I’m a US flyer finding the Turkish Miles and Smiles program totally confusing. I don’t know what I have to do to re-up my status level, or to increase my status level. I have read and re-read the terms on the website, but I know less after reading them than before I read them. I have read some of the FlyerTalk stickies, but can’t find the right questions and answers.

I also stopped in Istanbul last week while on a layover. I found people who looked like they should be able my questions, but they said all they could do was print replacement status cards.

I currently have an “Elite Card” that is Gold. I have 74,844 status miles earned since 10/02/2013 and an Elite expiry date of 31/08/2016.

If I do no more flying, do I drop one level to Classic Plus? Or all the way to the bottom-Classic level?

How do I tell how many miles I have to fly to renew my Elite Card (gold) status?
And by when?
And do they have to POST before the expiration date?
Or just FLY before the expiration date?

How many miles do I have to fly to earn the highest status level of Elite Plus status? By when? Is it worth it to push miles to TK to get the top-tier, or is it better to be happy with Mid-tier and push my extra miles to UA?