Hello folks, long time lurker, newbie to posting. Hope you’re all safe and flying high! 
I’m looking to get some advice from you active Point Hackers as I’ve seen the Kris Flyer points-for-status offer (here) which seems like a great offer.
I have circa 250K Velocity FF miles that I would transfer, which would see me hit the silver or gold status (Do conversion fees factor in?) for what seems like 24 months.
The Velocity FF miles don’t have an expiry, but it seems that the Krisflyer miles do, so can I transfer them back to Velocity just before the end of the 24months with Krisflyer? or another Star Alliance partner?
Are there any other “gotchas” here?
Also, would the Krisflyer Gold status be able to be used for status matching with other carriers?
Thank you for your advice.
Hi @info.for.alistair
Thanks for posting for the first time. It’s great how you’re thinking of ways to take advantage of your points.
Unfortunately, there are a couple of “gotchas” with what you’re proposing.
First, transfer of points between Velocity and KrisFlyer has been suspended since the start of the pandemic and there’s no word on when, or if, it’ll come back.
Second, the transfer isn’t 1:1. Before transfers were suspended, the rate was 1.55:1 (ie. for every 1.55 points you transfer from one programme, you’d get 1 point in the other programme). So a transfer of 250,000 Velocity points to KrisFlyer would get you approximately 161,250 KrisFlyer points (enough, I think, for Silver but not for Gold). If you transferred them back to Velocity again before the end of KrisFlyer’s 3-year expiry period, you’d finish up with a mere 104,000 Velocity points – certainly not a great use of points!
In answer to your question about status matching, the answer is a firm “maybe”. With status matches, airlines often look not only at your status but also about your flying history. They may well reject your application if they see that you didn’t earn your Gold status through flying. Or they might not!
Remember, though, that KrisFlyer Gold status gives you status benefits with every Star Alliance airline as well as Singapore’s partner airlines such as Virgin Australia.
Finally, a word about Star Alliance Silver: I’m KrisFlyer Silver myself, and the benefits are almost non-existent. It’s absolutely not worth transferring points into KrisFlyer simply to gain Silver status, especially considering the 3-year expiry of your hard-earned points.
I hope this helps!
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Thanks for your insight @sixtyeight and I agree with what you’ve said; effectively using (losing?) ~140k of points over 3 years just for Silver Status really doesn’t seem like a great use of the points.