I was thrilled to receive an email from SAS this morning letting me know that my challenge was EuroBonus Million Mile challenge was successfully completed.
Our SAS EuroBonus Million Mile Challenge Is Completed!
With my Mexico journey complete, all 15 SkyTeam carriers have credited to my EuroBonus account (same for my son Augustine) and we both just received the email below with subject line, “You’re a SAS EuroBonus Millionaire!”:
Hi!
It’s with great pleasure that we would like to inform that you have successfully completed our EuroBonus Millionaire challenge and will earn one million EuroBonus points! We’re thrilled to celebrate your incredible journey and this exciting milestone.
We’d love to hear about your adventure! If you’ve captured moments along the way – photos, videos, or memorable stories – we’d be delighted if you’d share them with us.
Here’s how you can contribute:
- Tell us about your route and your travel experience! Was there a particular moment, destination, or airline that stood out?
- Is there any specific content you’d like to share with us for a potential feature on our channels?
- Do you have an Instagram account or other social media profiles? Let us know, we’d love to tag you when sharing your story.
- Your journey inspires us, and we value your feedback. If there’s anything you’d like to share about your experience or suggestions for improvement, feel free to let us know.
We will be in touch again in the new year to let you know when your points will be credited.
Thank you for being part of this challenge, and well done!
Best,
Marcus and SAS EuroBonus Team
Well Marcus, I will respond but you might want to start here, where you can find dozens of stories and reviews from this journey around the world.
I’ll reflect on the journey more in a future post, but I have ZERO regrets over doing it and it would have been fun even without the million miles…I just wish I could have spent more time in every city we hastily flew through.
It’s probably too late if you have not started already, but best wishes to all who are completing their challenge in the final 12 days of 2023.
I never took part in the US Airways Grand Slam challenge, so this was a lot of fun and a first for me…but hopefully not the last.
What a great trip and awesome memories for Augustine and you (although at his age, it will likely be the Lego stores around the world). 🙂
So , which was your favourite destination , where you accomplished a great deal of business or leisure ?
In Copenhagen you might have toured the Lego factory , no ?
The Saudia flights were the best, the Korean ICN-LAX was a great surprise, and our night in Ho Chi Minh City was the most fun.
The reports I got said that the Saudia/airport ground services at JED have been great for those doing the terminal transfer there to the hajj terminal when coming in on Saudia flights into the normal terminal at JED. And this comes from some of the people who have serious complaints about the airline ground services in most other GCC countries.
How did your son feel about it? 🙂
I’d very much like to see Augustine’s response from an 8 year old.
You shall see it!
That will be the highlight trip report. Maybe someone should write a movie script inspired by a kid dragged along on a trip of a lifetime just for the miles. If you coordinate with Ben, you can even fictionalize it by calling the kid Miles to protect the names and faces of the innocent. 😀
It was certainly fun to follow, so thanks for taking us along for the ride!
I’m still waiting for mileage to post from flight taken over a month ago. 🙁
Did you do the challenge?
I did the challenge in mid-November and am waiting on credits from Xiamen, Garuda and Virgin to hit. I’ve filed claims, made calls and done all the dances as suggested by various forums. I even dashed down to GDL last weekend (I’m LAX based) to get a 16th airline (Aeromexico) just for good measure and am now waiting for that to post.
The announcement that they will keep claims open through the end of January for the many people like me is small comfort. I made a grand world adventure out of it and had a great time (and have some great stories as a result) but will be sorely disappointed if I get lost in the shuffle. I took weeks to plan, followed the rules and flew in the proper fare classes. This will sour me on SAS and SkyTeam if I get left out… and I’m a decade-long One World Emerald man.
My Air Europa flight has still not posted.
And I am getting lots of messages about people having problems with Vietnam Airlines and Kenyan posting.
Yes, and it’s been interesting to see where the main intersection points are where people repeatedly randomly met with others doing the challenge.
For example, KQ flights between CAN and BKK, some TAROM flights. And then things like the transfers that were barely every done before, such as the ones between Saudia and hajj terminal flights to Jakarta.
Did anyone see any dressed up Christmas elves with the special delivery backpack on their flights or at the boarding gates? There were at least two running around — including an American — and at least one was doing the SAS promo. Last sightings at OTP, IST, CAI and then may have disappeared in JED among the white-shrouded pilgrims.
It seems that interest in doing the promo run increased when SAS said it would accept eligible flights flown by year-end even if the flight hasn’t posted automatically or otherwise before year-end. Of the people who will have met the flight requirements for the million points, I expect that the majority won’t get all their flights credited until some point in January and that there will be issues with this even going into possibly February or March.
I’ll do a post on meetings I had in JED, TPE, and PVG. What a great community.
I’m eating grilled oysters in Xiamen on segment 13/15 right now. I also wish I’d had more time in each city. Thanks so much for your guidance (was a big fan of the Ibis you recommended)
How long did it take between getting the last flight miles credited and receiving the congrats email?
Four days.
Glad my guidance was helpful!
Beside the people doing this promo, the highlight of my trip was being in economy class on Garuda on a long flight showing the speed as Mach .881 and the FAs on it going around to recline the seats of passengers who had tired eyes and didn’t necessarily know the seats could recline.
