This week we revisit elite status matching on the different airlines. Generally status matching is a one time event, so if you are going to match proceed carefully. In addition to airline status matches we discuss some recent airline news including:
- New pet relief area at American's JFK hub
- New pricing plans for GoGo Wifi Internet - finally some plans for the mileage runners out there
- More turbulent news from Continental with an unlucky patch of rough flying
- Air Koryo's 1 star ranking
- Our upcoming live recording at the San Diego Film Festival. Register now (using code UPGRD) and mileage run in for a live upgrd recording.
Our main topic covers status matching on the following airlines:
- US Airways buy up to preferred program
- American Airlines Challenge
- United Airlines
- Delta
- and others
Please leave a comment below on any points we missed.
Comments
I think i was Hunter who mentioned there were alot of great fares from LAX-SYD on DL to qualify for diamond. I'm in the same boat, and trying to reach diamond. (i'll be at around 100,000 by the end of the year without any MRs) Can i ask where are you getting these good fares. All the ones i've found are $800+. That's more than 5 cpm? Am I missing somthing here?
Yes, you're missing the fact that it's Hunter providing the advice on great mileage run deals. ;)
Sorry about the confusion - the sale has ended, and it's not the best deal anymore. I'm of the "I want the easiest thing possible" school, so despite the fact that the BE fares have also gone up, the ~2600 round trip is still an OK deal to me. More importantly, it's not a hard way to pull ~22,500 miles.
About Lufthansa not doing status matching - oh yes they do. They are aggressively advertising their current status match campaign in several European countries. With an European address you could easily match your AA card to a LH card, or any non-Star Alliance card. I matched my BA Gold to a Lufthnsa Senator status. See http://milesandmore-aktionen.de/status/?cc=FI_EN
Hey guys. I was catching up on some of the podcasts and while listening to this one, I think you forgot to mention one thing. Unless I am wrong, I think that many of these programs only allow you to match / comp status once in a lifetime? Is that the case because after reading many threads on FT, it appears that this is what many are finding out? Not a big deal right now going for NWA Plat, which was a great comping come year end as was discussed in the podcast.
I think we need to get into further into the hotel matching programs (SPG, IC, and Hilton) and what are the pluses and minuses of each (upgrades to room type, suites, % of UG hits, point bonuses, exec. lounge priv, welcome gifts, etc.) and how many times you can do this as well.
Malties............