New Marriott / Singapore partnership that fast tracks you to Star Alliance Gold (but with a catch)

Marriott Bonvoy has had long-standing partnerships with airlines including United and Emirates. A new name has just been added to the list – Singapore Airlines. You can view the promotion details and link your accounts here.

[Marriott Bonvoy]

• Gold: Two flights within six months for Krisflyer Silver
• Platinum and Above: instant Krisflyer Silver, and four flights within six months for Krisflyer Gold
• Booking class G and award tickets are excluded

Matched / upgraded status is valid for 12 months. As the challenge starts immediately once you’ve linked your accounts, wait till you have relevant flight plans.

One biggest catch is how a “flight” is defined. I’ve seen at least three response emails from SG already, and here’s one of them on China’s FlyerT forum:

In addition, a few data points concerning the ongoing Infinite Journey promotion they have with Shangri-La confirm that it is indeed based on bookings not segments. This is bad news as you can’t complete the challenge in one return trip of four flight segments.

(Update: we’ve now received a data point and a reader was upgraded after one PNR of four segments.)

If you are based in Singapore / Southeast Asia it is still relatively easy (and cheap).

There’s also a “hack” for European residents, as SQ has a fifth-freedom flight between Milan and Barcelona.

Four one-ways cost about €400 (with the discount offered by Trip.com). KrisFlyer Silver is next to useless. Krisflyer Gold however, gives you extensive benefits including priority check-in, extra baggage allowance and business lounge across the Star Alliance network.

[Singapore Krisflyer]

• Silver: stay three nights within 6 months for Marriott Silver
• Gold: instant Marriott Gold, and stay ten nights within 6 months for Marriott Platinum

If you are currently Marriott Platinum and above, you could complete the Krisflyer Gold challenge, and at some point link back for the Marriott Challenge, if they allow it.

[Shangri-La Circle]

In case you have Shangri-La Jade membership that’s due to expire, you should participate in the Infinite Journey promotion first if you haven’t done so already. Similarly you’ll get Krisflyer Silver and then need to fly three times in four months to upgrade to Gold.

After 12 months you could then re-do the challenge through Marriott’s offer – their terms explicitly say that previous status match promotions don’t preclude you from being eligible.