Originally Posted by
jbcarioca
Just adding to the general state of confusion. I have roughly 20mm lifetime miles and I've redeemed just about every category of international award on quite a few airlines, although never for domestic US travel.
The SM program is neither better nor worse than several others AFAIK, but much better than most non-US programs that charge lots of fees. Of course DL does often, but not always, charge a non-US origination fee that I've been charged fro by no other carrier.
If you're talking about a lifetime of experience you might think that Delta was no worse than others, because (1) the real slide in Delta has predominantly come over the last couple of years and (2) you might have missed the improvements in other programs like Continental and Aeroplan.
The people who complain about international award pricing or availability are generally not calculating the cost of alternatives, or the wealth of points earning power available to DL elites.
I think many of the posts in this thread would counter that conclusion, actually.