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View from the Wing flags the fact that Air Canada’s Aeroplan is offering a really interesting status match opportunity that will give the matching member status through the end of 2021 with the ability to keep that status for 2022 with one round trip on Air Canada, Air Canada Express, or Rouge by January 15, 2021. This could easily be mileage runnable for many people and marks an especially good opportunity for those with a Southwest Companion Pass.
The Deal
- Air Canada Aeroplan is offering a status match for those who have elite status with American, Delta, Alaska, JetBlue, Southwest, or Hawaiian Airlines based on the following chart (note that this chart was updated on 9/30/21):
- The initial match is until December 31, 2021. To keep your Status beyond December 31, 2021, you must book and fly 1 return trip travelling with Air Canada before midnight on the January 15, 2022. You will then have your status extended until December 31, 2022. If you do not complete the return trip before December 31, 2021, you will lose the Elite status for the period between January 1-15 2022, but your status will be returned as soon as the flight is processed. Please allow for 5 business days post flight for change to be processed.
- Direct link to this promotion
Key Terms
- Matched status will last until December 31, 2021.
- To keep your Status beyond December 31, 2021, you must book and fly 1 return trip travelling with Air Canada before midnight on the January 15, 2022. You will then have your status extended until December 31, 2022. If you do not complete the return trip before December 31, 2021, you will lose the Elite status for the period between January 1-15 2022, but your status will be returned as soon as the flight is processed. Please allow for 5 business days post flight for change to be processed.
- This match is only offered to the listed airline status members (can’t match from other airlines)
- If your Status Match is successful, you will not be eligible to apply for a Status Match with Air Canada for at least 2 years.
- You must currently be a US resident and hold the relevant airline status to be eligible for the match.
- See this page for more FAQs
Quick Thoughts
This is an awesome opportunity for those who can match since it would be very easy to keep status through the end of 2022. You’ll need a revenue (paid) flight on Air Canada — award tickets won’t count — but I see same-day turns for under $300 round trip (as low as $223 on some of the routes I checked) and I’m sure there may be even cheaper options to keep status through the end of 2022.
Particularly surprising here is that the Southwest Companion Pass will match to Aeroplan 75K status. Update: Companion Pass holders now only get 50K status (which is still Star Alliance Gold, but one notch down on the ladder). That’s terrific both because it gives those members Star Alliance Gold status (which I believe would get them United lounge access when flying United even domestically) and the next-to-highest tier of Aeroplan elite access (surprisingly, A-list Preferred members will end up two notches one notch lower in Aeroplan’s program and only get Star Silver). Delta has been offering a Platinum status match challenge to those with Aeroplan 75K status – if only this deal had been around sooner for me I may have worked out a path to a better match challenge during our Passing the GUC trip.
Obviously this could also be a good deal for those with other airline statuses who are looking to become invested in Aeroplan. Benefits at the 25K and 35K levels aren’t terribly exciting (you can see full program benefits here), but if you are expecting an increase in travel on Air Canada and/or want to be able to earn a bonus on United flights credited to Aeroplan, the match certainly may make sense. If you are interested in this promotion, I recommend taking advantage of it sooner rather than later as the FAQ page notes a limited number of spaces available.
H/T: View from the Wing
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Hi Nick. I was able to match to 75k a while back. To keep the status does multi city return or 2 one-way flight count? Found a cheap ticket for a quick rt to canada and back to us but it’s going to be from 2 different city.
If you match and then take the flight to get it extended, would you get two sets of choice benefits (one for 2021 and one for 2022)?
I would have expected for you to only get one but the 75k email says to “select and enjoy your benefits by December 21, 2021.
I was successful in matching my SW CP to Aeroplan 50k and therefore Star Alliance Gold. I have a trip coming up on 10/21 to Greece and Croatia and we will be flying several Star Alliance partners. Will I receive a physical card showing my Star Alliance Gold status? If not, how do I prove to lounges, security and airlines my status? Thank you.
I haven’t received my physical card yet either, but I downloaded the Air Canada app to my iphone. At the top of the app landing page it shows my Aeroplan status as 75k along with a small QR code. If you click on that it, it brings up your digital card and an option to add it to your apple wallet at the bottom of the screen. Once added to your apple wallet, it shows your Aeroplan status as well as a star alliance gold icon in the upper right of the screen. Hope this helps.
