Status - what's all that really about?

Been thinking about this recently...

For the moment, please put aside the question for those that fly for business and regularly gain AU or above with any airline - that level of status is nothing more than a loyal customer that spends a lot of money with that airline would really deserve and gives you good benefits in return.

For someone like me, that travels purely for pleasure, usually with my family, and has the occasional business flight (once every couple of years kind of occasionally)...what is status all about?

Think for the moment, about the middling tiers of status with an airline group.

I used to attain AG with Virgin more often than not...
I switched to BA for various reasons...
I now attain AG with BA just about...

But at what cost, and for what return?

You see, this quest to obtain or retain "status" with an airline (or airline group) is really very insidious - it actually has the effect of limiting your choices.

For example, Towards the end of my time with VS, I was travelling to TPA. Rather than taking the direct BA flight and better airport experience, I took VS to MCO plus an expensive taxi ride in order to just get those TPs I needed...it ended up costing far more and was less convenient.

I've been looking at flying to CLE later this year, and have been trying to contrive a routing with BA and partners in orrder to gain maximum TPs...and maintain my "status"...

Why am I doing this? What do I gain?

The fact that airlines have called it "status" is very clever, it makes many feel valued far more than the cold reality of the thing, and for some, I'm sure is some sort of head swelling factor ("Oh, of course I am a silver member" - "being a gold member..." - and the like).

So, having achieved the dizzying heights of mediochre status with an airline, I get "benefits" that variously include mileage bonuses when I fly with them, lounge access, notional advantages in standby queues, check in at premium/business class desks etc.

In the cold light of day, what is this really worth? So what if I have to spend 15 minutes longer checking in, so what if I don't get to sit in a lounge - in the grand scheeme of things, airports are not a place you would choose to spend time, it's a necessary part of getting from A to B.

Of course, when you do get that reward flight (usually in F for me with BA), you don't get the tier points and then find yourself looking for ways of taking extra flights just to squeak over the line to keep "status"...

What's the point of this opus?

I happened to log into my old VS FC accounts today and found that I still had around 100k miles in there. If I maintain this singleminded "loyalty" to BA and partners, I'm never going to get the chance to use those miles...nor am I ever going to check out prices with other airlines or take the best routing...

I am seriously considering just forgetting all this airline loyalty stuff and taking the flights with the airline that suits me best on a particular route, and just incrementally gain mileage in whatever loyalty scheme happens to apply.

I'll keep the BA Amex - their 241 actually is useable and is great value when booking F (which I have now done twice using Avios).

This will give me freedom to try other airline products, to take the best routing, to mix and match airlines and take my self-imposed pressure off to maintain my "status"...

Thoughts? Comments?

I have often thought that if you are a leisure traveler that solely travels in Business or First cabins, be it on reward tickets or paid for, there is little point in status.

What is the point of VS Gold when traveling in Upper? A few more miles? (If you paid cash for the ticket)

What is the point of BA Silver if flying Club or First, or the point of Gold if flying First? Again it's just a few more miles.

If you do a lot of travel with BA, you can get GGL, and that does come with some benefits, but it has been pointed out many times that if you don't naturally obtain this status through your normal flying habits, it's not worth much expense in trying to achieve it, as the extra money you spend cancels out the additional benefits.

So I do agree that while having status with an airline is nice, it's only really worth it if it is obtained 'naturally' and not through thinking of brand loyalty forcing strange routings or paying for extra flights.

I agree with you, Concorde. Status is a word which helps to manipulate us !
When I first lost Silver Status with VS I felt really let down. Then suddenly, as I started looking at other airlines and different routes, I realised I had been liberated and it was all rather exciting again.

( But deep down there are days when I still miss my Silver Card .......). :#

For example, Towards the end of my time with VS, I was travelling to TPA. Rather than taking the direct BA flight and better airport experience, I took VS to MCO plus an expensive taxi ride in order to just get those TPs I needed...it ended up costing far more and was less convenient.

I've been looking at flying to CLE later this year, and have been trying to contrive a routing with BA and partners in orrder to gain maximum TPs...and maintain my "status"...

Why am I doing this? What do I gain?

I briefly thought about taking a routing to Sao Paulo via JFK using VS and Delta just to add to my TPs / miles balance and then thought "what am I doing?" and opted for BA direct...

I got the definite impression that silver status with EK definitely helped with getting upgrades before Christmas..

It took me 14 years of only leisure flying with VS to gain Silver, which I have had for 2 years but have just gone back down to Red. We were loyal VS flyers for all this time then when VS started to cut that availability of some routes and stop some altogether we started to look at BA.

Only been collecting for 2 years and have used one 2-4-1 another one just obtained looking around for that flight in First (something we could never achieve with VS) and also redeemed an Avios voucher with our cc and another already waiting to be used.

