Originally Posted by
craigthemif
"If you really really pause to look at it in detail, for everybody other than the most frequent of flyers, maintaining elite status in 2 or 3 alliances costs more than "the price difference of paying for seats and bags", which BTW isn't at all a *A-wide benefit for TK elites. (and a lot of people will just OLCI to grab their preferred seat type and travel HBO when necessary) Use your miles, fly on the best airline option for each itinerary, spend OPM exclusively, or even simply be totally loyal to your home country's airline. But if you're really travelling enough to benefit from elite status, you are earning it organically anyhow.
Sure, you have to be careful - chasing too much status can turn out to be much more expensive as just looking for the cheapest deals, paying for your seat and luggage when needed, and using a say 200-300 Euro CC like MC Black giving you lounge access. At some point I had A3 as *A back up - around 2011 once qualified as Gold you had it for life - I qualified in a year where I flew enough to maintain Gold with FB as well. That could not last, and when around 2014 A3 went to an annual requalification scheme I dropped it - too much money for little value added. But for me it works now - almost PfL at AF/KL so no pressure there, and the status match plus some cheap J TK flights I felt ok to use for travels I needed to do anyway give me 2 alliance flexibility for the next years.