Star Alliance gold status

Although the received wisdom in the frequent flyer community is that Aegean Airlines gold status is the easiest to obtain - I thought it was worth a check to see if that really is the case.

Initially to get to Aegean Airlines silver status you need either:

12,000 Tier Miles and two Aegean/Olympic flights or

24,000 Tier Miles 

And then to upgrade to gold status you need either:

24,000 Tier Miles and four Aegean/Olympic flights or

48,000 Tier Miles

So in order to go from zero to gold you need either:

36,000 Tier Miles and four Aegean/Olympic flights or

72,000 Tier Miles

But then to retain gold status you only need:

12,000 Tier Miles and four Aegean/Olympic flights or

24,000 Tier Miles

This compares to an airline such as Thai Airways - which requires the following for gold:

50,000 Qualifying Miles within 12 months or

80,000 Qualifying Miles within 24 months

And then to retain Thai gold they still require the same amount of miles per year / two years.

Aegean Airlines are also sometimes more generous in calculating their Tier Miles - so for example a Thai Airways business class flight booked in C class will earn 150% in Thai's own frequent flyer programme, but will earn 200% in Aegean's.

WhereToCredit is an excellent website to check out which programme to credit your flights.

Looking at a real life example - an itinerary such as LHR-BKK-CTS return in business class (assuming C booking class) would earn: ( 5,958 + 3,152) x 2 x 200% = 36,440 Aegean Tier Miles.  So it would get you straight into Aegean gold if you took a little LHR-ATH-LCA trip later in the year.

So the moral of the story is that whilst Aegean is only a little easier to get to gold, the lower retention requirements are where it really shines.