Actually, having the card to show doesn’t matter. You just need to put your Aeroplan frequent flyer number on those reservations. Go to the operating carrier website, or if that doesn’t work go to Lufthansa’s website, and change the Frequent Flyer number on your reservation to your Aeroplan number. Then your boarding pass will reflect your Star Gold status. Just having the card, whether physical or digital, won’t matter. You need the number associated with the reservation.
Hey Nick, thanks for the quick clarification. Here’s one for you. We booked United Flights to Hawaii using the Turkish Miles and Smiles sweet spot. At some point in the booking process, I must have added my miles and smiles frequent flyer number to the itinerary. Now that I have star alliance gold, I’d like to change it to my Aeroplan frequent flyer number to have access to lounges during the trip. I logged on to United, and can’t figure out how to do it. At your suggestion, I tried Lufthansa to edit this itinerary, but when I enter the United confirmation number, it doesn’t find the itinerary. Any ideas how to revise the itinerary to link my Aeroplan number?
Just tried to change it through United chat, but they said they couldn’t do it on their end, had to be done by Turkish. Logged on to Miles and Smiles, and there’s no option of changing the frequent flyer account associated with the itinerary. Oh well.
Don’t give up! United won’t do it for you, but it can be done.
Are you using the United confirmation number or the Turkish confirmation number at Lufthansa? Try both.
If you don’t know what I mean, when you put in the confirmation number at United.com and pull up your reservation, does it show the same confirmation code as the one you entered? It’s been a bit since I last did this, but I believe that Turkish gives you their confirmation number and when you pop it into United, United pulls up the reservation and shows their confirmation number. I can’t recall which one should work at Lufthansa, but one or the other should.
If that doesn’t work, I’d try the same steps with other Star Alliance websites. One of them should work.
I tried both the Turkish and United confirmation codes at Lufthansa, and neither worked. Next I tried both confirmation codes at ANA, Air Canada, Avianca, and Singapore with no luck. I know there are several others, but I’m not sure it’s worth pursuing at this point. I have other lounge options that we’ll use on this trip. Thanks anyway for your advise Nick!
@Nick Reyes I should find out soon enough how this works. My wife matched SW CP to AC 75k and didn’t receive a physical card and I didn’t know about associating the Aeroplan number as her frequent flyer details. She’s about to try and access the United lounge on her United flight with the 75k member card in the app….
Any update on this Chris?
Sorry, no. The outgoing connection was to tight and the line too long to the united lounge. She flies back on Friday with a much longer layover to test.
Brett, success! I never did get the Aeroplan number associated with her boarding pass but by presenting her Aeroplan number/QR code to the check-in personnel at the DEN United Lounge they let her in!
That’s dope. Thanks for following up Chris. Now I just need to find a cheap nonstop flight to keep the status.
Is Canada letting those from the US in?
Same-day and next-day turns LGA-YYZ widely available for $210.04 in November and December (and somewhat in October).
Where does it say it has to be a revenue flight?
I don’t see it in written on the promo, but View from the Wing reported this first and specifically reported that it had to be a revenue flight, so I think he probably had that info direct from Air Canada. I’m also not aware of any status match that has existed that accepted award flights (and apart from Delta and Virgin Atlantic I’m not aware of any airline loyalty program that counts award flights toward status qualification at all), so it would be very unexpected for award flights to count for this match.
If you follow the link for the terms of service for the status match, you get to a page that says the folowing:
Since award flights aren’t eligible to accrue points, they aren’t eligible.
@ Nick — It’s going to be difficult to time travel and complete a flight by January 15, 2021…
Wait… People have been getting approvals in minutes? I applied with Delta Platinum three days ago, and haven’t heard back.
Now I just checked the Status Match Tracker, and it says “There is no Status Match application with those details.”
Back to the drawing board, I guess.
New info from Air Canada states that starting Oct 1 SW companion pass will only match to 50k instead of 75k. For those interested, better do the match ASAP.
