ClanJ

Hi just a a question that perhaps someone could answer. Myself and my partner are A3 gold however our anniversary/rollover dates a few days apart. Is it possible with A3 to change our anniversary/rollover dates? Any advice would be appreciated

KLouis

No, but out of curiosity, what would the advantage be it it were the same?

:D!

If they travel together and plan to requalify with only one or two long haul flights, then those flights can't be taken during the "few days apart" between their roll-over dates, otherwise one person might renew gold and the other person wouldn't.

As it's only a few days, it may not matter that much if those days are in a quiet travel period. But some people can only travel at the same sorts of times each year and if the dates fall during those times, planning an ideal itinerary may be annoying.

I am sure someone could easily edit a database field and change the date for one person, and it wouldn't really make any difference to A3 but I doubt the call centre agents have a function to do this.

The main way to align the dates would be for both people to drop to silver and move back up to gold together, or one person drops to silver and requalifies for gold by purchasing tier miles on the appropriate date, as this is instant. There is no guarantee that miles will post on a certain date to move only one person up to gold, so the dates may still not get aligned in that case.

giorginho

Surely they'll both renew gold! I've been around here for 4 years now and still don't get the issue with that (and I get it even less, when peoples' renewal dates are ~6 months apart, like it is with some cases after the first free extension was given in 2020)! So if they fly during those "few days" one will renew gold just a few days before it expires and one just a few days after the new gold year begins, the only difference will be how long each gold will last for after taking those flights (this I do get, but it only actually matters if you plan to give up renewing status entirely the year after!), but renewed will be both .

AlwaysFlyStar

So first off, you say they both qualify, but that's the thing, if they take the flight after the date of the one partner, that partner will not requalify. Because you have to get all of your miles before your requalification date.

Secondly, you seem to be operating on the assumption that people travel on the same dates every year. Unfortunately, this is not the case for many people so even though they might have earnt miles in this split period once, that doesn't mean they will keep doing so. And now it is a pain because one partner is sorted with miles for the year and the other isn't.
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Just because you don't get it doesn't mean it isn't a headache for other people. My partner and I are about 6 weeks apart and this has been mildly annoying at times. If Aegean offered to let me take his earlier qualification date, I would happily do so.

giorginho

But that's only a question of whether or not they've made that requalification in time already, not whether or not future attempts to requalify will lead one or the other to drop to silver!No, I'm just assuming that people will travel again to requalify within a given set of 365 days! Which is a must either way!

I think this is the part I don't get the most. Say your important date is May 31st and your partner's is July 15th.

• If neither of you has already retained gold tier, then flying before May 31st is something you would have to do anyway and it works for both of you.
• If you've both already made it, then flying prior to May 31st helps neither of you, flying post July 15th helps both of you and flying between your dates only helps you this year, but both of you next year and nobody loses status!
• If only your partner has made it already and you haven't, we're going back to my 1st point, that you can't really complain, when your partner has had less time to requalify and still made it and you've had more and haven't! Just fly before your status expires as you would have done if you lacked said partner! You'll only need to do this once (not per year, just once, period)!

And if what you're saying is "my status expires on May 31st, but I want to fly this year in April and next year in August and then in April again", well, we're back at my point, that you can't leave 15-16-month gaps at will and demand your tier gets retained. You know there are rules to "play" by and you can still use them to your advantage (just fly in April, then in August of the same year or whenever just before June of next year and come next year you can fly during the summer or whenever post-May you wish!).Well I didn't say that I "have to" get it. Just as you can't get, why I can't get, why you, even though you just wrote that you would "take the earlier date" (!) won't simply keep your date and just take "earlier flights", just like you would have to do, if you had indeed that same earlier date!
And if the answer is anything like "well because I've already requalified and they won't cound", then, obviously, they'll count when you take them next year!

The bottom line is: You've had your gold tier, you've had your dates (not fixed by any means, but certainly sometime within the 365 days before your tier expires) that you took your flights to retain your tier and you've had your expiration date. Same goes for your partner. Worst case: Someone is going to just once need to adjust their schedule to the other one's date (without changing the actual reccuring expiration date)! After that, one of you will have at least 12 months to retain status and the other will have 12 months + the time they're "ahead". Those "at least 12 months" include, you guessed it, all months of the year!

But yeah, like I said, I don't have to and I guess I just won't get it (and I am someone who's basically a gold-newbie and currently flies only 2-3 times a year, with a family member in silver and a "date" 8+ weeks ahead of mine, so why doesn't the "when am I going to fly to retain both our tiers" bother me?).

PS. What often gets suggested here is to have someone drop to silver and through some very creative and obviously expensive planning reach gold again, whereas what I suggested is far easier, and costs far less (and only some exceptions will be required to do it).
PS2. The only scenario the aforementioned won't work to the advantage of both partners, is when you were planning to take flights right before and right after that expiration date and effectively extend your tier by 2 years. But that was never the question (or the point) here.

irishguy28

Then your qualification dates are, effectively, already aligned.

