aktchi

As has been emphasized repeatedly, the challenge is based not on miles but points. Gold and Platinum challenges require 5K and 10K points respectively. Various fare classes can give 0, 0.5, 1.0 or 1.5 points per mile flown: http://www.aa.com/aa/i18nForward.do?...quirements.jsp

For discounted economy, be sure to book in a class that awards 1.0 point/mile. Those are booking codes / booking classes / fare buckets H, K, M, L, W, V. If you search by Price and Schedule and click on Flight Details, you can see the booking code.

BTW, not only London but even a coast to coast rt can make you Gold. With creative routing, for example ORD-DFW-LHR-DFW-ORD, London can make you Platinum in one rt.

zipadee

I flew LGW-ORD and LIT-ORD-LIT to qualify for gold last year. I discovered the challenges via FT AFTER I had bought my ticket. My outbound was ORD-MUC on LH. I assumed (obviously wrongly) that since AA had sold me all the flights I'd get miles on all the segments. If I had known then what I know now I would have gone DFW-FRA or something else to mid-Europe on AA to have qualified for PLAT. (About once a day I kick myself for that stupid mistake/assumption) It's amazing how much more I know about flying now than I did this time last year. (But still not nearly enough. I just became cognizant of booking classes. Whoops). One word of advice. Once you get gold, you won't wanna go back and you'll be obsessive about it and this board. At least I am

bdemaria

Apologies if this sounds like kicking you when you are down, but just to clarify:

You can register for a challenge after a ticket has been purchased, just not after the flight has commenced. In other words, if you know that you will be flying a lot in October, you can purchase your tickets now, call in late Septebmer to begin the challenge on Oct 1 and then complete the challenge at that time. The purchase date of the tickets has nothing to do w/the challenge.

I add this only to clarify for others who might be reading.

zipadee

Right. I signed up while sitting in ORD and my LIT-ORD flight credited toward the challenge even though I had already flown because it hadn't posted yet. So that's not entirely correct to say you can't register after a flight has commenced. You can. It just can't have posted yet. I had tried registering while waiting at LIT but it was early enough the AAdvantage desk wasn't open yet. Hence why I did it in ORD. And the already flown flight counted.

My problem was I discovered the challenges AFTER I bought my ticket and one of my legs (ORD-MUC on LH) wouldn't count toward the challenge. Had I known beforehand, I would have bought a ticket that was either all AA metal or had a BA flight from LHR to MUC or something like that and signed up for a PLAT challenge. Cheers.

Fawxer

If you're doing a challenge, and you fly a short-haul, say 350 miles (assuming 1.0 EQP per mile, for simplicity) how many points would you receive? You would receive 500 miles, but would you receive 500 points? Or just 350 points?

(Sorry if this question is a repeat, but I couldn't find the answer in previous posts, couldn't find it in the pages I browsed, and "search this thread" didn't give me any answers. Actually, I found something posted from a few years back but wasn't sure that policies hadn't changed).

miamigrad

AA currrently features 500 EQM and 500 EQP minimums on AA coded flights (you need AA coded flights for challenges), provided that the flight earns miles.

Fawxer

Thanks for the quick answer!

oklAAhoma

Try searching this thread with the key words "500 minimum". You'll get lots of recent replies that cover your question.

steve32

Not accurate.

You can register for a challenge after you have flown, but in order for the flights to count you must be registered before the flights post in your AA account.

April 2006 I had already been registered for the Gold Challenge when I did my positioning flights to DFW, did 6 RTs (for FLY3 bonuses) between DFW/DAL-AUS and flew back two days later, took my Mom out to an early dinner, then drove that night down to Hilton Head, SC. Before going to sleep in the early morning (after checking that my flights had not posted yet), I made one last attempt calling AA and asking to sign up for the Platinum Challenge. All previous reps had seen the note in my account that I was already signed up for the Gold Challenge and told me that the switch would drop me out of the Gold Challenge (which I declined, thanked them, and hung up to call trying again later). This last time somehow I got chatty with the AA rep., and after a couple minutes of just chatting, got back to what I had called about--signing up for the Platinum Challenge. Either she had been distracted by the chatting, or I had schmoozed her enough, but she didn't mention my being signed up for the Gold Challenge, after a few keystrokes said I was signed up for the Platinum Challenge, and asked if I would like her to send me an e-mail with the rules of the challenge. I said yes and thanked her very much, and that was it. Within a day my flights started posting, and my promotion to Gold was noted a little more than halfway through.

A month later, on my second MR, I qualified for Platinum by challenge 19 miles before landing on my second leg on IAD-DFW-SJC-SAN-LAX-IAD in 23.5 hours on the DBL06 bonus (an extra 100% bonus RDM, giving 300% miles as Plat).

Steve

johnathome

I'm a newbie with AA. Mostly fly Continental and UA but have some long distance traveling on AA (or AA codeshare) this year (NY to London and Sydney back to NY in business). I was wondering about the challenges. Do I just call the AA desk and ask them?

Thanks

oklAAhoma

Yes .

IMH

To supplement oklAAhoma's accurate but extremely succinct response: yes, but do your research first (this thread and the Flyerguide Wiki). Key points are ensuring that your flights both (a) qualify and (b) earn sufficient EQPs. From the brief details you give, it sounds as though your planned flights should do the trick and comfortably get you to PLT.

bdemaria

There are number of posts in this thread that contradict your experience. The rules on challenges have been tightened and it is possible that what was possible for you in Spring 2006 may not possible in Summer 2008.

IMH

Indeed. And steve32 also tells us that he only got what he wanted after an agent had been sufficiently "distracted" or "schmoozed". I'm not casting any doubt on his account, of course, but it would be unwise for others to expect similar treatment - with or without schmoozing.

WanderingGent

Agreed. I completed the Plat Challenge in January of this year, and I was told by the Challenge Desk that I needed to sign up for the challenge before flying, not simply before flights that I had already taken had posted.