Originally Posted by
ThatT1Feeling
Congrats! I am a matter of months away (just hit 34k LTTPs) so I will be reading these responses with interest
Haha! An early welcome to the club, from it's newest member!
Originally Posted by
Lost-in-Space
msm, I had the same thoughts about two years ago when I achieved GfL and, because I had just retired and stopped travelling very much, I had no chance of getting GGLfL.
There are some good suggestions above, but some of my key thoughts were:
One of my regular routes is MAD > ABZ. LH stopped flying to ABZ; avoiding AF and the CDG zoo was a no-brainer. KLM via Schiphol is no picnic either. The T5 transfer experience is pretty straightforward, so I keep going BA or IB.
As I now fly on my own Euro, I usually book Y and using another airline or alliance would not give me the benefits of fast track, lounge access, etc.
When researching travel I always check pricing. Sometimes BA/IB win, sometimes they don't. Last year I used AF/KL for a USA trip - notwithstanding my comments above - they simply beat BA on price. I was looking for a trip in J to Asia next year and the ME3 all came in around the same - then BA came in 20% less, so I booked with BA.
Keep in mind that if you book with BA in CW, you might (might!) be in line for an upgrade to F - when travelling on business my success rate was probably 33%.
I think a little bit of loyalty to BA can pay off - I don't know how it all works in the background, but I've had a few IROPS recently and they fixed it very quickly and smoothly.
Horses for courses, of course.
Whatever you do, enjoy!
(A pedant note for some: In BA it is called 'Gold for LIfe', not Lifetime Gold.)
Good advice, and definitely sounds like a similar mentality to mine.
Like you, I'll fly BA when it suits and when the price works - but I'll be much happier to not pay through the nose, just to hit the TP target.
M