Kimmel couldn’t just buy tickets and stay home to reach the status. You must physically be on the plane and complete the travel to receive the Elite Qualifying Dollars (EQDs) and Elite Qualifying Miles (EQM’s). “I was only $275 EQMs short after returning from Indonesia, so I reached out to the airline and asked if I could just pay that difference without actually flying. Instead, I was provided an offer that asked that I pay $1,875 for the status, which makes absolutely zero fucking sense. So I started looking on Google flights to see what would be the bare minimum spend that would give me what I needed.”

“Places like Vegas or Denver were coming up around $600 for a return trip. The only two places came up that were just enough and not too far away so that I could still make it back before New Year’s Eve (if you travel after the New Year, it doesn’t count towards status). Those two places were San Jose, CA or Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Both flights were priced the same, just over $400, which would give me the EQDs needed for Platinum Pro and would save me a huge amount in spending $1,875 without flying as the airline so generously asked. Personally, I don’t want to fly somewhere just to fly there. And the San Jose flight would’ve been me sitting in the airport for two hours then coming home. Cabo was 24 hours. Where I could rent a cheap car, found a cheap hostel, and figured I could sit on the beach and make a day of it. I made the wrong choice…”