"buying" elite status?
 

I never quite come close enough to get status on the airlines, but other than doing mileage runs, is there a way to "buy" your status?

Here's the thing - I am a business owner and on me and the other owners business credit cards, we charge probably $200k a year combined. They are NOT mileage cards, but I was thinking about getting them.

I fly about 10 times a year, mostly in the continental US on business, and I go to Europe 2-3 times a year, on business and pleasure.

If I get a business credit card, is it possible to have the miles go to a different person than the cardholder? I do most of the purchasing on my card, so if I got an awards card, I could probably get better status, but I also fly a fair bit so I may not need as much help, whereas I could use my purchasing to maybe get status for my father or brother using my CC points and have them deposit to someone else's account?

Finally, is there a way to get points by buying airline tickets if you don't end up using the ticket? What I mean is, if I was 10k miles short, I'd not mind buying a couple round trip tickets from BOS->LAX and back, but honestly I dont really have the time to take the flights. It seems the airline is mostly concerned with selling the tix, but I don't think they give miles if your butt isn't on the plane, right? So other than using a miles credit card, is there another way to get miles that doesn't include having to take a mileage run?

Thanks!

Other than US Air, who lets you earn 10k miles/yr towards elite status from their cc's, I'm not aware of any other airlines that let you earn EQM's via creditcard, only via flying.

And you can't just by tickets and earn the miles, you have to actually fly the segments.

Same with DL Amex, 10k MQM's if you spend over 25K. Several other airline affinity cards are similar.

The AZ amex gives double or triple EQM's (depending on which card) on euro spent on AZ flights.

credit card - starwood amex
charge cards - amex and diners club

i recommend getting one or multiple

I know that UA and AA both have prepaid travel cards that you can buy and automatically earn status, depending on how much you buy. So if you know you're going to spend $20000 on *A airlines over the next year, why not get the 1K status right away?

The last couple of years, United has offered a pre-paid travel card that grants you status. It's $5000 for Premier (2P), $10,000 for Premier Executive (1P), and $20,000 for 1K.

https://secure.unitedmileageplus.com/MP0603TH.jsp

The United Chase Platinum card allows you to get the following in the first year: 25K RDM, 5K EQM (both on sign-up), then an additional 5K EQM for purchases on ual.com for travel (mathced 1 to 1), and 5K EQM for 35K spent on the card in a calendar year.

Thus, if you got the card in January, you could earn 15K EQM on the Plat card, which is 10K EQM short of Premier status, UAs lowest elite level. The card costs $140 per year.

I must be confused on something.

I was looking at the Citibank Business card which says it allows you to get up to 150,000 miles per year. I understood that to be 1 mile for each dollar you spend, right? So if I am doing $150,000 in purchases and then some on the card, then I would get 150,000 miles.

I also was looking at AA's website (the plan I prefer) and they mention that you must fly 4 qualifying segments per year - no problem because I probably average 20 segments a year. But those 20 segments are in the USA and probably total 20,000 miles total. If I could get 150,000 miles from Citibank using their business card, I could get 170,000 miles - putting me in executive platinum.

Or if not, what am I missing?

I read somewhere that Citibank gives 2:1 ($2 for each mile) points on debit card purchases, or 1:1 if you "upgrade" to a different kind of debit card. So I could move my petty cash account over to Citibank and give employees debit cards and (hopefully) I could reap the points. It would not be a ton but probably adds up to several thousand $$ a year.

Or is the only way to get exec platinum to actually fly 150,000 miles a year on the actual plane?

EDIT: I think I get it - you guys are saying that the miles generated from CC purchases are not "qualifying" miles that go towards your status, but rather miles that can only be "spent" on free tickets and the like, yes?

AA has an undocumented benefit whereby 1,000,000 miles FROM ANY SOURCE get you lifetime Gold status. With your purchasing pattern, you could do that in 5 years or even less. For example, the AA Citi Business MC gets you double miles for AA ticket purchases (2 miles per dollar). And the Starwood AMEX card lets you turn 20,000 points into 25,000 miles.

That is correct. They are two different sets of "miles".

I thought it was well-documented. Also, 2,000,000 miles will get you lifetime Platinum.

