hawkinsrv

I learned about the low miles required for :-:A Gold through Aegean Airlines, so I just finished that program and got :-:A Gold! I'm looking to do something similar with oneworld. It looks like the lowest entry for oneworld status is with Royal Jordanian? Has anyone tried this? Here's the RJ website's FFP overview.

Status can be earned by accruing oneworld miles OR with segments, some required to be on RJ. Since I don't plan on flying RJ, obviously I'd choose the miles.

15k miles for Ruby status
35k miles for Sapphire status
55k miles for Emerald status

In addition, "Royal Plus Miles and Member shall get 1000 bonus Royal Plus Miles on his/her Member Account following the Member initial flight activity."

I don't have the ability to do an AA status challenge, since my company books my airline tickets, and they generally choose whichever major airline is cheapest. But I'm pretty confident that I can earn at least 35k miles in a year, if not 55k. Mostly I just want priority checkin/boarding and lounge access when I fly oneworld.

What's the catch? Thanks!

bhomburg

the catch? Minimum RJ metal segments requirements.

To qualify for Platinum Plus, you must achieve one of the following within a period of 12 consecutive months:
- Earn 55,000 tier miles.
- Travel a minimum of 42 Segments (at least 12 Segments must be flown on Royal Jordanian flights). for Emerald, and
To qualify for Gold Plus, you must achieve one of the following within a period of 12 consecutive months:
- Earn 35,000 tier miles.
- Travel a minimum of 28 Segments (at least 8 Segments must be flown on Royal Jordanian flights). for Sapphire.

UL's FlySmiles has similarly low mileage requirements but also requires a ton of segments on their own metal. So - if you can't fly them chasing OW status with their FFPs doesn't make sense.
Oneworld unfortunately doesn't have an A3 equivalent...

angatol

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bhomburg

No. The wording isn't very precise, but regardless of if you qualify via miles or segments, 12 segments need to be flown on RJ. I called them about this when I was about to defect to OW from M&M and this is what they told me.
There would be more threads about their program in here (not to speak of blogs etc.) if they would offer a real shortcut to status.

angatol

.....

jerry a. laska

From the terms and conditions:
http://www.rj.com/en/royal_plus_terms_conditions.html

I think we went down this road a few years ago when someone else thought RJ looked like easy pickings.

hawkinsrv

Darn it! Well that's the catch I was looking to find. Glad to hear it from someone who called. Thanks!

wijibintheair

It really depends on your flying pattern and where you are based. I am gathering you are US based but don't know where you fly - using BA's EC programme 1 return flight on QR in J to say Singapore from New York would pretty much get you to OW Sapphire.

77W_12A

I think if it were that easy to attain Emerald status on RJ, frequent fliers would be flocking to their program. It's just like JL. If i'm correct, you need 80k to attain Emerald. That's a piece of cake. HOWEVER, if you look at JL's fare structure, there are so many fares that earn, 25%, 50%, 70%, etc. If you want the 100% fares, you have to book the higher classes; W, Y, B, & E. Discounted business class gets you 70%! There's ALWAYS a catch.

Wasabi Tofu

However, taking account of JL's double status miles for domestic routes,
you can earn 80k for 800,000JPY (e.g, HND-OKA domestic discount F 28 oneways). If you use a well-known crafted MR route (HND-xOKA-xHND-SIN-xHND-xOKA-HND), 80k for approx 650,000JPY.
The point is a domestic flight (HND-OKA) that is connecting an international flight earns 100% mileage (a HND-OKA earns 1968 status miles) independent of an international booking class.

Gardyloo

There are still lots of options where you can challenge up to AA Platinum (OW Sapphire) for around US$1000, e.g. SFO-ORD-MIA-PTY-MIA-ORD-SFO in F/J, around 8400 miles (hence well over 10,000 EQP at 1.5 EQP/mile). There's a signup fee for the challenge, but it can still be a bargain given you can obtain the status with one weekend's flying in a premium cabin. See the AA board for details.

77W_12A

Too bad I don't live in Japan. Sounds tempting, but I'm quite happy with the program I'm with now.

As far as picking the FFP, my philosophy is pick the airline you plan on doing the most flying with. You will ALWAYS be treated better being the elite member from the airline you do your flying with as opposed to being a top tier member of a oneworld alliance airline.

jbwe350

Note there are two more catches here:

(a) RJ calculates mileage by NAUTICAL MILES and not regular miles
(b) Earning rates are terrible, really terrible

So, yeah, looks better on paper than it actually is unfortunately

flyinhy

I got Saphire status with RJ with two RJ round trip tickets and crediting cheap partner flights. TLV-AMM-ORD-SFO
There is a slight glitch in their system (PM me)