best

Friend posed following question and I told them we get expert opinions and advise:
Currently Gold with 19,000 miles in 05. Just flown 3,500 miles last week. Has one more trip for 10,800 miles on AA in 12/05 where supposed to get 1 Qp per one QM. Expects to fly only about 30,000 miles in 06; about 40 to 50,000 miles in 07.
Should they sign up for Plat Chall now and ask to be retroactive from 10/15/5-this would mean they be Plat during the return flight of 12/5 trip?
Should wait to 12/1/5? Should not bother with Challenge since do not plan to fly 50, 000 miles in 06? Or other suggestions?

richarddd

Challenges are based on q-points, not on miles. Are the miles worth at least 1 q-point/mile?

Retroactive to 11/15/5? What do you mean by this? You can start a challenge on a date prior to the present, but should not be able to use flights that have already posted.

If the challenge is successful, your friend would be PLT until Feb 2007. Why would not expecting to fly 50,000 miles in 2006 affect the decision to take a challenge?

Have you read the sticky at the top of the page?

Ceasy

Easy answer. If he's going to net enough Q-points to qualify, have him do the platinum challenge. That way he'll be plat until February 2007, and either gold or plat for 2007. There's really no point in waiting, as I see it.

Efrem

I suspect a typo here - should perhaps read "retroactive from 10/15," i.e., to include the 3,500 miles from last week. (Odd, though, since the digits 0 and 1 are at opposite ends of most keyboards.)

As noted, whether or not this Challenge will work depends on the fare classes for all or most the travel earning at least 1 Q-point per mile.

best

THANK YOU FOR POINTING OUT TYPO. CORRECTED IT TO 10/15.

nako

As richarddd correctly points out, retroactive challenges can only be used to count points that have not yet posted. If the miles and points from last week have already posted to the account, then they're of no use to any challenge that was started after the fact, regardless of when the challenge is set to begin.

As for the rest, it's been adequately covered already re: Q-miles vs. Q-points.

Mike

gemac

It appears the OP's friend could challenge in December, and make Plat based on the 12/05 trip, or could wait and do a challenge in 06. If they do the challenge in December, they will get double mileage in 06 (on 30,000 miles), then drop back to Gold in 07, getting 25% bonus on 40-50,000 miles. If they did their challenge in the second half of 06, they could get double miles on the larger number of flights. In my mind, it depends on the timing of the flights in 06 and 07. If they could do a successful challenge in 07 to capture the bulk of that mileage in Plat, I would go ahead and do the challenge in December, then challenge again in 07, after dropping back to Gold. If not, or if timing of future flights is uncertain, it is more of a judgement call, but I think I would go ahead and challenge now, and refer my friend to Flyertalk's Mileage Run forum.