It may be well-documented on FT and other websites, but it's not officially documented on AA.

AA's prepaid travel card offer expired on August 31.

Mike

Yowza - this sounds promising! Is there a level where you get lifetime exec platinum? And if I had lifetime gold, do I only need to earn the difference between gold and platinum to get platinum, or do I need to earn the whole lot? I mean, gold is 25k miles, platinum is 50k miles. If I get lifetime gold, an I also get 25k qualifying miles, do I get platinum or do I need to earn 50k even though I am already gold?

If I concentrated on pushing most of our purchasing through awards CC's, I could probably get $500k a year, and wouldn't be too long to get platinum.

I used to work at a place years ago that required employees taking company-paid biz trips to give the miles to the company. Are miles transferred from others considered qualifying miles? Or does it include cases where I buy the ticket but it's in another persons name? I.e. company pays for Bob and Sarah to go to a show in Seattle but the points are retained by the company because during the booking it asked which FF account to use and I put my account in since I'm purchasing the tix? Or do the miles only go to the actual traveler as qualifying miles?

Thanks for the info - sorry if I seem green, but I *really* appreciate the benefits of these programs and it seems an easy way to make life easier without doing much different than we do right now.

amex starwood credit card would require $1.6MM spending to get lifetime plat on AA
or $2MM on diners club charge card

amex centurion also comes with DL, CO, US gold. $250K/yr spend on amex plat to qualify for it, $2500/yr annual fee.

1) There is no such thing as lifetime EXP, other than by meeting the annual requirements for EXP every year until you die.

2) Having lifetime Gold does not reduce or eliminate the requirement for 50k Q-miles/Q-points in a year for PLT (or 100k Q-miles/Q-points for EXP). It gives you the benefits, not a head start towards a higher level of qualification.

Mike

You seemed to be asking about airline status, but there are also hotel status you can get which may be of interest to you:

Starwood Gold (1st level in a 2 level program): $30K in a calendar year with a Starwood AmEx
Hilton Gold (2d level in a 3 level program): $20K in a calendar year with a Hilton HHonors AmEx

At least for the Hilton, qualifying via the credit card acts exactly the same as doing it through hotel stays during a calendar year. That defines when the status expires based on their program rules.

nowhere near as valuble as airline status but also

starwood gold - amex plat
hilton gold - citi chairman

Based on a 25k requirement and the travel patterns the OP stated I am not sure why you would not earn elite staus unless you are spreading these trips across several airlines.

Perhaps the OP just doesn't fly enough...

If you can't scrape together 25k miles in a year to earn basic status then you really have to ask yourself is it worth having status?

Well, I do fly enough - just that I often do it with different airlines. For example, I am flying to Finland next month, Germany in December, and starting in January I do my trade shows - 8 in the USA in CA, WA, TX, AZ, IL, FL, GA and OH. I live in MA so that's a fair amount of flying, although it may not come out to 25k miles unless I focused on getting it all with the same airline, and then often I'd be paying much higher ticket prices or flying sub-optimal routes just for the miles.

On the other hand, if I can get platinum for life just by routing purchases I would be making anyway through specific credit cards, why not?

For the 10 or so times that I fly a year, bumps to first class would be nice, as would quicker boarding and lower prices on lounge membership. Additionally, with that many miles I'd likely get two RT 1st class tickets a year, or I could take a European trip 1st class each year - not bad for $$ I'm spending anyway.

Yes, most airline affinity credit cards have a limit to miles that can be earned per calendar year. To my knowledge, the SPG card does not. If you concentrate your spending on this card, you can do two things:

Get SPG Gold status after 30k spend
If you transfer the SPG points to AA miles, you can get AA Gold after 800k spend. There is no fee to transfer these points.

DC has a tax to convert their points to miles, as does Amex.

If you charge that much and could use an AmEx-family card at those places, you might look into an AmEx Centurion card. It's not cheap, you may have to establish a track record with a lower-level AmEx card before you can get it, but it comes with mid-tier status in a few airlines. Lots of threads on it in the AmEx forums.

