Originally Posted by
corporate-wage-slave
Surely logically this is being looked at from the wrong end? Isn't this really a question of when you choose to join BAEC? In which case the answer should be such that you get status approximately 8 months into your year so you have enough slack if something goes wrong, and in a good year the chance to go one higher.
I certainly see plenty of messages here saying "my year ends on Tuesday, how can I make 440 TPs over the weekend?", to exaggerate only slightly. I think it's wrong to see these things purely in a one or two year timeframe, the idea is that you are in BAEC for rather longer than that.
So an informed consumer at the start of his / her BA travelling life would make the informed choice to start their membership just before the bulk of their travelling season. You can't change your membership year thereafter, but you may be able to change your travel pattern.
I think most people are not as informed as you when they first join an FFP. They may not know what their travel pattern will be, or how that affects getting status. Travel patterns also change over time, with employer, job or role changes. And some FFP members were made members at a very young age, after which point the dates are just a given as they enter their professional life 20 years later.
Now maybe one should choose one's job based on whether the travel requirements fit the year-end of one's FFP.
