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Apologies for what is likely a frequently asked about topic. I’ve had a search of the forums but would appreciate some bespoke advice since I’m pretty new to the status game.
Background
Prior to 2025 I was a lifetime blue member, doing all my premium travel via award flights. I unexpectedly had a lot of business travel in the last few months and got catapulted to BA Silver with ~800 tier points.Upcoming travel
I have one business class flight booked with BA post-April, with a base fare of around £8k, so if I understand correctly this guarantees me Silver level in both BA and IB (£7.5k and EUR7.5k spending required). I’ve no idea if I’ll continue to have business travel past this (very contract-dependent). So I’m wondering if I should be jumping ship to Iberia. The ongoing avios earning looks more or less equivalent. Also worth mentioning I do no significant leisure travel with any oneworld carriers.Options
My thinking is that Iberia is the safer bet. If I end up doing loads of travelling (>£20k total), I’ll be gold no matter which choice I make. Although I’ll miss out on ~17k avios on my £8k fare flight if going with Iberia since I’d be starting from the Clasica tier (5 avios/EUR).
But if I only end up doing say £15k of travel I could be gold in Iberia due to the TP bonuses but still be Silver in BA.Should I be considering Qatar/Finnair? I’ve had a look through their loyalty scheme pages but it looks like they’re roughly equal to BA or worse?
Is there anything else I should consider? From reading around, BA soft status landings are potentially going away. I’m not sure what Iberia’s policy on soft landings are?Thanks in advance.
IB gold and BA gold aren’t the same thing, so it depends what benefits you want.
There’s a long discussion thread on the changes and moving loyalty to Iberia which is worth a read, over on Flyertalk.
If you don’t need to stay with avios as your points currency but have reason to stay in OneWorld (eg wishing to have an opportunity to use the status you could earn in April) then take a look at Alaska Air’s program. You can use the status benefits you’d have with BA whilst crediting to another OneWorld program, on the same flight, if you manage at what point you switch each flight you take to the program you want to credit it to, carefully.
Alaskan also have awards tie-ups with some interesting airlines you could be flying, outside of OneWorld.
If April is early in your tier year then if BA continues to honour status for the rest of the year it’s earned in as well as the folowing year this is worth taking into account. However I have a gut feeling BA won’t maintain this.
IB gold and BA gold aren’t the same thing, so it depends what benefits you want.
There’s a long discussion thread on the changes and moving loyalty to Iberia which is worth a read, over on Flyertalk.
Thanks, that’s quite the thread! I’ll be sure to read through it. I guess access to F lounges is the main thing I care about if reaching Platino/Gold.
If you don’t need to stay with avios as your points currency but have reason to stay in OneWorld (eg wishing to have an opportunity to use the status you could earn in April) then take a look at Alaska Air’s program. You can use the status benefits you’d have with BA whilst crediting to another OneWorld program, on the same flight, if you manage at what point you switch each flight you take to the program you want to credit it to, carefully.
Alaskan also have awards tie-ups with some interesting airlines you could be flying, outside of OneWorld.
Thanks. I’ve heard Alaska has some great sweet spots and earning potential. But I’d prefer to stay in the avios ecosystem mainly because I’ve built up a decent balance there and to take advantage of 2-4-1s etc. I also don’t have as much time these days to juggle lots of schemes like I used to…
If April is early in your tier year then if BA continues to honour status for the rest of the year it’s earned in as well as the folowing year this is worth taking into account. However I have a gut feeling BA won’t maintain this.
I thought that with the tier point changes going live in April, everybody is reset on an April-April cycle. It says I have my current silver status until Apr-2026. And presumably if I credit my upcoming flight to BA and maintain silver, that’ll tide me over until Apr-2027. Or are you saying they might change to something like “once you hit silver you have it for 12 months from that date”?
Not sure what @LL means here.
I don’t see how they can do that now they’ve aligned everyone’s TP earning years.
I have one business class flight booked with BA post-April, with a base fare of around £8k, so if I understand correctly this guarantees me Silver level in both BA and IB (£7.5k and EUR7.5k spending required).
Going back to the beginning, that is true if it was booked post Dec 30th. If booked earlier you will earn using the distance based regime with the 13.33 multiplier for nTP conversion.
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