My friend is flying TLV-EWR-PHX-EWR-TLV. He is a plat. I (just a silver) live in NY but need to be in PHX at the same time so I'm going EWR-PHX-EWR, probably on the same flights for those legs as he.

Is there any way for me to get on the same ticket as him so that he can give me a companion E+ seat at booking and get me a companion CPU if available?

I'll look to see if separate tix (TLV-EWR-TLV and EWR-PHX-EWR) works for him, but if it's more expensive and so impractical, is there any other way?

Thanks!

Edit: The separate tix won't work as the straight ticket is a couple of hundred $$ cheaper. Any other options?