Help trying to retain BA Silver status

[wlonjay]

Hi all

Just wondered if anyone has any suggestions

Currently silver and have 39 sectors booked by end of March. I commute using domestic flights and therefore won’t make it via tier points. I have until 8th April but exec club said they may offer a 1 week extension and therefore could manage another 4 flights in that time. Any wise tips on routes or ways to do a points run to get the rest. I live in Manchester so would need to start and finish there. Thanks

[JamesF300]

I think it’s a tricky one.

Assuming the worst case that you’re on 195 TP, you either need 405TP or 11 more sectors, 7 with the extension.

Would it be more worthwhile looking at the following year and aiming for 600TP? Flights to SOF in business (Long layover in LHR) are showing up at around the £500 mark in April/May, so turning it into a BA Holiday by tacking on a cheap hotel/car would net you 480TP right off the bat; Upgrade two short haul returns and you can be silver in a matter of weeks, and it’ll last you another year

[BA Flyer IHG Stayer]

Firstly I salute you for gaining silver based solely on flying economy flights not TPs!

So you need an additional 11 over your current total / bookings which is still quite a lot to do.

All I can think of is a couple of multi hop trips so say MAN-LHR-XXX returns (which would get you 6 sectors per trip and take you over the 50 which might be less stressful than 6 simple returns.

Not sure of the pricing but the EI MAN-DUB flight bought via BA with the BA codes share could be an option.

The holiday option mentioned above might also help but unless you got those TPs by the end of May when your existing Silver ends you’d be booted back to bronze and you’ll lose the lounge access which looks to be the benefit you want to try and keep.

[memesweeper]

BA Flyer IHG Stayer wrote:

Firstly I salute you for gaining silver based solely on flying economy flights not TPs!

+1

I nearly got there once via that route, but the TPs got me over the line at thirty-something sectors. Leg-crushingly bad way to get status.

If you want to rack up fairly cheap BA sectors then starting in one of the non-tax places (eg INV, JER) might help, and make sure your destination requires a change and is fairly cheap (eg AMS, DUB). You can ‘nest’ the returns so for instance fly to JER on a long return, and fly back and forth from there on short duration return trips. I think code shares count, so maybe you could tag on something from MAD, like ALC?

Honestly, though, if you’re 11 sectors short I can’t see how this could possibly be worth it. Paying for seat selection and lounge access for another year would surely be cheaper unless you value your time at nothing.