Unless these few days are a travel-intense period (Christmas, or New Year, or some other fixed or standing annual milestone for you both), it shouldn't matter that there is a small "gap"; even if you both have to travel in this "gap", it also shouldn't be a problem; you both have agency here, and can easily "adapt" to account for this.

Strategies that involve making up the balance right before the end of your membership period are inherently risky; what if a flight gets cancelled and all necessary travel cannot be performed before the required date? It's best to ensure, if either of you struggles to maintain status, that you do the necessary flying early in the year, not in the dying days!

No, I don't believe it is.

But it could be done by you, working together. (One deliberately fails to requalify as Gold, and in their Silver year, must travel in a VERY particular way so that they reach Gold again on the last day of the other's Gold year. This would therefore require the person whose year expires later to be the one to drop to Silver and climb again).

As you can see, it's much easier just to plan judiciously and have your Gold requalification sown up long before either of your membership deadlines approaches.

aflo

Please no more discussion how much sense it makes to want to align requalification dates

Our new family member is currently A3S and should become A3G at the start of November. We would prefer to move the qualification to end of November, to align this with our dates. Obviously we should make sure, that flights at the start of November don’t auto credit. I guess doing a retro credit at the end of November will not shift the A3G qualification date to the retro credit date, but will keep it at the actual flight date? Best option would be to invest 50 EUR for a couple of status miles on our preferred qualification date, if no flights are planned for this period?

giorginho

Of course it will! It is even stated in the T&Cs that it will!
https://en.aegeanair.com/conditions-...nd-conditions/
Chapter 3.8.b)
I've actually already watched this work out exactly like this, but with a caveat: When a retro-credit results in a tier upgrade on the date of the retro-credit, which is different than the date of the flight, then any excess miles will not be taken into account for retaining the tier, since they actually get credited with the date they were actually flown and not the date of the retro-credit.
​​​​​​​So plan accordingly.

irishguy28

So make sure that this family member moves their early November flight to end of November; or - if they must take that early November flight - make sure they do not associate that flight with their A3 account at all (maybe best to cancel the flight and have them travel on a non-Aegean, non-Star Alliance flight altogether) and make sure they then delay taking the flight that will bring them to A3*G until whatever exact date in late November that you want the year to be realigned to.

aflo

Perfect, then I will proceed to manually credit the flight on the desired date! Thank you!

aflo

haha, this seems a “nuclear option” or am I missing the irony?

irishguy28

Are missing flights credited immediately, or fed into some queue that might require manual processing and which therefore could take some time?

You have complete control over the date on which you take a flight - you are required to indicate a precise date when you make the purchase. You don't necessarily have complete control over the date a retro-claim is processed and your account is correspondingly actioned for an upgrade.

I'd also advise caution regarding Chapter 3.8b. It only mentions when the tier upgrade occurs, and says nothing about what the actual requalification date will be. It could be one year on from the date that the tier upgrade occurs...or it could be (as normal) one year on from the date of the flight in question. (In other words, Chapter 3.8b could merely be saying that the "upgrade" is processed without retrospective effect, but you may only get a "year" from the date when the flight occurred, not from when the flight was retro-credited).

Remember, this entire thread is all about aligning the rollover date - not about tinkering with the date when the upgrade is actually processed. If the alignment of the rollover date is the important thing, then the only foolproof way is to ensure that the flight that pushes you up to the next level occurs on the date that you want your renewal date to be moved to. As such, it is entirely in your power to do this - by ensuring that the final A3 flight that will push you over the threshold (and yes, I think it's better to take an A3 flight for such an important task, given that the chances are it will post automatically, and quickly, whereas a partner flight may not post or take longer) occurs on the date that you have specifically chosen as your new requalification date.

aflo

Still if that was the case, the easiest would be to purchase a couple of tier miles for 50 EUR on the exact day?

Anyway, giorginho has actually already watched this work out exactly like Chapter 3.8b explains, as he says, so there is no reason not to trust him.

I mean, it's not life changing to be able to align requalification dates, but if it's simple as withholding miles and only manually crediting on the desired dates, then why not?

giorginho

The question only regarded setting the date by reaching gold, which you can actually "set", regardless of the date one actually takes the flight (I reported this back in May, when I got confirmation it works and will even use it myself to set the silver renewal date of my son to one that we prefer).
What I wrote stands.
If the gold year created by retro-crediting was shorter than 365 days, then the excess miles would also count towards retaining gold, which, as I wrote, they don't (when the upgrade is done by retro-crediting from a previous date). Moreover I've retro-credited a significant number of Aegean flights for friend's family, myself and my son in the last 2 months and on each and every case the miles posted the moment I hit the button on the browser to claim them!
However there were no codeshares or any other "work-arounds" there, always pure A3 bookings and flights.