Do you have elite status on American Airlines, Delta, Alaskan, JetBlue, Southwest, or Hawaiian? Would you like to use said status to achieve similar elite-ness with Air Canada? Well, thanks to a new Destination Canada -sponsored promotion, you can! For a limited time, U.S. Aeroplan members can match their status for free and enjoy the elite perks through the December 31st. Plus, if you fly round trip on Air Canada before the end of the year (technically by January 15th), you’ll be able to retain that status through December 31st, 2022.
So how does it work? First, Air Canada’s Aeroplan program currently has five tiers: 25K, 35K, 50K, 75K, and the flawlessly named Super Elite. Obviously, which level you’ll be able to obtain through this promotion will depend on what you currently hold with your domestic airline of choice. For example, as a lowly Delta Silver Medallion, I’ll be matched to the 25K level. However, if you have Delta Diamond, you’d be matched to 75K. Here’s a look at how the eligible programs compare to Aeroplan (note: this is effective as of September 30th as it seems Air Canada made a tweak to what Southwest Companion Pass matches to).
How to Match Status on Air Canada
The process of applying for status matching was fairly simple and started at this site hosted by StatusMatch.com. Well, actually, I began my journey at Air Canada’s main site since I needed to actually create an Aeroplan account first. But once that was done, I headed back to Status Match, entered my newly-obtained Aeroplan number, selected the airline I had status with, and provided other such basic details. Next, as you might expect, they wanted a bit of proof in the form of a photo. This could either be a shot of a physical card showing your name, loyalty number, and status or a photo of your computer/tablet displaying the same information on the airline’s site. On that note, my initial instinct was to just use a screenshot of the Delta app before re-reading the “photo of a computer or tablet screen” requirement. To be on the safe side, I instead loaded up the Delta site and literally took a photo of my computer screen with my phone. Weird? Yes – but effective, apparently.
After sending my application, I was provided with a submission number to track its progress. Well, that turned out not to be necessary as my approval arrived in my inbox not even a few hours later. That said, when I’ve logged into Aeroplan, it does not yet display my status and Status Match advises that it could take five business days to do so.
So what am I going to do with my 25K Premier status? Um, well, probably not anything. While I would love to visit my friend in Toronto now that the border is back open to vaccinated Americans, something tells me that time is running out before Ontario becomes a frozen tundra. Of course, if I do manage to make the trip, I can retain my elite status through 2022 — which, again, might not mean much if I don’t have any other Air Canada flight plans.
Ultimately, there was probably no good reason for me to take advantage of this particular status match opportunity (other than this awesome post, amiright?), but I’m still glad I went through with it. If nothing else, I now have an Aeroplan account and can start looking for potential award booking paths using this loyalty program. Meanwhile, I’ll also need to keep an eye on this StatusMatch.com site as it looks pretty interesting and could prove valuable in the future. But, in any case, if you’re a frequent flyer looking to see what Air Canada has to offer, be sure to check out this promotion while it lasts.