Home is IAH. School is Michigan State University. Guaranteed fly home for Spring Break. Everyone wants to go south for SB, I naturally live there. Lucky me!! Summer, Thanksgiving and Christmas are also trips home. This is my last semester in school so those trip will be ending soon.

My father and I own and operate a consulting business. Upon grad, there is the possibility that we will be frequenting South America and the remote possibility of work in Asia. This could be an opportunity to rack up miles on company money.

I do carry the Chase CO Debit Card which grants me first checked bag free.
Elite at all levels gets two bags free, no?

Can you please tell me how to gain silver for less than $1320? I live near EWR.. we used to take one discounted business class trip to Europe each year to get to Silver. Those eqms, along with our trips to Orlando, put us over 25K each year. But the expense was high. Thanks so much for your answer to this question.


We live near EWR in Monroe Township, Exit 8A on the turnpike. We can get to PHL in an hour and a half but parking is horrendous. (we get discounted handicapped parking benefits at Newark and the NYC airports). I want to get elite back but want to do it without a lot of hassle and also without a lot of bucks. In your post you say you can do it with one MR and you can do it cheaply out of PHL. Can you explain how? You can send me a PM if you feel better doing that. Thanks a lot!

Marylyn

Ahh,
Based on the intl flights, the baggage fees will be gone---not sure if your business is domestic too, but if the majority is international, then you start reducing the benefits to the 25% bonus and some EUAs, depending on destination; remember possible upgrades on Copa if you're going to cities served by them (ie, SCL, and Brazil if you're willing to go with a stop).

personally, I'm one to throw in a fun trip somewhere to get away while knowing it will rack up a bunch of miles. But if you're unsure of the benefits you'd get from it, then I wouldn't do any more than that. For example, I missed elite by a few thousand (3?) miles about a little over a year ago. I didn't think it would matter, since I didn't plan to travel, but found out on jan 10th that I'd be on a 20k trip to HKG. I was sort of pissed off at myself for not just doing the MR somewhere over the winter break.

You can fly EWR-DUB ($299 all-in right now) 4 times to get Silver status for under $1200. It's hardly worth it, IMO...

In years where my travel has been scant, I've just waited until later in the year to see what I need to make it... and decided whether it was worth it with that knowledge in hand.

Is it worth it to spend $1000+ to get to Silver? I don't think so. If you have the first bag fee waived already, I don't see strong financial motivators to spend that much for Silver. Tiny elite bonus, "premium" seats, early boarding, elite desk, and occasional upgrades aren't worth that to me if I don't really have the money. But if you find yourself a few thousand miles short, that's a different story! Then a carefully chosen run could finish things up for very little, and maybe you'll get a fun trip out of it.

I frequently finish my year with a trip to Florida or California just to get a few more miles. A few days on the beach isn't such a hardship...

Bags -- and if you're lucky enough to steal an upgrade you get three.

I still stand by what I wrote earlier: they're ways to make these things pay for themselves, and it's often an easier trick to pull off at the high end of the spectrum (Plat / 1k / EXP) than the low side.

FYI -- you can bag plat for $2,392 based on EWR-DUB alone. (8 of those $299 r/ts)

tell me Tommy, how many mainline CO flights don't fly into or out of IAH/CLE/EWR?

47

It doesn't matter and my point is still valid. If the guy has family in ANC but goes to school in SEA I bet there is a damn good chance he often gets upgraded if that's the route he flies.

Also, legs that originate in certain non-hub cities that connect to hubs may also have a better chance of getting upgrades. Unless of course you believe there is a large concentrations of elites and/or people flying into/out of cities like Des Moine, Omaha or Witchita.....or maybe Kansas City. Yeah, I bet there are a lot of Golds and Plats in Kansas.

I just looked at the CO Flexible Schedule. I am going to be in MCO from Feb 26-March 6th so those days are out. I only see one date in March, none in April, May etc.

EWR-DUB = 6386 EQMs or 11.75 trips

8 will get you Gold not Plat

also the EWR-DUB run at the $299 fare ai = .047 cents per EQM, not great nor bad, just nothing special like the SFO-BFS fare was. And seems you need to be there over the weekend, BFS was w/o a weekend stay

LAX or SFO will yield 12400/11975 for $382, due to a couple of commitments I cant do a BDL-EWR-SFO-IAH-EWR-DUB run as I did with BFS Both LAX/SFO comes in at the 3 cent mark. Out of the NY area BDL-EWR-SFO is $254 while EWR-LAX is $260

I believe you need to be there over a Sat and I would assume mid March (close to Paddys day) it will not be found at all. keep in mind CO has 2 flights per day that leaves at night , so a Sat departure counts as a Sat stay

what about upgrades for lax to ewr thursday afternoons? and return flight is sunday evening. is a silver elite upgrade plausible?

Transcons are tough, even for Plats. EWR-LAX often sells out in F. I wouldn't count on it.

So I should do several EWR -LAX runs to make gold or platinum. Is that what you are saying? That's a lot easier than Belfast or Dublin.