Thanks for the replies.
Partner should have easily qualifed, but I made the mistake of booking an L fare on CO for one of the non-F class fares. I didn't know at the time that if I would have been earning and burning on OnePass we'd have got 100% EQMs but on WorldPerks it was 50% EQM's, so that dinged us out of over 2k in EQMs
Then, the final trip of the year (we were supposed to go today) we cancelled yesterday due to weather issues and flight cancellations.
Weather here in Canada has been crazy this holiday season and trying to get decent fares on a last minute trip within next day or two is a moot point due to all the re-accommodations.
I was hoping NW might have a 'forgiveness' for cancelled flights or weather related issues given how close it was to the qualification and that most of the flights were full fare F. If they do, it'd definitely encourage my partner to steer flying to NW and partners rather than just booking lowest fare which might be AC/US etc.
I know that a lot of FT'ers have dim views of anyone getting any kind of a break (diluting the elite pool and all that) but the weather/cancellations of flights were outside of our control and the shortfall is very very small indeed so I don't feel as if we're trying to unfairly take advantage.
Final option is to ask if we can pull the miles from NW and instead credit them to CO (in which case it would be well over the Elite threshold) but I don't know if you can change the programme the miles go to after they have posted.