Lifetime membership in FF Elite?
 

Hello all,
I'm a new member to this group(thank the Washington Post)and I have really enjoyed my time here. I'm also am pretty frequent traveler(2002 Gold CO, Silver US Air, 2003 Silver CO, lost it by 3,000 miles). I do have a question thought. Some people have spoke of achieving "Lifetime" elite status on some airlines (I think the one I saw was AA, but I'm not sure.) How can you achieve this? I've never seen this benefit in any of the FF info, so what does one have to do to bask in the glow of lifetime “eliteness?” Do all of the carriers outthere offer this benifit?Thanks for your responses.

I don't know of other airlines, but on AA if you achieve 1 million miles you earn lifetime gold, and 2 MM=lifetime platinum.

UA gives Premier Exec. for 1 million UA flight miles.

DL gives lifetime elite at certain millions of MQMs

On United, it's 1 million actual flight miles (does not count bonuses) on United metal that nets you lifetime Premier Executive status in United's Mileage Plus program.

That's roughly equal to American Airline's Platinum status.

American counts all bonus miles towards lifetime totals. United...only actual flight miles on them.

So while UA offers a better lifetime status level (one that offers 100% bonus miles, rather than just 50%) to it's 1 million milers, AA allows all miles to count towards towards million miler status, but you have to wait until 2 million miles to start to get the 100% bonus miles.

So it's kinda a wash competition wise.

[This message has been edited by PremEx (edited 03-05-2003).]

And DL is...

1MM = Lifetime Silver
2MM = Lifetime Gold
4MM = Lifetime Platinum

Although they don't use the word lifetime.. rather, status is renewed annually. (Sounds to many of us like this way they could pull the plug t some point.) And these are flown miles.

Thanks for the info folks. My next three questions become:

1) I'm assuming we are not talking amassing 1 mil miles in one year, although from what I have read here, that's not out of the realm of possibility for some people on this site. So, it is the basis of total miles accumulated over some time period, correct?

2) That being said, do I have to allow the miles to sit there until I hit 1,000,000 and then I get the lifetime status?

3) If I have to let the miles sit there, and I eventually get to the 1 mil mark, do I then have to "maintain the balance" to keep the benefit? Example, I hit 1,000,000 and get the card. Can I take that free around the world flight now(assuming the availability of seats) and not lose my status?

Again, thanks.

These are lifetime miles. That is, total miles earned in the program. With UA and DL, that's flown miles. (And I do know specifically, it's flown miles on UA metal and not partner metal.) With AA it's total miles from all sources.

It's not mileage balance. It's total miles earned, independent of how many you have at any one time in your account.

See #2 above.

You can go ahead and redeem all your miles, have a zero balance, and still earn lifetime status...

QF has status credits, if you hit 14,000 QF status credits (which clock and never expire), you will get lifetime Qantas Gold (which is the equiv of AA Plat). If you get 7,000 status credits, you'll get lifetime Qantas Silver (which is the equiv of AA Gold).

LH miles&more lifetime Senator:
* must be over 65, and
* must have been Senator, uninterrupted, since the miles&more program started (for future qualifications this probably, but unconfirmed so far, means: must have been, uninterrupted, Senator for 10 or 15 years?)

Anyone know if Alaska Airlines has Lifetime elite program?

[sorry; I was replying to a previous post and realized after the fact that I had misread it]

[This message has been edited by Efrem (edited 03-06-2003).]

Lifetime Admiral's Club access is the big perk for QF (14000 point level). As far as I can tell the only other plan to offer lifetime lounge access is DL at 4MM. DL used to count all miles (like AA) but now only counts flown miles (actually MQMs) so there will be very few with 4MM at DL (it takes 40 years at top-tier status, while QF will take me just under 3 years at present rate, and I'd make it in 2 years if I didn't also use miles to reach AA status). Are any of the other plans offering useful lifetime benefits? Lifetime US lounge access is worth a fair bit.

Sounds like by the time you earn your Lifetime airline lounge membership, your Lifetime will be just about over!

Only on third-world airlines. QF really has this sorted, in fact you can buy lifetime lounge access (QF, AA & BA lounges) for either $$$ or points with "Qantas Club Lifetime Membership".

As previously mentioned, QF elites can also qualify for lifetime free membership by obtaining lifetime gold, at 14,000 status credits (the equivalent of 10 cunningly planned F RTW trips).

Or, in my case, about 7 years of extensive discount Y, short-haul international Y and long-haul international J travel...

If you travel occasionally on QF, and often on either BA or AA (or both), you'd be mad to sign up for their programmes, when the benefits of the QF programme are so much better.

Or those who are really cunning can do it in 4 trips. As an academic exercise I worked out the maximum for an AONE6, and it is 3800 status credits (also 170K QF miles). Not bad for approx. AUD 16K, and almost all of the cities are ones that I would want to visit (great places like Easter Island, for example, though I suppose IPC can't be called a city). I suspect another 10% could be added to the mileage and status credits if the routing is picked solely for maximum credit.

No they do not.
I have e-mailed them suggesting that they consider it. If enough people e-mail them maybe they will.

------------------
"A day without Points/Miles is like a day without SUNSHINE"

DL had responded to someone (as reported in the DL forum) saying they don't use lifetime any more b/c you could be 1MM and get Silver, then hit 2MM and get Gold - so to call it "lifetime" would be a misnomer.

