also called qualification year · elite year
The calendar the airline uses to measure flying or spend toward the next year of status.
The elite week, or status year, is the specific calendar an airline uses to measure your flying or spending toward next year's status. It is not always the plain calendar year, so what counts toward requalifying depends on that program's own window. A last-minute push only helps if the flights fall inside that measuring period.
You scramble to book flights in December to lock in your status for another year. Then you find this program's status year had already closed, so all that late spending landed outside the window and did nothing toward requalifying.
December panic runs only help if they fall inside that program’s qualification window.
The difference is the whole point, so here is each one in a line.
An elite week or status year is the calendar an airline uses to measure your flying or spend toward next year's status.
A soft landing is the cushion if you fall short: a policy that drops you only one tier, or extends a partial one, instead of resetting you to zero.
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