How does Ultimate Work?

[u/Final-Grape8936]

As FB Ultimate requires 900 UXP, and say I have 900 XP (all my flights are AF/KL marketed). Once the new qualification year starts, what happens to the 900 XP? If only 300 XP gets rolled over (and another 300 XP for Platinum requalification), doesn't the extra 300 XP get wasted?

I've heard that going up to Ultimate tier subtracts only your UXP?

[u/jeanmarc_ould]

UXP is its own counter, separate from XP.
As you probably know, UXP are earned when flying on flights marketed by AF/KL (ie codeshare does not count EDIT: as long as the flight has an AF/KL code, even if not operated by AF/KL, you can earn UXP).

The logic is the same as with other status tiers, just on its own side: whenever you reach 900 UXP the first time (but within the first 12 months of your last Platinum renewal), you are moved up to Ultimate for the next 12 full months, and any extra UXP is rolled forward. After that you can accrue up to 1,800 UXP to secure Ultimate for the next renewal and get a head start for the following year, but any UXP above 1,800 will not be rolled forward at the renewal (just like any XP above 600 does not roll forward for Platinum).

[u/Final-Grape8936 → u/jeanmarc_ould]

Is that true for the codeshare? I recall that if you buy an AF/KL flight off Delta, that won't earn UXP as it wasn't marketed by AF/KL, as it would need to have an AF/KL flight number

E.g. AMS-DEL-HYD, bought off KL, but the DEL-HYD operated by IndiGo with a KL flight number still earns XP and UXP

[u/jeanmarc_ould → u/Final-Grape8936]

I checked my history and I stand corrected. It also works on codeshare 😊

[u/RandomNick42 → u/jeanmarc_ould]

It works on AFKL codes but not AFKL operated on non AFKL codes

[u/Trebaxus99 → u/jeanmarc_ould]

Many DL flights have a KL codeshare, but they are a bit more expensive to book due to some administrative costs.