happens when you let a non-morning person at the computer before noon?

SW's rewards are so good that my sister-in-law, having accumulated 3 trips (all ALB-MCO) and getting close to the 12 month period since the first trip took a roundtrip ALB-BWI just to get the free trip. Not entirely free, but the $80 that rt cost will be less than what any flight she'll eventually take will cost. Some of her friends thought it crazy - I just thought it crazy that she never left the terminal at BWI - I would have at least taken the light rail to Baltimore's Inner Harbor. You definately cannot beat Southwest's frequent flyer program.

That may be true for travel within US, but what if you want to travel to Asia, South America, Europe, or even do African Safari? America West has an agreement with BA and VS, Southwest can't even come close to it. Sorry I have to disagree with the &quot;rb&quot;. I just booked a trip from Tampa to LAAA)to Kenya via Hong Kong(stopover for a week) on Cathey Pacific all first class - free with my AA miles. I priced the ticket on CX website from LAx to NBO with a stopover in HKG and it came back at $16,000.00. It cost me 140K miles. That's 4 or 5 r/t to Europe for me(depending on the routing), which I do every year anyway on business/pleasure. The most I ever paid for a coach ticket was about $625.00 per trip. The next one is only $425.00. So tell me now what is the best program.<BR>That's what I call a great program.

No question that IS a good deal, AAFrequentFlyer. I was of course refering to continental US flights, since &quot;23&quot; was asking only about SW vs AW. Is AA currently limiting the number of non-revenue or reduced-revenue seats it allows on a flight though? With Southwest's program, if there's an empty seat, you can use your Rapid Reward - again with the exception of just a few blackout dates.<BR>

rb,<BR>All AA award tickets are capacity controlled. Some folks report an occasional problem, but nothing that a day earlier or later would not fix. Personally I never had a problem booking an award ticket. As I stated before, I fly a lot, so I have an &quot;insight&quot; on the airline business. I keep in touch with other FF and we know where to look for award availibility for flights. I suppose a casual flyer that's trying to redeem a 25K award to a hot spot at the peak times will have a problem, especially if they wait till the last minute. I look at the redemption of the miles as a great deal, thus I'm willing to investigate, research and prepare myself in order to get what I want. <BR>Happy Flying!