We have no status with either airline only being a BA blue, we never will have unless we part with full or part cash for a flight and as you say for what purpose. We can check in the same and get the same result. IN fact the UC desk was so busy at LHR the last time they directed us to economy. The only thing missing is the lounge access, which although very nice, I can live without.

WE are travelling Club or UC where we can but have also booked Premium and WT+.

Like hiljil, I also felt a little sad when we lost silver status, but that happened at the same time as my husband retired early due to an accident - now its opened up a whole new world, no longer are we bothered about TP's or whether the card is red/blue silver or gold or what airline we fly with - having accrued nice amounts of points with several companies, now its a case of "I've got this amount of points, I want to go to this place, you tell me what flight time, what day and what airline I can use them on" - oh its so liberating
As has been said before, company's are not loyal to old customers, only new ones!

I have been silver a year and am just about to lose it.
I don't feel it's made any difference other than a few more miles.
Unlike some of the others when I go back to red I'll be sticking with Virgin. This years holiday is all sorted and upgrades done.
I have enough points to upgrade next year already and these have been earned through the various loyalty schemes and credit cards so it will be Virgin for a few years yet.
Dick D

[Nottingham Nick]

Excellent thread, and a subject close to my heart.

This may be a little controversial, but I blame the internet and sites like V-Flyer!

Let me explain - in the days that this site first started, and before Facebook, the internet was a dark place inhabited mostly by nerds and anoraks (with a few exceptions 8D ). 14.4k dial up modems - logging on after 6pm when the cheap rate started - etc. etc.

Flyertalk, V-Flyer et al enabled the anoraks to band together and share tips - believe you me there were some great bargains to be had in the early days - (SIN-KUL gold runs for example) and a gold card was REALLY worth having - in my first three years, I was batting well over 50% on op-ups, and remember well the great Gold Card do's we were invited to - like the Garden Party at SRB's house and the VH do at Crawley.

In those days, we didn't do VS any harm because there were so few of us. Now however, any dodge or perk that is mentioned on the internet and is picked up by someone like Martin's Money Tips, is suddenly swamped by hundreds of thousands of folk in search of a bargain - and inevitably the loop hole closes as soon as it opens.

Nowadays, gold cards are so common that the airlines (not just VS) have realised that they don't have to work too hard to keep the minions loyal and pursuing the next tier. The perks are few and far between for the folk like me who have to work really hard to attain and retain premium tiers. Part of me says that is right and the real perks should go to the REALLY regular premium class fliers, but another part of me misses the perks we used to get.

In short, I lost my gold card a few years back and have been Red for a few years now - I now concentrate my finances on retaining my Gold Marriott status because I feel I am still rewarded more than sufficiently, as a Marriott elite member to justify the expense and the brand loyalty.

Thank you ConcordeRIP for starting a thread that allowed me to vent

Nick

I am now moving to a less single-airline-driven model. I will say that status on airlines like BA/OneWorld is worth having when you're bouncing around Europe on cheap Y fares and, on the back of a few TATL Business flights, you can get into Galleries First at LHR. In essence, I can get to LHR earlier, better managing risks for the journey from Central London, and do some work, eat some eats, drink some drinks in a decent place for free. I would never consider buying a Club Europe ticket unless it's a through ticket from a TATL trip, not with status. So the benefit of Gold can be variously measured as money saved at an airport to money saved by buying short haul Y instead of CE.

Of course you are correct, I don't go out of my way to rack it up, I just get it as a matter of course. Would I chase it otherwise? I don't think I'd ever do a pure mileage run. Even if I buy my own ticket in a great sale, it's usually for a trip that has some ulterior purpose - visiting family, proper vacation etc. I would probably book SFO-MIA-LHR instead of a direct flight at a slight inconvenience and 10 dollars more in taxes for the sake of the extra Tier Points. That's a no brainer.

I have United 1K and the things I like about it are here https://www.united.com/web/en-US/conten ... fault.aspx if anyone wants to take a look. The big things for me are priority boarding, lounge access, complimentary Economy plus seats for my family and me), Star Alliance Gold, plus a very good baggage allowance. I also get 6 free upgrades per year for the next class of service but that is getting increasingly hard to get these days. It is useful as I travel a lot but I am under no illusion that their "loyalty" to me is a variable. I am glad I have it, but would survive if I didn't.

We have Silver at present, had it a couple of years now, from twice-yearly flights to NYC to visit family. Only 'benefit' I can see is the extra miles. Looked at logically, it's offering nothing else and we can use miles booster to better effect, and 'status' doesn't affect that. CH access influences us, we enjoy being pampered so miles matter but status? This thread suddenly makes me realise how useless Silver is!