Airlines will only give miles to the traveler, not to someone else he/she designates. The way those deals generally work is that the miles go into the employee's account, the company tracks how many miles the employee should earn through business travel, and requires him/her to get an award ticket for his/her next trip (or for someone else's) when the balance is high enough. No miles are transfered, so the question about transfering miles is moot.

Some airlines (e.g., but not only, AA) have small business programs where a company can also earn points (not FF miles, a different kind of points) for its employees' travel. The award list for those sometimes includes elite status for someone who otherwise wouldn't have it. Company points are in addition to, not instead of, regular FF credit for the traveler.

again, OP could spend $250K on an amex plat, and you can get cent for $2500 a year.

comes with DL CO US gold status.

http://www.delta.com/skymiles/about_...ance/index.jsp
http://www.continental.com/web/en-US...e/default.aspx
http://usairways.com/awa/content/div...s/default.aspx

thats mid tier on DL and CO, but lower on US. only star alliance silver.

Unfortunately, until you get elite status, there's a limit to how many miles you can earn each year using the credit card. I think it's 50K. Once you are Gold or better, all the limits are removed.

For what it's worth, the AA Million Miler benefits are fairly well-documented - well enough that AA sent me materials on company letterhead about it along with luggage tags that say "Million Miler" on them. When people say it's "undocumented", perhaps they mean it isn't listed on the web page that lists the usual Gold/Plat/Explat qualifying rules, but you can rest assured that if you hit 1MM today, AA will send you your Lifetime Gold letter without you having to know a secret handshake something like that. ;)

credit and charge cards that allow you to transfer points into frequent flyer programs have NO limits.

starwood amex, amex green/gold/plat/cent with membership rewards, diners club

Plus, at the risk of flogging an already-dead horse, SPG Amex gives you more flexibility and a higher yield than typical mileage cards.

Best case: you use some or most of your points on hotel stays. It's relatively easy, even for a modest midscale guest at Sheratons and the like, to justify Starpoints as 3 cents apiece in real cash return. If you are already spending a lot of money on higher-end hotels, the returns can be even higher.

Worst case: you can't find enough need for hotel stays, and you convert them to air miles at at least the same rate ($1 - 1 mile) as you'd get with the airlines' own cards. And although I wouldn't advise burning large chunks of Starpoints on miles, if you have to do it in 20k increments, you get 1.25 miles/$.

You have many airlines to choose from. The only major "catch" that might affect some is that UA is not on the list of 1:1 carriers. (I think UA is 2 SPG to 1 mile, an absolutely horrific conversion rate.) But...as long as you aren't married to UA, that's not a showstopper. Sounds like you're talking AA. They are on the list of 1:1 carriers.

the horse needs to be flogged :)

starwood amex, amex charge cards, and diners club charge card are all VERY good cards with the ability to earn as much as you want and transfer to a number of programs.

you cannot go wrong with any of them. and many of us have multiple :P

Lifetime Platinums
 

So corprorate666, I guess you are looking for a FFP which grants you lifetime platinum status.
Here I have some suggestions for you :

StarAlliance :

BMI : First you need 16,000miles to become a silver member, once done, you have to fly 38,000miles to get gold status.
And then you need 38,000miles/year to remain a gold member.
For being a gold member ten consecutive years, you'll get lifetime gold(platinum?)
BMI is VERY generous to business class and first class guests. (*2.0 and *3.0 each) So you'll need to fly only 19,000miles/year in business.

Asiana : First you need 100,000 miles to become a diamond member. (equals StarAlliance Gold) REGARDLESS HOW LONG IT TAKES.
Your status remains three years, and you need 40,000miles within those three years. I think it will be no problem for you even if you only fly economy and cannot concentrate on StarAlliance carriers.
Once you have one million miles, you have the lifetime platinum status.
Asiana isn't that generous towards business and first fliers, (*1.25 and *1.5 each) but once you achieved the diamond status, it's extremely easy to remain diamond until you get that lifetime platinum.

Asiana is recommended if you plan to get status at SkyTeam and OneWorld at the same time. Getting 40,000miles in every three years is really easy.