Wife has companion pass. Can she match and I fly the round trip flight for her? We have a small baby and we don’t want to do the round trip flight for 3.
for those travelling on AC metal the eUps with you get with AC status can be used when booking award flights or cash flights to upgrade to J class. And If you book your Aeroplan award ticket ( or revenue ticket ) in economy latitude class your eUps clear immediately after booking. Useful for those who want to transit through Toronto , Montreal, Vancouver etc on long haul flights to Europe , Asia.
What are eUPS? Automatic upgrade to business?
think of them as Canada GUCS.
LOL.
I had no idea that you can use them to upgrade award tickets. That’s great! Any idea how good or bad availability is for long distance upgrades?
you’ll get 55 eUps with 75k status. you can eUp a latitude Aeroplan award booking immediately upon booking ( upgrades work ONLY with AC metal ) . With 75k status you can also select an additional benefit of gifting your p2 ( or even Nick ) 35k elite status. that gives an additional 30 eUps to the recipient. to upgrade a long haul flight from Toronto to Hawaii would be 4 eUps. to upgrade the longest haul international AC flight would be 13 eUps. you can use the eUps for you and a fellow traveler on the same flight. Latitude economy Aeroplan award flights cost more points than saver economy but less points ( often much much less ) than saver business. plus latitude bookings are completely refundable and easy to do online. Your Delta Status gives you 85 eUps for your family, saves a lot of Aeroplan points on J flights and helps hedge against the wild swings of the new Aeroplan dynamic pricing on their own metal. The downside to this is having to transit through Canada during covid and the fact that the eUps would have to be used on flights taken by DEC 31 2022 ( if you kept status by taking that AC flight in the next few months ). This link explains using eUps much better than I can.
oh and to answer your question availability is pretty good. you can filter your award search results ( on a laptop ) to only upgradable flights.
https://princeoftravel.com/blog/latitude-attitude-optimizing-your-eupgrade-strategies/
Well now you’re really making me regret not matching my wife’s Companion Pass to 75K.
Oh dear, sorry I didn’t mention this earlier Nick. 50k still gets you 40 eUps but certainly not a lucrative as Greg’s family. Two ( Delta Diamond ) 75k parents and two 35k ” gifted ” children means 170 eUps for a family of four. Combine that with the current Amex Aeroplan 20% transfer bonus and there are certainly opportunities for premium redemptions.
So we have to fly to Canada to be extended through 2022?
“It is not possible to search for flights which have both an origin and a destination in the United States.“
Or anywhere else Air Canada serves outside of the US. My understanding is that it is not legal for a foreign carrier to sell or fly an itinerary that is entirely within the United States (this is generally the case around the world — doing so is called “cabotage”. You can Google that term for more info). That applies to cash bookings, obviously not award tickets.
So a Canadian carrier can’t sell you a ticket between two US cities and Ryanair can’t fly a plane to the US and start servicing US markets more cheaply than US airlines do.
As a result, your cheapest option will be to buy a round trip ticket to Canada. However, Air Canada also serves tons of places – I often find that their prices RT to Europe are very competitive with what I’d find on US-based carriers. If you live in a city where you have to connect no matter what, it probably doesn’t much matter to you whether you connect in New York or Toronto on a ticket to Europe. So if you’re planning a trip to Europe before January 15th, that might work (as would places in Asia served by Air Canada).
But yes, you’ll have to fly internationally.
FWIW, you do not need to be an Aeroplan member prior to today. I just signed up for Aeroplan and then matched my Southwest CP … which is likely to be the only use of my CP for the whole time I have had it 2020-2021. Now the fun begins to see if I can make something useful of this status.
A bit odd that Skyteam Elite Plus (Delta Gold) and Oneworld Sapphire (AS MVP/AA Plat) are only being matched yo their second tier which as you note is still Star Alliance Silver – a step down. But I suppose it’s also perhaps realistic in light of how many people’s current status is the result of extensions and matches rather than actual flying.
I submitted a status match request with a screenshot of my Southwest Airlines account status (mobile app) showing my CP, and 12 minutes later I received a notification that the status match was approved. Awesome…thank you @Nick Reyes !
took 16 mins for me to get an approval 🙂