Aeroplan Premium Credit Cards: Spend Your Way to Elite Status!

Throughout all of 2021, we’ve wondered whether Aeroplan would take any steps to make it easier for members to qualify for a higher Aeroplan Elite Status level, given our largely curtailed flying activity throughout the first half of the year. 

Air Canada has already decided to extend everyone’s Aeroplan Elite Status levels into 2022 – but would we be offered any further incentives to achieve an even higher level of status? 

The answer has arrived today, and it’s a resounding yes. New and existing Aeroplan premium cardholders will be granted Aeroplan 25K status or a one-level upgrade to the next status tier upon spending only $10,000 on their cards over the coming months. 

Spend $10,000 on the Premium Credit Cards for Higher Elite Status

The offer applies to the following four Aeroplan co-branded credit cards in the premium family:

Existing Cardholders

Existing cardholders prior to today must first register for the offer via this link. 

Then, upon spending $10,000 on your Aeroplan premium credit card, you’ll earn the following status benefits depending on your Aeroplan Elite Status as of November 30, 2021:

• Members with no status will earn Aeroplan 25K status for 2022.
• Members with Aeroplan 25K, 35K, 50K, or 75K status will step up to the next Aeroplan Elite Status tier for 2022.
• Members with Aeroplan Super Elite status will earn the following qualifying benefits towards their 2023 status:
  • 25,000 bonus Status Qualifying Miles
  • 25 bonus Status Qualifying Segments
  • 3,000 bonus Status Qualifying Dollars 

New Cardholders

Meanwhile, for new cardholders who sign up between now and October 1, 2021, there is no registration required.

Instead, upon spending $10,000 on your Aeroplan premium credit card, you’ll earn the following status benefits depending on your Aeroplan Elite Status as of November 30, 2021:

• Members with no status will earn Aeroplan 25K status for 2022.
• Members with Aeroplan 25K, 35K, or 50K status will step up to the next Aeroplan Elite Status tier for 2022.
• Members with Aeroplan 75K or Super Elite status will earn the following qualifying benefits towards their 2023 status:
  • 25,000 bonus Status Qualifying Miles
  • 25 bonus Status Qualifying Segments
  • 3,000 bonus Status Qualifying Dollars 

As you can see, members all the way up to Aeroplan 75K status have the opportunity to bump up to as high as Super Elite status for 2022 if they were an existing cardholder prior to this offer’s launch.

If you get a premium Aeroplan credit card after this offer’s launch, the maximum status level you’ll be able to bump up to is Aeroplan 75K status.

Spending Window

Importantly, your window for spending $10,000 depends on when you had opened your card. 

Make sure to identify which criterion you fulfill and keep track of your spending during the correct window:

• If you opened your card before January 1, 2021, then you must spend $10,000 between July 1 and October 15, 2021 to qualify for Aeroplan 25K status or the one-level status upgrade.
• If you opened your card between January 1 and July 11, 2021, then you must spend $10,000 between July 1 and November 30, 2021 to qualify for Aeroplan 25K status or the one-level status upgrade.
• If you open your card between July 12 and October 1, 2021 (i.e., you’re a new cardholder after this offer was released), then you must spend $10,000 by November 30, 2021 to qualify for Aeroplan 25K status or the one-level status upgrade (excluding to Super Elite).

Eligibility

Finally, the TD and CIBC offers are not available to residents of Quebec.

Quebec residents will need to spend $10,000 on one of the American Express premium credit cards to take advantage of the associated status benefits during this offer period.

Optimize Your Aeroplan Elite Status Strategy

Spend $10,000, get a higher level of Aeroplan Elite Status. Sounds pretty simple, right?

If you currently don’t have any status, then you’d be able to earn Aeroplan 25K status by spending $10,000 on your premium credit card by October 15 or November 30, depending on when you had opened the card.

That’s very generous on Aeroplan’s part, allowing many members to become newly-minted elites and enjoy the magic of eUpgrades for the first time in 2022.

Similarly, if an Aeroplan 50K member were to spend $10,000 on their premium card by October 15 or November 30, they’d be bumped up to Aeroplan 75K status for 2022 – something that many 50K members otherwise might not have been able to achieve this year. 

But since the one-level status bump applies to your Aeroplan Elite Status level as of November 30, 2021, there’s actually a bit of room to optimize further here with some mileage-, segment-, or dollar-runs.

Let’s say you don’t currently have any status. What if you combined this spend-based incentive with the Everyday Status Qualification benefit, which also allows you to earn Aeroplan 25K status as a non-status member?

By racking up 100,000 Aeroplan points through eligible sources before November 30, 2021, you’d be bumped up to Aeroplan 25K status by virtue of your everyday engagement with the program – and then you’d be further bumped up to Aeroplan 35K status as a result of this spending promotion on the premium credit cards. 

Similarly, consider the situation facing an Aeroplan 50K member with the top two tiers within their sights. Taking a look at the Status Qualifying Dollar (SQD) requirements for 75K and Super Elite status, there’s clearly some juicy arbitrage to capture. 

If you can qualify for Aeroplan 75K status by November 30, 2021 by achieving 75,000 Status Qualifying Miles (SQM) or 75 Status Qualifying Segments (SQS) – perhaps with the help of the spend-based SQM/SQS on the Aeroplan credit cards – in addition to $9,000 SQD (or perhaps even $4,500 SQD as a foreign resident), then you’d be bumped up to Super Elite through 2022! 

With as little as $4,500 in SQD required in this situation, compared to the usual requirement for $20,000 SQD, there will probably never be a better time to get a taste of the Super Elite lifestyle in the future. 

The real winners here? Those who might’ve completed an Altitude 35K status challenge back in 2019, levelled up to Altitude 50K under Travel at Home in 2020, and now have the opportunity to bump up to Aeroplan 75K (or perhaps a heavily discounted Aeroplan Super Elite as outlined above) under these spend-based status offers in 2021.

Conclusion

The new spend-based status incentives on the Aeroplan premium credit cards are set to give most of us a significant boost towards a higher Aeroplan Elite Status tier through the end of 2022.

Depending on their status levels as of November 30, 2021, existing and new premium cardholders alike can earn entry-level Aeroplan 25K status, a one-level status bump, or a meaningful chunk of progress towards their 2023 status qualification with only $10,000 in spending during their offer period. 

Make sure to carefully digest the terms of the promotion and identify your correct offer period based on when you had opened your premium credit card. If you have an appetite for optimization, you’ll also want to ensure you move the correct puzzle pieces into place by November 30, so that your one-level status upgrade can perhaps take you further than one level. 

If you don’t currently hold an Aeroplan premium credit card, the best deal possible would be to apply for the Aeroplan Reserve or the Aeroplan Business Reserve during their spectacular summer offers until August 3, 2021.

The minimum spending requirements here would overlap with this offer period, allowing you to knock out two birds with one stone and spend towards 150,000 Aeroplan points and a higher Aeroplan Elite Status level at the same time.