Originally Posted by
CommittedLurker
My very same experience SFO-CCU, 5-6x yearly in J. I am planning on diversifying as well.
My last week as EK Gold after 8 consecutive years (2004 - 2011). Have been a Gold member ever since the JFK direct flight started (used to be on the east coast) and amazingly EK started LAX and SFO when I moved west, so it continued for 3 more years. But it's time to say goodbye.
Main reasons for quitting:
1) Substantial devaluation of Skywards - really hard to confirm awards/upgrades when I need them.
2) Lack of alliances hurts for a US-based traveler (around 50K of my ~150-200K annual BIS travel is intra-US and so 1K really matters and so that's now my first priority for qualifying each year). End of redemption opportunities with UA/CO made this worse.
3) No real advantage of being EK Gold when traveling in paid J
4) When I travel alone on work, I am in paid J - but am in Y when traveling on vacation with family. So the EK Gold lounge access policy is completely useless for me (compared to SEN/1K where families are allowed in)
The main thing I will miss is ICE, but I'll probably still travel EK J around once a year once I've hit my 1K and it's my off year for SEN.