fieldeng

yes and no.

Soxfan15

Is the best way to speak to someone who may be willing to waive the fee is to call AAdvanage customer service or is there another department that you know of who will be more able to help? While I am not sure if someone will be willing to waive the fee, I assume it is worth a try because I do have status on Delta an have quite a bit of upcoming travel planned For points alone, I should be earning a little over 20K in the next month or so. I think I will end up falling a little short of platinum unless I do a challenge. Any advice on who to contact?

fieldeng

I haven't heard of a case where they waive the fee. It's part of the upfront agreement of wanting that challenge. It's like signing up for Amex Plat and trying to get them to waive the fee. You signed up for it. They didn't sign you up. As a rule, AA doesn't do matches. The exceptions are 1) Corporate agreement with AA 2)the recent 1k/DM match to EXP. There was a 2 day period where they oops'd and matched to AA gold and Plat but they rescinded that shortly after when the flood of match requests became overwhelming.

Soxfan15

Okay thanks for the update. Does AA ever grant status during the challenge, if the passenger has booked enough travel already to reach the 10K points. I will most likely pay and signup for the challenge but it would be nice to have status during my international flights so I could benefit from lounges.

JDiver

Generally not. You need to have earned 10,000 points in your flying (within three months) to be granted Platinum status - which would normally "cost" you 50,000 miles or points to gain. (Shoot, for someone flying B, Y or higher, that's flying 6,667 miles - though for someone flying deep discounted coach fares, it's 20,000 miles flown; they prefer a flyer who will give them some significant revenue.)

Basically, with no high status from another airline to match (UA is the only one I believe they are matching anyway at the moment), and not much flying history on AA, the Challenge is a shortcut where they are granting you a onetime exception and shortcut to status.

There is no Executive Platinum Challenge.

We'll move this line of questioning to the Challenge thread soon. /Mod hat on

ahcjar103

when i did my platinum challenge they gave me temporary gold as i had booked travel that showed i was completing the entire thing in one trip.

rodsren

I (after writing into the President of Aadvantage, maybe I should have to Marketing) requested an Exec. Plat. Challenge (current Plat. for life.) They gave me 25K EQP or 50 K EQmiles (deep discount tickets). I will see how it works, but I was given 90 days. They called me within 12 hour of my sending the letter (I also sent in a snapshot of a UA Silver status saying that I was really perturbed by them offering UA's the World and not offering loyal AA passengers anything, if they were already platinum. Once I got that I also wrote an e-mail to the person I talked to saying that UA 3 MM gets 1K for life, delta Plat. at 4MM for life. Above the Platinum level, there is only 2 SWU's for every million miles. Maybe they will revamp that program too. Feel free to private me if you need more info, if I put much more up it will more than likely ID me

JDiver

Yes, well, congratulations, it seems you earn 50k EQM you get EXP - but you'd have to do that in addition to the 50K you have to fly for Platinum anyway. So you earn a shortcut to EXP (25K EQP inste ad of 50K you'd have had to earn otherwise) if you fly this year, essentially. Not bad for a few minutes of writing, I guess. (I'd guess this offer was not crafted by Mr. Horton.)

As to the rest, IMO you are talking about apples, oranges and peaches.

Until recently, any and all miles (bonus miles, credit card miles, EQ miles earned on any qualifying flight, AAdvantage dining miles, etc. etc.) all qualified for million mile benefits (8 stickers or 4 SWUs if domiciled overseas) plus Lifetime Gold, and 4 SWUs plus lifetime Platinum for 2MM, 4 SWUs every further million mile node. So if AA had an EXP offering at, say, 5MM, those with aspirational ideas could buy their way lifetime EXP without ever actually flying.

I do not recall UA and DL ever offered EQ / MM qualifying miles for masses of credit card miles, so they can be a bit more liberal in allowing lifetime high status to those who achieve 3MM or 4MM (respectively).

Maybe the "New" AA will add lifetime EXP at some appropriate time.

I am not sure what you are saying with "Above the Platinum level, there is only 2 SWU's for every million miles" - with AA's MM program, one earns 4 SWUs crossing each Million Miles threshold. You would prefer two? (OK, fine; get your four and give me two... )

JDiver

This thread is obsolete. The 2014 / 2015 status match challenges offered to flyers from United Airlines is here: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...solidated.html

Our apologies for any inconvenience.

/Moderator