As the Alaska Airlines and Virgin America merger progresses, there have been a number of announcements on timelines for various milestones. The latest announcements include details of the closure of the Virgin America Elevate program by the end of the year.
Over the course of 2017, members of Elevate will be able to move their points across to Alaska Mileage Plan The following diagram shows the timeline that Alaska Airlines is working to.
Elevate Timeline
Throughout 2017 you will be able to use your Elevate membership as normal. All current earning and redemption option remain in place. You will still be able to use points for flights on Virgin America or partner airlines, convert points to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan miles, and earn points for flights on Virgin America, Alaska Airlines and other partners.
Points transfer
Members now have the opportunity to move their points across to am Alaska Mileage Plan account. To do so, you will need to hava an Alaska Mileplan Account. All members of the Elevate program as at December 5, 2016 were pre-assigned a number, and should have received an email with information on activating the account.
During 2017, a 30$ bonus will be offered on points transferred across. That means that each Elevate Point will conert to 1.3 Mileage Plan miles.
Any Elevate points that have not been converted by the end of the year, will be automatically transferred early in 2018. It is not clear if this will be done at the same conversion rate.
Status
Alaska has said that they are not planning a status match between programs during 2017. However, in 2018 there will be a limited form of status matching. Members of Elevate achieving Silver or Gold status during 2017, will be offered the same status in Alaska Mileage Plan. This will only be available to members that had a join date prior to March 23, 2017.
Partnerships
While Alsaka has said that the existing partnerships will remain in place for now, it is unlikely that some of Elevates partners will remain beyond the end of the year. For example, Elevate offered sone good redemption value on Virgin Australia services. As Alaska is more aligned with Qantas, it is hard to see the Virgin Australia partnership surviving post 2017.
