JerryBolton

Hi all,
I was looking for a little help/advice.
I have one month left to renew my Gold status and I'm on 1285 points. I normally travel in WTP, but as I've been having back issues this year the company agreed to fly me in CW. All good you think, but I missed nearly 6 months flying and now I'm playing catch up. To make things worse the company are now using their OnBusiness points to book me flights and I'm getting no tier points at all.
I'm off to PHX next week (using OnBusiness points again) so was looking at options from PHX to gain some points. but I cant find an option to earn 215 points for under £1000 (ideally I'd like to spend less.) Any ideas?
Also I could fly from the UK when I'm back, again I cant find any good tier point runs for my budget.
Any help gratefully received.
Jerry

teledude

exUK-LHR-TLL via HEL will net you 280TP and should cost alot less than £1000

Likely £500/£600 in the next month date dependant

Foltan

Most straightforward answer - a return First (I) flight with AA to the east coast (PHL, IAD, JFK etc) will be 280TPs and looks like it might be something along the lines of £800.

For something a bit different - do SJU via CLT and MIA for <£700 and a nice beach.

The cheap fares that people often use are usually a 28 day minimum booking, hence the options above aren't cheap. One way to save cash can be to get a reward flight to another airport that happens to have a cheap deal and run from there, bit it's extra hassle. Use this thread for ideas:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/premium-fare-deals-740/

But yes I agree that you should do the run in Europe - either TLL via HEL or JER to a Spanish region via LGW & MAD (PMI, TFN etc)

nux

Usually difficult to find good value TP runs from an AA hub.
Play around with ITA Matrix to East Coast cities including Canada.

ccurran88

for info - i think ba let you renew gold at 1430 tier points - they let me do this a couple years back. might be worth a call as it could save some cash

Paralytic

BA has changed a lot in a couple of years. I doubt you'd even be able to speak to someone who could make such a decision nowadays.

mikebg

I don't think anyone would be prepared to give you an assurance in advance, although there may be an unwritten policy to allow it after your year is up. So you would be taking a risk there.

ESFLYER95

Could try a status match with LATAM so you can continue to be Emerald. This is what I have done. I don't need it but its good for free upgrades on flights within South America.

JerryBolton

Thanks, sounds interesting. How did you "apply" to LATAM for status match?

This might work in conjunction with pleading with BA to remain gold even though I missed the points required becuase of illness. Although I'm due to have surgery soon on my back which will mean no flying at all for 3 to 4 months, so I'm like to keep that for next years renewal!

JerryBolton

Thanks, there are some good flight options for around the £600. Thanks again

ESFLYER95

I emailed [email protected] with copy of my BA gold card and statement. I also had a few LATAM bookings which I provided the booking references of which I don't know if made a difference.

12cheungtk1

Chiming in at this point. For a LATAM Pass status match first you'll have to open an account and deal with the IT Issues. Then book a flight with LATAM (I booked a basic economy fare on the MAD-FRA 5th freedom for £33 with tax).
Afterwards I checked in for the flight and emailed to the link ESFLYER95 posted in Spanish (there are samples on the internet) and attached the boarding pass. The status changed after 48 hours with no email notification.

However do note there are drawbacks to this scheme.
1. No more physical card
2. A match might not be approved
3. You'll have to change the FFP number every time you fly if you want to credit it to BAEC
4. LATAM have IT issues communicating with AA bookings. So status might not be recognised automatically