298 EQMs missing, help needed
 

I am about to fly my second transatlantic flight this year, after which I will have more than 30,000 EQMs. The problem is that when I always fly back I carry more than 50lbs, and without Elite status I will be forced to pay $25 a bag on overweight. A good solution would be being Elite before I fly back, but apparently I will have only 24,702 EQMs before boarding the inbound flight, leaving me with 298 EQMs short.

Any ideas? I figured that it's not worth a Mileage Run since I can't imagine it will be cheaper than $50 (2 bags * $25 each)... My route is TLV-EWR-PBI, FLL-EWR-TLV.

Thanks,
Dan.

The ideal way would have been to pad the outbound mileage (e.g., TLV-EWR-CLE-PBI).

But if you can't change your route at this point, try calling the OPSC when your outbound miles post. It may work.

I've been told that they will consider such requests only when you are within 1000 miles of whatever you are asking for. Since you will be, I'd suspect this approach will work.

Yeah, they used to do this, though I've heard that they've been cracking down on it. Not sure why, it seems like a reasonable courtesy if someone is within striking distance of the next level, and has imminent travel already booked (or in this case, in progress).

Thanks a lot. Anyone has recent experience with such issue that got it from CO?

Channa's right. It never hurts to ask. CO was very lenient in my case. I was not quite at the point where I would requalify for Silver when CO accepted my request to be upgraded to Gold!--though I did have bookings out the wahzoo; I'm sure that helped. :cool:

Ok, after calling for the first time and asking for the Silver status I was declined... After I saw my last flight's miles were posted in my account, I decided to try again... This time there was a reasonable person to speak to, and she obviously understood that she can get a customer happier just by waiving the 300 miles (AND knowing that I will fly them in 5 days). It worked!

Thank you all for your help.

Think about it again. Maybe you don't need those 50 pounds after all.
Almost everything is now the same price in Israel, so why bother buying it here?

The limit is 50lbs per bag. And you can have two bags (for 100lbs total). So instead of fretting about EQMs, just buy a cheap bag and spread out your 70lbs of stuff between two of them.

First, it's not like I'm shopping my brains out in the US. Second, apparently u haven't been in Israel for quite a while... (or in America 4 quite a while).

True, but what happens if I already have two bags over 50 lbs.?
Regardless, why lose all the perks of a possible complimentary upgrade, priority security screening, priority baggage tags, etc?