Shareholder

My experience with most STAR partners is that the boarding pass will print out the STAR status, ie. Silver or Gold, following the airline program ID. As do oneworld partners who's boarding passes indicate Ruby, Sapphire or Emerald if not the full FF number and airline. When I did have problems was in the period where we still had Cdn+ cards, explaining these now had the same status as Aeroplan cards. The LH people last year would not let me into the lounge in Berlin, though I had no problem with the same card in FRA. I did get in using my Diners' Maple Leaf Club card.

Ken hAAmer

As does mine. However, this only happens once you are at the airport and have physically presented your AC card, with the appropriate Star logo on it.

In fact, even with my AC number on the record, I still always first get a regular UA boarding pass. After they see my status on my card and change it on the computer, they then have to reprint the boarding pass so I get a gold one, allowing pre-boarding and possibly an Economy Plus seat.

It occurs to me that many of you might be booking AC tickets (or tickets through AC) with connections to UA or another *A carrier. But in my case, I often need to travel from one point in the US to another, so I end up calling UA directly, and booking and e-ticket ing over the phone.

I once tried calling the SE desk to have them book it for me, but was told that I must contact UA directly, and was provided with the no-status UA reservations 800 number. I also had a cooperative UA ticketing agent in ORF spend the better part of an hour trying several different ways to determine my status without my card. (It's OK. It was a very slow evening, with no one else in the queue.)

Academic

I think you may be right, Ken. My flights were all AC, although the return was handled by UA. I still don't understand why my status showed on my return segments. I had made the initial reservations last year when I was still with CP, so I assumed that was why status didn't show there. But it was a surprise to get UA BPs with AC*E on them. One day, I'll get my new Elite package and I won't have to worry about it.

Fly Boy

AC & UA, although imperfect, have a far more streamlined arrangement than exists with the other Star carriers. LH passes seem to only print the carrier's code + P

i.e. British Midland = BDP, Air Canada = ACP, and so on. Not having some sort of AC Star Gold card, even an expired one, creates hassles.