per4mer

I've been Elite most of my working career, usually E75K or SE. I always earned my status on segments rather than miles, so have no million mile Elite for Life eligibility. I retired in 2017 and my personal travel won't get me to E35K. Other than begging a current SE to grant me there unused E50K benefit, are there any other paths to Elite status for a retired road warrior? Thanks!

Jumper Jack

Bro

That's a pretty big ask lol, you are pretty much asking them to give up 50 eup which is easily worth 750 to 1000 bucks

yyznomad

Withdraw more from your RRSP to fund Flight Pass purchases? You'll have to pay more income tax though.
Crappy advice, but it works.

KDS777

If you can wing it, two long haul trips in paid J..................that's all I need to do on United to hit Gold (E50 on AC) each year.

mapleg

No offense but that is one heck of a request. . Any status I earn on AC comes out of my own pocket....all of it. No business flights whatsoever and if I am going to give some perks away, family members come first.

How many Elite status gifts did you give away in your working career to people you don't know?

yyznomad

expert7700

Speaking of self-funded travel and status, if you want a laugh go to the Southwest forum

Many FTers get 91% of the way to companion pass status simply by signing up for 2 credit cards. That means, unlimited buy 1 get 1 free tickets for 23 months. Any fare basis, even if the 'paid' traveller redeems miles.

Then they want FTers, many whom are travel veterans doing 50-100 paid flights a year, to help them get the rest of the way there without ever booking a single paid flight.

Fiordland

I have a slightly different problem. I earned my K35k spending avion points. Company card that has high spend. Due to changes in how avion rewards are awarded I am not going to make status on AC anymore. I am going over to WestJet and Delta for most of my travel coupled with an AMEX Platinum card for lounge access.

There is always the AMEX Aero Platinum cards for lounge access if you want to stay with AC.

If you are willing to go over to dark side (well teal side), the AMEX regular Platinum provides access in the lounges in the correct area of the airport. An RBC Mastercard provides free baggage and upgraded status on the airline with teal on its tail. (Now that AC is painting black masks on its aircraft would that not make it the dark side, however I am getting off topic).

longtimeflyin

If eligible I'd suggest the original poster to look at the Infinite privilege visa cards

SparseFlyer

Easiest way is to spend $6,000 with AC and getting either 50,000 AQM or 45 AQS.

MasterGeek

and why should you get more sympathy over someone who never had it and would like to experience it one year, just because you were SE in the past ?

songsc

How far are you to MM? It may worth it if you are close to MM and expect to continue travelling for a long time. You just need to estimate how much does E50K worth for you and how many years do you expect to travel on AC. Then simple math from there.

Many credit cards gives you "pseudo" E50K benefits, at the cost of annual fees. Again once you know how much you value the benefits it's simple math.

It's also easy to just book two TPAC round trips in J and you will have just enough AQD and AQM for E50K. Assuming you are relatively free, it should be easy to find cheap P fares and take advantage of them.

yul36

How do you get upgraded status on WS with the RBC card. True you get 1 free bag. But there is no seat selection for free, and no priority boarding. Two things that might make the card worthwhile.

YXUFlyboy

You could always do what I do and just pay for J tickets. Most of the perks, less of the hassle ;-) If you're not making E35k on personal travel you're not travelling that much anymore anyway. Let it go and be happy to be on the ground more!

somedude3210

After hearing about the Avion changes for AC, I just used Avion points for UA tickets. Earned AQM for flights as recent as October.