grrizzli

Last year I flew around 90K miles (plus enough EQM thanks to Aviator Silver to qualify for EXP) and paid around $6k for them. If I exclude taxes and fees to approximate EQD, then I had only about $5K "EQD" for my EXP re-qualification.

Naturally, I'm not trying to re-qualify for EXP this year. Plus playing the lottery with SWUs lost its appeal a few years ago.

enviroian

Good info, thanks. I fly the cheapest tickets for work and thank god AA is normally the choice that Concur shows. I'm at 125K EQM and $16,500 EQD YTD but that does include a $1700 ticket I bought to fly lax-doh-sin in J in February. All my tickets are cheap.

nrr

But LAS-LHR rt is under $800. [Separate cheapo LAX-LAS exist separately.]

pmblinn

Wrong. You will still be behind CKs.

eponymous_coward

Not everyone's flying to the UK, either.

*A UA/LX/AC/LH: SEA-ZRH, 373USD, <3cpm

http://www.secretflying.com/posts/ho...363-roundtrip/

http://www.secretflying.com/posts/se...522-roundtrip/

tom911

I bought a $532 BA SFO-LHR for January just a few days ago ($598 without the AARP discount). If you'd rather fly on AA the fare for the identical dates is $586 without any discounts.

tom911

I'll be one of those, walking away from AA EXP status after a nice 17 year run. i enjoyed the status a lot more before the US merger when I had a number of years with 100% domestic upgrade rates and 100% systemwide clearance (with the majority of those cleared at booking, something that is long gone now). Fortunately i have lifetime Platinum to fall back on when I do fly AA/One World.

I'm just not sure you'll do any better on upgrades or advance systemwide upgrade availability, though, and you should factor that into your decision. If you're a low revenue EXP, spending just enough to cross the $12,000 spending line, you'll be at the bottom of the list of EXPs requesting upgrades, and I haven't seen a lot of discussion this year about how rolling 12 month revenue has played into domestic upgrades.

355F1

I flew PHX-LHR for $488 RT in Feb.

I also flew PHX-CDG in March for $488 RT.

Flying LAX-ARN in January for $410RT.

javabytes

sfo-arn $548.
Lax-cdg $558.
Lax-ams $590.
Lax-mxp $563.
Lax-nce $599.
Lax-fco $577.
Lax-vce $588.
Sea-bru $482.
Sea-lux $443.
Sea-cph $464.
Sea-arn $450.
Sea-osl $537.
Sea-hel $501.
Sea-zrh $483.

theshortfinal

You can count me as one of those dropping off. Due to lose my EXP end of January. Just don't fly enough anymore.

nrr

The sea-zrh is cheaper than they are offering for jfk-zrh.
Two minor issues, AA does offer NS jfk-zrh, but not sea-zrh; many of the cheap flts to Europe connect through MAD, MAD has/had passport control issues = long waits.

GIGMIACDG

used to be EXP, last 2 years i was PLAT and this year i will be EXP
So, it will be at least one more EXP next year..

aztimm

As for finding cheap fares, there are plenty of threads in the mileage run forum with details. I try to look at least every few days, sometimes more often. Even if the best fare isn't listed from my city I'll try to piece something together and can usually get pretty close. In my experience, AUS usually has very competitive rates for international, as both AA and UA compete heavily here.

I don't think it is safe to say anything about the number of elites at any level. I'll be EXP for the first time ever (well I was a US CP several times), so I'll be another addition.

SiempreBCNJFK

I made EXP last year on $3500. It's possible.
I'm one of those who will lose EXP due to cheap exEU fares. Won't even have enough EQD for Platinum. I unfortunately have to switch to Delta as the have EQM waivers for non Americans.

george 3

With a planned work trip to PHX (in J) that will now be delayed to January, I'm going to come up short at between 95 and 96k unless an emergency work trip comes up. I've been EXP for six years and find its worth it, so regardless of the cost, I'm going to do a near term JFK LAX MR. There may be cheaper ways to go, but I want to avoid LGA and I don't want to do connections this time of year. I won't be high on the upgrade list at about a $15-$16k spend, but it will be high enough for some trips.

Bottom line is that its a perk that still is worth it to me, particularly for international leisure travel which I'm hoping to do three times next year.