Originally Posted by dvs7310

Actually their post originated in another forum where I directed them to here, and in the other forum they were interested in status. Since the itinerary crosses membership years in most programs, QR is one of the few that still have a floating qualification period, it's 12 months from first QPoints. So they need to decide what's priority, lower cost long haul redemption or elite status. But maybe it's possible to get enough LPs in AA's membership year (March to February) to get AA status another way (Canadian resident so Citi card isn't likely an option) but perhaps some other OW tickets.

They do indicate that most flying is YYZ to east Asia. Most CX economy fares don't credit anything to AA, but PE and Business are decent. JL can be quite excellent credited to AA if buying Business, but even discount economy will net something in AA. Unlikely that flying on AA codes is beneficial and going across the Atlantic on normal fares (not RTW), AY is the only one left that still credits on distance but not sure that'll last long. Not sure if AT offers connecting itineraries to Europe or not, but they fly to YUL.



I finally had a chance to check this against QR. It'd be 491 QPoints and about 82,090 Avios. That is QR Gold status (OW Sapphire), you need 600 for QR Platinum (OW Emerald), but the catch is you need 4 segments on QR or 20% of your QPoints earned on QR, you're only at ~13% on this itinerary, so basically you'd need to find a way to get 2 more QR segments and hopefully another 109 QPoints. Maybe if you fly to CAI on QR (revenue ticket)? The down side is that QR economy from YYZ-CAI will only net about 30 QPoints each way, but would get your segments. If you change HEL-JFK to an AA code it doubles your earnings, you go from 30 QPoints on the AY code to 63 QPoints on the AA code and also double the Avios on the segment. That combined with YYZ-CAI and back on QR should get you to within 1-2 flights of Platinum, something you could do on AA segments from home.