I am interested to read the opinions of others and AC if they wish to chime in, on the pros and cons for customers and company alike to buy SE100K with a $20,000 up front payment that is credit toward future travel in that year.
I would like to move back to AC and into their top tier in 2019 (I have NZ Gold Elite through until November 2019, with a soft landing to Gold until November 2020) but not have to wait until surpassing 100,000 bis miles to receive the benefits.
The advantage to me in being able to buy SE is I receive the benefits from flight 1.
The advantage to AC is that they receive the money up front. The disadvantage to AC is that they will incur the cost of giving benefit to someone who wouldn't have otherwise gotten it.

The SE benefit if bought would be the exactly the same as if earned BIS and carry over to the next year as well. The idea being that one would keep flying AC to enjoy the benefits.

I already fly AC quite a bit but accrue to NZ's AirPoints. I also have two TD Infinite Visa's that accrue about 550-600,000 miles a year through spend. These miles are used on copious quantities of Sport Chek gift cards among a few others. With SE, the use of those miles could change to AC seats. Travel patterns and limitations have made using AP miles for airline seats unrealistic for us.

Thoughts?