 TITLE: How Can a Credit Card Help You Earn Airline Elite Status? CONTENT: How Airline Credit Cards Can Help You Earn Elite Status\n-------------------------------------------------------\nSounds like you have to buy a lot of airline tickets and spend a lot of time on planes, right? Not necessarily. Some airlines partner with credit card issuers and allow cardholders to earn points or miles toward elite status simply by spending. The airline credit cards that do so are among the most premium available and may come with high annual fees and require you to have excellent credit just to apply.\nUsing these credit cards for an elite boost also means spending a lot of money on them each year. Still, putting all your regular expenses on an airline credit card and paying them off every month might give you just the lift you need to hit that next tier of status and save some cash at the airport.\nThe Delta SkyMiles® Reserve American Express Card, for example, has a $550 annual fee. Its perks include access to Delta Sky Clubs and American Express Centurion Lounges in the U.S. and Hong Kong when flying Delta (and using your card to book your ticket in the case of Centurion Lounges), and earning 3 miles per dollar on Delta purchases. However, cardholders can also earn 15,000 Medallion Qualification Miles (MQMs) toward elite status after spending $30,000 on eligible purchases with their card in a calendar year, up to four times per year. A cardholder who spends $120,000 on purchases in a year would earn a full 60,000 MQMs without even setting foot on an airplane. That's enough for mid-range Gold Medallion status with the airline, which usually requires flying 60 segments or 50,000 elite-qualifying miles and spending $6,000 qualifying dollars.\nBarring a once-in-a-lifetime shopping spree, though, spending $25,000 on eligible purchases in a calendar year with the card will let Delta SkyMiles members waive the usual spending requirements of $3,000 to $9,000 on airfare for Medallion status up to all but the topmost tier of Diamond (that requires $250,000 spent on the card, or $15,000 on Delta airfare under normal circumstances).\nBut that's just one example. Here are other airline credit cards—many of them with more modest spending thresholds—that can help flyers earn or boost their elite status simply by spending as usual. END