Need some opinions. I travel only for pleasure and pay out of my own pocket. I can reach Gold status by flying 10 flights, 6 segments each, approx. $140 per flight. I would do these trips only to reach status. In addition to these trips, I would probably fly 4-6 times through the rest of this year. Next year i'd probably fly to Europe(2-3times), Calif.(3-4 times), Florida(5-6 times), plus whatever i'd need to maintain status. I'd, most likely, do this every year. Are the upgrades, bonus miles, and other perks worth the cost and expense of attaining and maintaining gold status.

IMHO, I would say no. If you economize and pay for your own travel, it would not be worth it to obtain Gold status, only to see your status as worthless when sale and cheaper fares become available on other airlines. If you prefer a particular airline, then try to be loyal and if 'elite happens', so be it. If you can afford to pay 1st class for your leisure travel, of course you would have all the benefits of elite status so you would consider pursuit of it a trivial matter.

What airline are you talking about? I think you need to find out from particular "gold" members of that airline. Much of my UA 1K is leisure travel, and I can't even imagine flying anymore if I'm not either at least a Premier Exec on UA, or using miles or paying for a premium class on another airline. It's not that I receive such great service all the time, but its how I see the masses being treated.

It seems from what I personally see and also read that you need to be in the second tier up for any real benefit from most airline programs. Happy flying.

If you were trying to reach status on AA, the challenge (threads elsewhere) would be a better choice. I don't think it is worth flying that much to reach status. I flew one extra trip at the end of last year to achieve gold - spending $199 was worth it - went to LAX from ORD, through DFW. Got double miles because of promotions - so got about 9000 miles in addition to achieving status, saw a friend and went to a great conference. I flew this year to Brussels for the week-end to achieve the platinum challenge for a really cheap fare. With all the regular flying you are planning to do next year, why not achieve your status that way, rather than before . Personally I don't think it is worth spending $1400 to achieve status.

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DtG

The gold (50K) level is well worth it on United. You get treated much better and have an excellent chance of upgrades (though you'll have to buy extra certs because you don't get enough free ones if most of your travel is domestic).

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10 flights x 6 segs will give you 60 segs, which is Plat on AA. If I had the some, I'd be booking some of those flts that your talking about (specifically, the summer sale w/ AA)

Yeah, for $1000 you can buy status with an American Express Platinum card !!

(This card, which is different from a Platinum Optima card, has been very controversial. There were numerous threads over in the Amex file !)

Having said all that, taking an extra trip or two to finish out the end of year as a higher tier elite IS generally worth it (as Randy will tell us in November or December).

Actually, Wombat's referring to the AmEx Centurion card. It has a $1,000 annual fee and gives you gold status on CO, DL and maybe another carrier. It really isn't an option, as it is incredibly difficult to obtain. Supposedly, there are only a few hundred people who have it in the entire U.S.

The Platinum card has a $300 fee but no elite benefits, and you have to have one of those and spend a lot on it before you MAY be able to qualify for the Centurion.

Unfortunately it's the Centurion AmEx, not Platinum, that costs $1000 and you airline status. It's a lot harder to qualify for Centurion.

And a matter of terminology: each airline has its own names for its elite frequent flyer levels. "Gold" is first-tier with American, second-tier with Delta, and doesn't figure at all in United's naming scheme. So using that term can be confusing.

As for the original question: if you're not going to fly enough on an ongoing basis to maintain some sort of elite status, the perks probably aren't worth the cost of qualifying. You're going to take ten weekends and sit in airplanes. If you like sitting in airplanes, fine, but in terms of tangible benefits you'd come out ahead spending the same amount of time flipping burgers for those folks with the arches. And your elite status will expire at the end of next year unless you repeat the process.

If you WILL fly a lot on an ongoing basis starting next year, and it will or can be on AA, dgordon's suggestion makes a lot of sense. (You can generally only do their challenge once.) I don't think other airlines have anything like this, though.

Next year, it looks like you'll probably accumulate something like 35-40,000 miles from the trips you listed. That will give you first-tier elite status in most US programs. The most important difference in tangible benefits between first-tier and second-tier is the higher mileage bonus, typically 100% vs. 25% of miles flown.

So, say you fly 40,000 necessary miles each year. Should you fly another 10,000 miles to reach second-tier? Assuming a steady-state situation where this recurs each year, you'd get another 50,000 miles per year for doing so: the difference between 40,000 with a 25% bonus and 50,000 with a 100% bonus. Those are worth about $1,000. If you can fly the extra 10,000 for less than $1,000, which should be easy, you should do it.

You can do a similar calculation for qualifying on segments instead of miles, or on any other scheme such as AA points.

And, if you do qualify, the extra benefits (like getting into the upgrade line ahead of first-tier elites) are gravy.

By the way, where did you find six-segment flights for $140? Some of the other folks who qualify on segments might like to know!

Also, I think it is also important to figure how many miles you are getting for your $140 each trip. If your $1400 gave you enough miles for several tickets, that's another thing to consider. If each segment gives you a minimum of 500 miles, you book on-line for another 1000, then 10 trips gives you at least 40,000 miles. I just figured that my two trips to Brussels while AA had their bonus, one a fare at $279, one at $338 (in addition used 25% off coupons on the first and "bumped vouchers" on the second) netted about 72000 miles besides giving me platinum.(AA gave me and my husband EACH 9000 miles for a 2 1/2 hour delary on the tarmac for an oil leak. Didn't even have to write a letter - they just gave it. Now THAT was worth the extra week-end flight to Brussels over President's day week-end. My extra trip in the fall by giving me Gold, contributed because i was able to get enough miles on that first trip to Brussels (before Mar 1) to give 4 upgrades which I traded for 10,000 miles ( counted in that 72000). But in each case, only "one" more flight made the difference, and I did it really cheaply. I don't know if I would have done it otherwise unless there were places I wanted to go or people I wanted to see anyway.

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DtG

I agree that the status is well worth it, especially if you can achieve whatever your airline calls its second level (usually 50,000 actual flight miles), which shouldn't be too hard given that your projected travel adds up to ~45,000 miles.

Granted, that will mean locking yourself into just one airline. But as another post pointed out, it also means the difference between 50,000 miles with 100% bonus vs. 40,000 with 25% bonus (or less, if the 40k is split among airlines you have no elite status on). That extra 50,000 miles, not to mention the potential upgrades on the domestic legs, are well worth the inconvenience of sticking with a single airline.

As for the comment that locking yourself in means you would miss out on special fare offers, I've found that most fares get matched pretty quickly, so even if another airline comes out with something attractive, just call your airline and you'll probably get a quote close enough to be worth it (and at 50,000 extra miles per year, that's worth upwards of $1,000 extra fares per year right there. I doubt you'd have to spend that much extra, though - I spend about $6,000 total per year for just over 100,000 flight miles).

As Punki put it in another thread, her husband used to fly cheapest and most direct. But a few upgraded flights with her made him see the light; he's already reached Premier Executive (50,000 miles) and is making noises about 1K status (100,000 miles). Of course, Punki can be a pretty persuasive gal...especially when she's right (as she definitely is here).

Good luck, and enjoy the perks!