That being said, we all know what happened to TWA's "lifetime" lounge membership.

Of all the things they mess with, I doubt denying benes specifically to million-milers will be on DL's agenda. (They may dilute the SM/GM/PM status, but I doubt they'll back away from the multi-million mile clubs.)

I do find it odd that American has never officially publicised its lifetime programs. They will tell you about it over the phone and they will send you a letter in the mail saying that you are lifetime gold/platinum, but there is nothing on their web site about it.

PremEx - AA counts all miles. Credit Card, phone, partner, anything that hits your account, transfers, not just bonuses....

Continental had a program in the early to mid 90's whereby if you achieved gold 5 years in a row, you got infinite elite for life. Holders of that status are today actually Platinum Elite for life. The program was created to lure passengers onto an airline that was last choice for many. The qualifying period ended long ago while the few that qualified continue the status.

Lifetime Status
 

An AA rep once told me that if I accumulate 1,000,000 program miles (not necessarily EQM) I will have Gold status for life. I have never seen this actually printed anywahere. As I am currently at 961K lifetime program miles and am very curious. Can anyone confirm this? If there a way to get Platinum for life (I find being Platinum is tons better than Gold from a customer service/free upgrade perspective). Do any other airlines do this?

[This message has been edited by pushback (edited Jan 22, 2004).]

Yes, at 1mm you'll get lifetime gold, and at 2mm you'll get lifetime plat. Take a look in the AA forum, as you'll find various threads on this topic there.

Does anyone know of any other airlines that offer lifetime status counting miles rather then EQMs?

Just AA that I know of.

Alaska Airlines will give you MVP Gold for life also at 1mm.

Yes, but you only have to fly 2873 segments between SJC and SEA to get it!

(Yes, I know... they go to Russia and Mexico too... but I don't!)

In all fairness, I did ask the question.

Will they comp lifetime gold against AA? That I would love to sea! ;-)

[This message has been edited by pushback (edited Jan 23, 2004).]

United gives lifetime Premier Executive status for 1,000,000 actual miles flown on UA metal. I have lifetime status on AA (2MM including all sources of miles) and UA (1MM only from flown UA miles) and I can attest to the far greater difficulty of achieving it thru miles flown.

KLM are offering lifetime PE status after ten years at that level.

"Complimentary lifetime Platinum Elite membership
KLM’s most loyal customers, Platinum Elite FD members, now can be eligible for a complimentary lifetime Platinum Elite membership after having qualified as a PE member for ten consecutive years.* Lifetime members are entitled to all PE services for the rest of their life without having to qualify for PE membership each year**!
*Threshold options may change annually.
**Eligible PE members currently holding an extended membership will receive their lifetime card on completion thereof "


Nigel

Many used the "valuemags" promotion a couple of years ago to get the AA lifetime status.

That's funny, since so many people have been Platinum on KLM with only making a single trip on KLM http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Would it be possible to take a minimal amount of miles and transfer it in and out of AA so many times that it appears you earned 2 million miles and achieve their plat status without really earning many AA miles?

Not unless you found a way to transfer between programs without losing any value.

If you use miles for award travel, lifetime miles don't decrease. Do lifetime miles decrease when you transfer to another program? Do lifetime miles increase when you transfer from another program?

What I believe he's stating is that, for example, while you can transfer from
AA -> HH at a 1:2 ratio
5K AAmi -> 10K HHpts

you lose value when you try to go back.
10K HHpts -> 1.5K AAmi

AA -> HH -> AA
1 -> .3

If you just wanted to get lifetime gold and wanted to burn miles, by my rough est. you'd have to burn 540K miles and continue laundering them back and forth to get to ~1M lifetime AA (this is a pure est done in 3 min w/ excel).

Worth it? Probably not.
--
Even if you use the HH pts to redeem for flights, you still lose:
50K AAmi -> 100K HHpts
100K HHpts -> 1 free coach ticket in US on AA

That same coach ticket would only have cost 25K AAmi directly, so you are in essence losing 50% of the value.

This of course, doesn't do anything for increasing your lifetime miles.

To answer the other question: when you redeposit an award, the system is "smart" enough to know not to credit the redeposit towards lifetime status.

This is a good thing: if AA's IT department couldn't make this happen correctly, they'd kill the Lifetime Status program very quickly.

Not that I'd recommend it, but if you were *close* to 1MM or 2MM, you can convert out AA to Diner's, and then back at a 44% rate (45.6% if you value the residual points left in DC). Max 50K miles out (22K miles back in) per calendar year.

Edited to add that you can pay Diner's Club a fee to make it a 2:1 conversion. 50K AA -> 50K DC -> 25K AA, if you pay the fee. Otherwise, it's 50K AA -> 50K DC -> 22K AA, with something like 1800+ DC points left over.

[This message has been edited by pinniped (edited Jan 23, 2004).]

If you're losing miles on the round trip, it's likely a bad idea. Will anyone let you do 1:1?

Can you get close to 1:1 with any points.com trades? The options I saw were pretty bad. Any other round trip tranfer options that would be close to 1:1?

what about Amex or Diners deposits into a AA acount? Would they count?

Many used the "valuemags" promotion a couple of years ago to get the AA lifetime status.

Can anyone elaborate on this topic???