Lufthansa : You need insane amounts of miles and have to be over 60 years old in order to get lifetime status. Those Krauts must be kidding. I'll pass.
(Played too much "Company of Heroes" recently. :p )
(To Germans : Es tut mir leid mit "Krauts". Im obigen Spiel, das Gespraech in Deutsch in der zweiten Mission ist falsch uebersetzt. "Dein Frass ist unter aller Kanone....usw")


SkyTeam :

Korean Air : Being Korean carriers both, Korean Air's and Asiana's FFP are quite similar. The only, but huge difference is that Korean Air grants you Elite status at 500,000 miles!!!! It's insane IMO.
On the brighter side, once you join the Million Miler's Club, it's a lifetime status.

Air France & KLM : 70,000miles/year for platinum. Ten years platinum, lifetime platinum. Enough said.


OneWorld :

I have no idea. You are on your own.


The decision is yours. I hope it was of some help for you.

cya

Also, the AMEX Centurion card ($2500/ year) gets you US, CO, and DL mid-tier status.

Get a French bank account, get a French Flying Blue Amex and all purchases count toward status miles, which get you status with Skyteam. (Not a realistic suggestion, but I did want to point out that the Flying Blue Amex is one of the few cards I'm aware of where purchases get you status miles.)

How close do you live to Canada? You could get a CIBC Aeroplan card with Maple Leaf Club privileges, and this would give you business class check-in and lounge access for Air Canada (which has a good international network), with some check-in and lounge access benefits for code shares with United up to Canada. A silly suggestion if you live in Miami, but not out of the question if Toronto, Vancouver or Montreal would be decent hubs for your international travel.

Get a cash back card and use the money to do some long international mileage runs. You'll get status quick enough.

That's part of the problem - you're apparently thinking "same airline" when you should be thinking "same alliance". Pardon me if you already know this and I'm being Mr. Obvious, but are you familiar with the three major airline alliances: Star Alliance (referred to here as *A), Skyteam (ST), and oneworld (ow)? You don't have to fly the same airline - you just have to pick one alliance and then pick one - and ONLY ONE - airline program in that alliance.

*A: US carriers are United, and US Airways including the America West (HP) part of it. Other North American carrier: Air Canada. European carriers include (partial list): Lufthansa, bmi, Swiss, Austrian, LOT Polish, TAP Portugal, Spanair, Scandanavian, and affiliates. Also several Asian carriers (Thai, Singapore, Air New Zealand) and one each South American (Varig) and African (South African) carrier.

ST: US carriers are Continental, Delta, and Northwest. Foreign carriers include Air France, Alitalia, KLM, Czech, and Aeroflot. Also other North American carrier: Aeromexico. Asian carrier Korean.

ow: Only North American carrier is American, so perhaps less of a good choice if you have varied destinations or don't like O'Hare. But they do go pretty much everywhere. European carriers include Finnair (you're going to Finland), British Airways (cannot earn on American Airlines program when flying US-UK, but can earn on connections UK-Europe), Air Lingus (but leaving the program in early 2007), Iberia. South America: LAN. Asia/Pacific: Qantas, Cathay Pacific.

If you're flying to all the destinations you're mentioning, I can't believe you can't get at least first-level elite status (25,000 miles flown) level if you book all your travel into one alliance.

For example, choose *A and join ONE program - let's say United. UA has pretty good choices out of Logan. Probably can get to where you're going in CA nonstop or one easy connection. The old America West part of US has a hub in PHX so nonstop from Boston to there. Lufthansa has good service to Germany from Boston and a lot of connections from Frankfurt and some from Munich to other European cities, so that should make Finland not too bad. Illinois - UA's biggest hub is Chicago so you're set there. FL, GA, TX, OH on UA you're connecting probably in Washington Dulles but some of those might be easier on US. Credit all of those trips to your United Mileage Plus account - do NOT use a US account for US, do not use a Lufthansa account for LH, etc. You would definitely hit Premier (2P - *A Silver) and likely hit Premier Executive (1P - United mid-level and *A Gold top-level) easily. But if you spread the mileage around different programs, you wouldn't get elite at all.