Garuda crew in economy were so charming and helpful. I was on a 2ish hour flight and we had more than one beverage refill.
It might sound funny to say “the beef please” (of the 2 choices) and get an “excellent choice sir” in return, but it felt so genuine that I was giddy about it the rest of the day
Congrats! My wife and her Mom (age 75) just completed their 15th SkyTeam carrier this morning. 10/15 have credited so far. Your posts were certainly helpful in providing info for us during the planning phase and while traveling so thank you.
Haven’t heard of too many people’s problems, but about Half of their flights were delayed, including Kenya airways by 7 hours, TAROM by 5 hours and SAS canceling their flight! And the immigration system at CAN not being able to process transit without visa. Wild experiences!
That’s wild…I didn’t have any flight delays! Glad your wife and mom completed the challenge.
China’s December 17th TWOV liberalization now makes CAN-BKK easier. I had paid for some Chinese visas that were literally issued the day before or on the day of the TWOV liberalization for the purpose doing the promo run cheaper.
Got my email as well. If anyone is having issues with flights not posting after 8 days and the system rejecting the manual posting just email EBRETRO@SAS.se.
First of all, congratulations to you and your child on the successful completion of the EuroBonus challenge. Could you please share the list of the 15 airlines you flew with? Did your flights include Air Europa Express among the 15 airlines?
I might have to travel back to Europe from Korea just to board an Air Europa flight. I would really appreciate your advice on this matter.
Thank you so much!
Hi David,
I did fly Air Europa Express and it counted.
Rather than list the carriers I did fly, I’ll note I skipped Kenya Airways and Aerolineas Argentinas (and of course ITA and Middle East Airlines as well, since they were not part of this challenge)
Nor suspended SkyTeam member Aeroflot. Or have they stopped referring to it as a suspension of membership and noted it as a termination?
One gentleman I met who was doing this had tried to get his teenager to join him in doing the promo, but the teenager refused to go along. It was in that context that your blog came up about your son doing this and being about half the age of his teenager.
I didn’t give Augustine a choice! 😉
Did passport control or the airlines anywhere ask you to show a travel consent letter from your wife for your son’s trip(s)? Just curious if you had that as a consideration.
Matthew,
Thanks for sharing this cool adventure with your readers. I was surprised your eight year son Augustine handled it so well. That was a ambitious travel itinerary with stress induced scheduling and time changes that would challenge even the most experienced traveler. Congratulations on your successful quest.
Thanks, Gary!
How long after your last flight credited to your account when you received the congrats email from SAS?
My last flight was Dec 17, and it was credited to my account Dec 18. I am anxiously awaiting for my congratulations email from SAS.
Four days.
KQ seems to have flight cancellation/delay problems in the coming days for BKK-CAN/CAN-BKK. I suspect that will mess up some plans.
Congratulations! I’ve flown all 17 carriers but still have three outstanding and it’s totally grating, particularly since the worst of them is VS which seems to be actively blocking the mileage credit to Eurobonus in addition to having failed to reunite me with my bag for a shocking 17 days!
A million point promo runner in China got flagged for a fever on arrival to China. That then led to being sent to a health quarantine room for swab tests and a blood test. I hope that doesn’t put an end to their million point run before the end of the year.
I started this challenge on the day you posted this blog entry and said it was probably too late to start . Finished it up today (Dec 30th). Now it is up to SAS to validate I did everything correctly (I am very confident).
Just wanted to say thanks for your blog posts. They were part of my essential reading in planning this trip. Reading your experiences helped to inform my itinerary as I implemented lessons learned from you and others.
Thanks again and happy new year!
Congrats on completing the challenge!
Congratulations and happy new year. Glad to see you could do it too.
Beside others, I ran into various very warm and friendly random travelers who were doing the promo in the last couple of weeks while in Asia. This kind of promo certainly seems to attract a different kind of traveler than the usual, and all encountered deserve the full win for being such great folks.
Of my 15 SkyTeam airlines, 12 have posted automatically: SAS, AirFrance, KLM, Delta, Saudia, Korean, Garuda, Tarom, Vietnam, Aeromexico, Xiamen, China Eastern.
Took another Air Europa flight in December to see if the second Air Europa flight posts automatically since the first one went into a blackhole despite a supposedly successful claim for missing flight credit. Still waiting for credit from China Airlines flight and Kenya Airways flight. When these three airlines post as they should, I look forward to the million point bonus in my account.
Hey Matthew,so a couple of friends & i completed this challenge on December 14th, it’s now close to 2 months later we still haven’t received the million miles,looking online, I’m seeing numerous people are having similar issues especially regarding retroclaiming Vietnam airlines, we’ve reached out to sas many times via email,chat,phone & social media ,response has overwhelmingly been terrible with generally no one responding or a seemingly automated response…Too add insult to the injury sas has credited 900 people with the miles( seemingly every blogger/influencer has received there’s) and put a “celebrity video” announcing the winners…is there any recourse or action you can recommend for us to do? We have fulfilled our side of the bargain & flown the 15 airlines in the correct fare classes..now it’s sas turn to fulfill there end.