Aegean Miles+Bonus Buying Tier Miles (For Qualification Or Requalification Purposes)

Aegean is a nice little Star Alliance-affiliated airline based in Greece. It used to be extremely easy to achieve Gold status with (your earned tier was never downgraded), but it is still not THAT difficult.

I have had a Gold tier with Aegean since 2017, originally to avoid those nasty luggage fees when flying from the Greek islands (Aegean’s Olympic Air is not a Star Alliance airline), and I have found them to be quite okay to work with.

You can access Aegean’s page to buy Tier Miles here.

I haven’t had many Star Alliance flights within the past 12 months, but I have had four with Aegean and Olympic Air.

My Miles+Bonus account was more than 1K Tier Miles short of requalifying, and I was looking for options to fix this, like switching flights to Star, etc., but then I remembered that I could always buy some status miles.

Aegean Miles+Bonus Status Requirements:

Silver Requirements:

Initial Qualification: 12,000 status miles + two Aegean/Olympic Air flights OR 35,000 status miles

Requalification: 8,000 status miles + two Aegean/Olympic Air flights OR 35,000 status miles

Gold Requirements:

Initial Qualification: 24,000 status miles + four Aegean/Olympic Air flights OR 70,000 status miles

Requalification: 12,000 status miles + four Aegean/Olympic Air flights OR 70,000 status miles

The Aegean status and requalification requirements make it easier to REQUALIFY than to qualify. If you drop from Gold to Silver, you are back to square one.

Status Miles Purchase:

Blue: 1,000 Tier Miles

Silver: 2,000 Tier Miles

Gold: 3,000 Tier Miles

The number of status miles you can purchase within your membership year depends on your tier.

Aegean’s Email:

Aegean reminded me yesterday that I could buy some Tier Miles to requalify for the Gold status.

Aegean Miles+Bonus Buy Tier Miles Process:

The page allows you to buy both award and tier miles. The award miles are 2.5 euro cents each.

Aegean sells tier miles at 500 chucnks at 50 euros each.

I decided to buy 1,500, which set me back 150 euros.

The tier miles are immediately deposited into your account.

The Miles+Bonus dashboard confirms that the status has been extended.

The purchased tier miles are also displayed in your online account statement.

The tier miles purchase codes, or at least do with Chase, as a travel purchase.

Conclusion

Aegean may have just extended the Gold tier without me having to spend these 150 euros, but I just wanted to be sure.

Many airlines nowadays allow you to convert award miles to status ones, or buy a small number of tier miles, which makes sense.

I can usually move my flights around to ensure that I hit the numbers with the programs that I participate in, but I have had very few Star Alliance flights within the past 12 months, as I have flown more with Oneworld and SkyTeam.

I don’t “need” the Aegean Gold, as I have lifetime status with United that maps to the same alliance-wide tier, but these Aegean upgrade vouchers are worth more than the cash I spent.

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