Skyteam would also be a good choice, and given you have Georgia on the agenda I'd probably say join Delta's program. But fly Delta, Continental, and Northwest, whichever is cheaper/more convenient for your domestic trips. DL has a fair amount of service to non-hubs out of BOS since Boston is a "focus city" for them. To Europe, NW/KLM have flights to Amsterdam with loads of KLM connections elsewhere in Europe. Alitalia has Milan flights with MXP connections. Continental has a fair amount of destinations out of Newark one short flight away from BOS. Again, credit all of these to just one program - probably Delta.

Or oneworld - ow could be good despite my "don't like AA" comments. You can get to the coast nonstop on AA from BOS, I think still. Also European connections via LHR using BA onward (remember don't use BA to fly transatlantic if accumulating miles in AAdvantage). Combine AA to LHR onto Finnair to Finland. Of course a big downside of oneworld is so many connections through connection-and-carryon-unfriendly Heathrow. AA gets you to Dallas and Chicago nonstop and via 1-stop elsewhere in the States. In this scenario credit everything to American.

I'd recommend either Skyteam or *A over oneworld based on these factors: multiple US-based carrier choices rather than just one, and multiple European hubs that have major connections. Also ST and *A don't have the restricton against earning transatlantic in a USA-based program from an European-based carrier that makes BA US-UK worthless to AA members (and conversely, AA US-UK worthless to BA members).

If you think that you could hit 50,000 BIS (butt-in-seat) miles in one alliance, I'd then narrow it down to *A. 50,000 in United's program gets you mid-level elite on United like it 50k does on anybody else. But mid-level elite on United (or on most *A carrier programs) gets you top-level Alliance-elite, Star Alliance Gold. That gets you lounge access on international itineraries. 50K-level elite in the US-based Skyteam programs (CO, DL, or NW) only gets you lowest-level alliance-level Skyteam Elite instead of Skyteam Elite Plus. So no lounge access.

Focus on one alliance (or even on two if you think you can get 75,000 BIS miles in a year). Orbitz is great for finding itineraries in one alliance, including mixed-carrier-within-alliance flights - their Advanced search options under "Preferred airlines" has an option for "Preferred Alliance".

If you do think you could fly 75K miles per year but not 100K, I'd recommend mid-level in *A via UA and low-level in ST via DL, CO, or NW. 75K all in one alliance would still only be mid-level on UA (or the upper-mid on US). 75K on ST would get you top-level on DL/CO/NW but then you'd be nothing on anybody else. 50K *A gets you alliance top-level and international lounge on *A as well as the quite decent mid-level UA benefits, while the 25K in a ST carrier still gets you some elite benefits as to seating, check-in priority, some chance at upgrades, etc.

Your travel pattern sounds like 25k is a cakewalk, 50K is likely, and 75k is quite possible if you focus. Given the multiple airline choices within *A and ST, it should be easy to stay within your chosen alliance and still get good fares and routings.

Yes but 50,000 miles on most OW carriers will also get you mid-tier status, which will include lounge access to easily IMHO the best lounges of any alliance the weak link being the Admirals Clubs. And if you are not AAdvantage then you will get access to Admirals Clubs even if on wholly domestic itins, incl. free drinks.

Unfortunately, I think it's ten consecutive years platinum to get lifetime platinum.

The airlines aren't going to let you buy status. It's something they give to people who fly with them. By letting you buy status, they'd be giving you priviledges that you could afford to pay for yourself. The whole concept of status is simply a way for them to force you to do whatever you can to only/mostly fly with them.

I heard on the news that the owner of Dallas Mavericks bought a life time pass to one of the airlines for $3,000,000 with top status.

American had at one point a lifetime AAirpass, which I believe came with the perks of the top status.

US Airways is currently running a promotion where miles earned with certain retail partners earn status miles. FTD offers 20 miles/$1, so you could buy top level (Chairman Preferred) for $5000 of flowers.

Too bad its not a retailer you would regularly spend $5000 at... now if it was Sony or someone like that, it would be reasonable.

I suppose if you're
a florist though...

Hmm... interesting. I know that Mark Cuban (the referenced Dallas Mavericks owner) has his own private jet, a Gulfstream Aerospace V. So, I'm not sure why he'd be slumming it with the rest of us.