Originally Posted by
Hertzfan
United already offers Premier access to United Club card holders and priority baggage handling and security line. Delta would only be following suit.
I believe that the United Club card is a special credit card with a higher fee than the base UA affiliated cards. It gives access to UA lounges, among other privileges.
In contrast, the Gold DL AmEx card is a base-level card that doesn't have much if any anual fee. A closer analogue to the United Club card would be the DL Reserve card.
The problem is that when AmEx airport hawkers and FAs try to "sell" DL AmEx cards, they over promise, either deliberately to earn commissions from accepted applications or out of ignorance and not bothering to study the fine print. DL further confuses the issue by creating boarding zones before zone 1. It's marketing to make everyone feel important and like they have high priority. DL Gold AmEx boards with "zone one" which is really at least the third zone.