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American Airlines has announced that, from today, it has expanded its Five Star Service offering to three more airports and a fourth airport will be offering Five Star Service from 9 August.
American Airlines Five Star Service
What is it?
American Airlines Five Star Service offers the following benefits:
- Access to Flagship First Check-In and the Admirals Club®lounge
- Priority boarding and re-accommodation status
- Car service coordination
Who can book it?
Passengers with a ticket for an American Airlines premium cabin can purchase Five Star Service.
How much does it cost?
Five Star Service costs $350 for the first passenger on an itinerary, $100 per additional adult and $50 per child (17 years old or younger).
Where is it offered?
US Locations
- Atlanta (ATL)**
- Austin (AUS)*
- Boston (BOS)
- Charlotte (CLT)
- Chicago O’Hare (ORD)
- Dallas / Fort Worth (DFW)
- Los Angeles (LAX)
- Miami (MIA)
- Nashville (BNA)*
- Newark (EWR)*
- New York Kennedy (JFK)
- New York LaGuardia (LGA)
- Philadelphia (PHL)
- Phoenix (PHX)
- San Francisco (SFO)
- Washington Reagan (DCA)
*New locations offering Five Star Service from 1 August 2019
** New location offering Five Star Service from 9 August 2019
International Locations
- Buenos Aires (EZE)
- London Heathrow (LHR)
- Sao Paolo (GRU)
- Tokyo Narita (NRT)
Thoughts
On the whole, I don’t really see how Five Star Service would be useful to most people.
Five Star Service is only open to passengers with a premium cabin ticket and, if you have a ticket for an American Airlines premium cabin, this already gives you priority check-in and priority boarding.
If you’re flying internationally, a ticket for a priority cabin also gives you access to Flagship Lounges/Admirals Clubs.
Essentially, if you’re flying internationally, you’d have to put a significant premium on Flagship First check-in (over regular Business Class check-in), car service co-ordination and priority re-accommodation status if you’re to pay $350+ for this service.
If you’re flying domestically you get the added bonus of Admirals Club access (which you wouldn’t ordinarily get unless you have non-AA oneworld sapphire status or higher)…but even then this looks like an incredible amount of money to pay for what you’re getting – Admirals Club day passes can be purchased for $59 and Admirals Club annual memberships can be had with a credit card for a fee of $450.
Bottom Line
Unless I’m missing something here (I’m only basing my opinion on what American Airlines say it offers), the number of people for whom Five Star Service offers genuine value for money should be very low…but apparently its popular enough for American Airlines to roll it out to yet more airports.
Does the airline offer something else with Five Star Service that isn’t mentioned on its website?
if not, who’s paying for this and why? Someone, please tell me!
Well said.