ENDING: Virgin Atlantic’s Excellent Status Match Promotion For British Airways Elites

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Towards the beginning of January, Virgin Atlantic launched a promotion with a view to persuading BA’s Executive Club elites to test the water on the other side of the fence. Since then, the airline has been offering status matches to anyone with British Airways Executive Cub status and it has even improved its original offer. Sadly, all good things must come to an end and there are under 5 days left to make the most of this promotion.

How This Status Match Works

• You must have British Airways Bronze, Silver, or Gold status.
• You must be a member of the Virgin Atlantic Flying Club
• You much have a Virgin Atlantic booking by 28 February 2021 (existing bookings made before the status match was announced will qualify).
• You must apply for a status match on or before 28 February 2021 by supplying proof of your British Airways status and proof of your Virgin Atlantic booking via this website.
• Revenue ticket and reward ticket bookings qualify.
• Bookings for any Virgin Atlantic cabin will qualify for all status matches.
• Your new Flying Club status will be valid for 1 year from the date you receive your new status or from the first day of the month in which you’re scheduled to travel with Virgin Atlantic.

Note: Virgin Atlantic’s usual status match deal for elites of other airlines remains in place – click for details.

What The Status Matches Look Like

British Airways has four elite tiers while Virgin Atlantic has just two, so this is how the tiers are being matched:

British Airways Bronze —> Virgin Atlantic Silver

British Airways Silver —> Virgin Atlantic Silver

British Airways Gold —> Virgin Atlantic Gold

Note: there is no special higher elite status to which British Airways Gold Guest List elites can be upgraded.

The Improvement

When this status match promotion was first launched, Virgin Atlantic said that a traveler’s new status would be applied “within 30 days of successful application” but with very few people are traveling right now, this isn’t ideal for a large number of the potential status match applicants – anyone with no plans to travel before 3Q/4Q of this year doesn’t really want to trigger their status match in February/March 2021 when they know that they won’t be able to use their new status for over 6 months.

Apparently, someone has pointed this out to Virgin Atlantic and as a result, the airline has made a very positive change to when a status match will kick-in. The application for a status match now offers travelers the option of starting a match within 30 days of successful application or starting a match on the first day of the month that a person is traveling with Virgin Atlantic.

British Airways elites still need to request a status match by the end of February and must still have a Virgin Atlantic booking made before the end of February, but they may now defer their status match until the month in which they plan to next travel with Virgin Atlantic.

As Virgin Atlantic is currently taking bookings into January 2022, it’s possible that some flyers who take up this offer will be able to lock-in Virgin Atlantic elite status for all of next year. That could be useful if British Airways doesn’t offer any further status extensions.

My Experience (So Far)

I currently hold British Airways Gold status so I recently applied for a status match to Virgin Atlantic Flying Club Gold. The form that I had to fill in (here) was straightforward, and I used a screenshot of my British Airways Gold card and a .pdf file of my Virgin Atlantic booking as the two pieces of evidence that the status match asks for.

After submitting the form, this was the message I received…

….and just 10 minutes later I had an email confirming that my status match had been approved:

That’s impressively quick!

As we haven’t yet reached the month in which I’m due to fly with Virgin Atlantic my Flying Club status is still showing as “Red” online, but I’ll report back as soon as that changes.

Virgin Atlantic Status Benefits

Flying Club Silver Status:

• Earn 30% more Virgin Points on every flight.
• Access to Virgin Atlantic Premium Economy check-in desks (where available).
• Priority boarding
• Complimentary seat assignments in all cabins (including Economy Light) from the time of booking.
• A 7% discount on Virgin Holidays bookings and 2 points for every pound spent with Virgin Holidays.
• Priority baggage.

Flying Club Gold Status:

• Earn 60% more Virgin Points on every flight
• Complimentary exit row seat assignments in Economy Classic from the time of booking.
• Complimentary seat assignments in all cabins (including Economy Light) from the time of booking.
• Access to Virgin Atlantic Upper Class check-in desks (where available)
• Priority boarding
• One extra piece of hand and hold luggage on top of your cabin allowance
• Get Clubhouse access for you and one guest when flying with Virgin Atlantic or Delta in any cabin.
• Access to the Virgin Atlantic arrivals lounge (Revivals) at London Heathrow.
• A 10% discount on Virgin Holidays bookings and 2 points for every pound spent with Virgin Holidays.
• A complimentary treatment (limited choice) at the Virgin Atlantic Clubhouse and 10% off all other treatments.

Note: Virgin Atlantic statuses are also recognized on Virgin Atlantic partner airlines including but not limited to: Delta, Air France, and KLM.

Bottom Line

For the next few days only, Virgin Atlantic is continuing to offer an incredibly easy status match to elite members of the British Airways Executive Club program. The match simply requires a flyer to hold BA elite status and to have a Virgin Atlantic flight booking made on or before 28 February (revenue and reward flights qualify).

Considering a one-way Economy Class reward flight will give a British Airways Gold status holder Virgin Atlantic’s top-tier status for a year, and considering a flyer’s new status doesn’t have to be triggered until the month in which they’ll next be traveling with Virgin, it’s hard to see this as anything but a very generous promotion.