Thank you Scott for such incredible communication! ^^^
I'm in a very different group that most of you, I'm an elite (silver) passenger qualifying purely on leisure travels, and #4, which is so great for corporate travel, changes a lot of things for me:
4. Full Elite Qualification is back. Effective Oct. 27, you’ll earn 100% Elite Qualification Miles and full Elite Qualification Points on discounted fares, regardless of where they’re purchased. To all of our loyal corporate travelers: message received.
It looks like there's gonna be a big increase in "I'm elite and I didn't know it" leisure pax, families booking vacations through expedia and orbitz, and therefore more and more silver elites. This in addition to the double EQM promo which helped things go in the same direction (albeit not for the same kind of pax).
So now we get maybe twice as many silvers (or more?), while in the same time Gold is becoming more and more rewarding (being *A gold). The gap between silver and gold is increasing, and the number of reasons to qualify for Gold as well. I'm finally making Gold next month (yes, only on leisure, and mainly with cheap fares bought on co.com), so I'm... mmm... golden
But of course, I'm not naif enough not to know that elite levels are here to reward and encourage corporate travel, i.e. big spenders, and not leisure, i.e. cheapo's. So this makes a lot of sense for continental - and it makes for a happy CO board here on FT, which is just as well
