ANC

Can you earn miles and segments towards status if you buy a ticket and do web checkin but then dont actually go to the airport and board the plane? Or do you have to be scanned at the gate and get on the boarding manifest to actually receive credit and miles for the flights?

Punki

I have earned millions of miles without flying, but, to the best of my knowledge, the only way one can earn "butt in seat miles" (commonly called BIS miles) is to put one's butt in the seat.

jackal

Unfortunately, no. You must actually board the plane and have your boarding pass scanned (or the agent must otherwise input it into the computer) in order to receive flight credit.

Unlike some other airlines (e.g. UA and their EQM bonuses for using the Platinum Class Visa Signature), AS also does not offer any other way (AFAIK) to receive elite qualifying miles. You must sit your butt in the seat to earn status. (Many around here would say that's how it should be!)

However, an extension of this question: what if you started to walk down the jetway and then turned around and walked back out--and no one noticed? As far as their system would know, you had boarded the aircraft.

I'm sure there are security protocols to prevent this from happening, since this could possibly be a terrorism risk (although we've all seen that terrorists are not stopped by the mere threat of death...), but I'm sure it could be done...

gba

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows CE; IEMobile 6.12) Sprint:PPC6800)

If your flight is cancelled and you are rebooked on a non-partner carrier you can still (with luck) get AS EQMs without flying AS.

IStream

This happened to me once. Our Beijing to Tokyo flight on NWA was seriously delayed by fog on the ground in Beijing. By the time we made it to NRT, the SEA-bound flight had left. NWA got us seats in the back of a Singapore 747 that was going to SEA from somewhere in India via NRT. Lo and behold, I got NWA credit for the Singapore leg since it was still technically an NWA flight. I wasn't sure whether or not is was a mistake, but I didn't complain.

BLI-Flyer

You can achieve elite status on AA for accumulating 1 million miles (Gold AAdvantage) or 2 million miles (Platinum AAdvantage) from any source (credit cards, flowers, rental cars, hotels, etc.) without ever having set foot on a plane.

ANC

thanks for the replies. I didnt think you could but it was worth asking. I have to make 4 segments by March 15 to be gold for 2008. I woulda been a lot simpler if I actually didnt have to haul my butt to a seat