Urgent : Help appreciated – Status match options from BA/OW to Star Alliance?
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Hi,
Family are Flying on UA in the weekend and (sadly) I just clocked to there being a potential option to status match through to Star Alliance (or even Miles and More) to attain temporary status and benefits for the month long trip. Currently BA Silver / One World Sapphire.
Anyone will any ideas about a fast way to apply or move from BA Silver to UA Miles&More or general Star Alliance status would be greatly appreciated.
I have seen the status match program link for UA with the challenge, so will try that – it may not work quickly or auto approve.
But have also seen other airlines like ITA or such may be easier bets.Any info ASAP or just links/forum thread would be great! Thanks!
I don’t know how they check it so quickly, but UA match is more or less immediate.
I don’t know how they check it so quickly, but UA match is more or less immediate.
Thank you – are there any ‘gotchas’ or things to note that may delay it? Will give it a shot but would help to know of anyone’s experience.
Also keen to know general *A options – other airlines with a quick or better status route into the alliance, special promos aside as i cant see any current – i know last year there were a few and will keep an eye out.
I don’t know how they check it so quickly, but UA match is more or less immediate.
Hey the UA Status match wont let me upload my BA card screenshot, says its invalid information. Is there any trick to this/getting it uploaded? Please help a Fellow FF out if anyone knows!
I don’t know how they check it so quickly, but UA match is more or less immediate.
Hey the UA Status match wont let me upload my BA card screenshot, says its invalid information. Is there any trick to this/getting it uploaded? Please help a Fellow FF out if anyone knows!
Perhaps save the screenshot as something else .pdf perhaps, and then try again.
I don’t know how they check it so quickly, but UA match is more or less immediate.
Hey the UA Status match wont let me upload my BA card screenshot, says its invalid information. Is there any trick to this/getting it uploaded? Please help a Fellow FF out if anyone knows!
Perhaps save the screenshot as something else .pdf perhaps, and then try again.
Have tried all variations, even webpage screenshot. Various formats etc. Maybe its to do with UA being on USA time?
I think its actually the new BA App format for the card. No expiry date, new ‘Club’ designation etc is throwing the UA processing of the images.
Am asking at FT also as there is a long thread on UA Matches and most people pre April had immediate success by just using the card screenshot……….Looks like another fallout from Tiermaggeddon ;-(
Surely it would be unfair to think BA has changed the front of its membership cards for The(former Executive)Club to remove membership dates just to make the card impossible to submit to snother airline for a status match and escape ?
Surely BA would not be that “dog in a manger” ie **cking the BA orogramme, but at the same time trying to stop people leaving by making the format of their card unuseable elsewhere?
For absolute clarity – I got this to work by using a screenshot of the OLD FORMAT of the card on the app and it worked immediately.
This proves it was the BA changes screwing it up. Hope this helps someone out – thanks for the comments!@desh36000 – that is interesting. Thanks for coming back to confirm.
I wonder if it is a software UA uses – maybe it is simply programmed to recognise old versions of the card, and simply doesn’t ‘know’ the new cards yet?
Yep exactly – its not resilient to the changes as BA IT no doubt couldnt be bothered considering impact on partners or potentially airport lounge ops when they removed the expiry date, and changed the layout. But yes – no doubt UA are using some image recognition to break out the numbers and details, possibly AI, and then cross check them with BA. At least the cross check works fine – to be fair, when it works its VERY fast at approving it which is incredibly efficient.
Main point here for anyone attempting the status match to united airlines this year, is to find or manufacture an old format SILVER/GOLD membership card snapshot. e.g. the card popup screen from the app as it was pre April/March 2025.
I was lucky to have that around, but YMMV. Paintshop it if needed…. making sure details are of course bonafide not fake, as it will get checked. This whole thing is just about submitting details for them to check, and getting past the upload problem.
I don’t know how they check it so quickly, but UA match is more or less immediate.
Thank you – are there any ‘gotchas’ or things to note that may delay it? Will give it a shot but would help to know of anyone’s experience.
Also keen to know general *A options – other airlines with a quick or better status route into the alliance, special promos aside as i cant see any current – i know last year there were a few and will keep an eye out.
I matched my BA status to TK Miles & Smiles a few years back.
Surprised no one has mentioned statusmatcher.com, a longstandng site where you and others can report the success or nonsuccess of your status match requests.
As distinguished from statusmatch.com, which is a new business apparently making quite a lot of money for charging as an intermediary processing within status match campaigns (and doubtless building a database of individual, provider and industry data they can sell, in the course of this).
Charging is a new phenmenon in past year or so which is defnitely accelerating the transformation of ‘loyalty’ to levels of monetization never seen before IMV
UA recently changed there status match , before you would get instant status for 90 days, now you get status once you have taken an eligible flight
Just for refrence – UA status match (120 days ‘ trial ‘) to silver came thru as confirmed pretty much instantly, but only triggered on the account/turned the UAL card to ‘gold’ about 16-20hrs after the first flight we took. So LHR-SFO was detected, but no lounge in SFO outbound , and then by time we hit MEL on leg 2 it lit up on that day during the layover in time to use the Air NZ lounge for the next flight. Just a baseline data point for anyone doing this.
Note : technically not allowed in AirNZ but they allowed it at the desk didnt really ask.
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