Could you earn Star Alliance Gold status for S$2,800?

About a week ago, I wrote about Singapore Airlines offering some pretty amazing Premium Economy fares to the USA on their LAX/EWR non-stop A350-900 ULR flights. Round trip fares to LAX and EWR were going for S$1,328 and S$1,428 respectively, making them some of the cheapest SQ premium economy fares I’d ever seen.

Those fares are unfortunately no longer available, but from 20-27 September SQ is offering a different set of (slightly higher) fares, which still represent great value in the grand scheme of things.

Round trip flights to LAX and EWR are now available for S$1,398 and S$1,598 respectively, up by S$70 and S$170 from the previous sale. Travel dates to EWR remain the same, but LAX is now available for the second half of November and first 5 days of December.

SQ is using a slightly different version of their Premium Economy seat on the A350-900 ULRs, as The Points Guy unveiled in June this year. 

As per TPG:

This seat is heavily based on the existing Singapore Airlines premium economy seat. So, those familiar with the existing product are going to generally feel at home in this new seat. There are a few notable modifications: a higher seatback pocket, a redesigned armrest cupholder, a solid aisle-side armrest and reduced seatbelt bulkiness due to a lack of airbag.

The prime seats on this aircraft are the single seats towards the back of the cabin, in the back 3 rows where the configuration goes from 2-4-2 to 1-4-1.

Earn 100% accrual with KrisFlyer, or 300% accrual with Miles & More (?)

Now for the fun part. The GC Map tool tells me it’s 9,534 miles from Singapore to EWR, so a round trip flight clocks at 19,068 miles in total.

These fares book in fare bucket “R”, which accrues 100% mileage with KrisFlyer…

…but want to see something cool? Check out what happens if you credit them to Lufthansa’s Miles & More program.

What’s going on? “R” used to be the fare code that SQ used for Suites tickets, which accrued 300% miles with most partners. That code was retired and later repurposed for Premium Economy, but it appears that not everyone got the memo.

Now, I have no way of knowing if Lufthansa updated their back end and simply forgot to update their webpage, so I still think there’s some element of risk involved in crediting to Miles & More. But we have to take what they say on the website at face value, and assuming the 300% credit does come off successfully (and I’d be sure to take a lot of screenshots if I wanted to try this), you’re looking at 57,204 status and redeemable miles. 

Here’s how many miles it takes to earn elite status with Lufthansa Miles and More:

Unfortunately, Lufthansa’s elite system has much higher qualification requirements than most other Star Alliance carriers (100K miles for Gold versus 50K miles for most others), so this isn’t quite the “one flight Star Alliance Gold” that Aegean Miles and Bonus used to offer.

That said, taking 2X flights to LAX could potentially earn you Star Alliance Gold for S$2.8K. That is mighty, mighty tempting. It’s not like your miles would be wasted in Miles and More anyway- the program actually offers some pretty compelling redemption opportunities (and unlike most *A partners, is able to access SQ’s long haul First and Business class space).

For example, they often run “Miles and More bargains” where economy and business class awards are offered at up to 50% off. Here are some example awards from Bangkok, expressed in round trip amounts.

I’m already booked on the inaugural SQ22 to EWR, so I’m giving these fares a pass. If anyone’s taking them up, do let us know if you’re going to try crediting to Miles and More!