awadryheat

As a frequent flyer to Seoul, the decision was easy. I was US CP in 2012, and PP this year, but the day after the merger was announced I started accumulating miles on UA. The *A has far better service to Seoul, and better in general to Asia. To have to go through DFW or Tokyo to get to ICN from PHX was the last straw. What is unfortunate is that I accumulated 15k miles on US before the announcement that they were going with oneworld, or I'd be *G already on UA. It also is crappy that *A rules prevent any kind of status match from UA to US DM members, even though they know US is leaving. So I wasn't able to board early for a few months and had to fight for lounge access several times. They constantly want to put my US DM number on the ticket to let me into the lounge which is not required by the *A rules. I loved AWA but the service has slowly been deteriorating over the years since the HP/US merger, and now - I'm out.

I've actually been treated better as UA *A Silver by UA and OZ in the last few weeks than I was as US CP in 2012. I think if you live in the northeast or east of DFW, this merger might be OK for you, but if you live west of DFW and particularly if you fly to Asia, the decision seems clear to me - stick with *A. I imagine after US leaves, UA will offer some kind of status match, but I didn't want to take the chance.

I was surprised to read a few posts back that a CP member got 100% upgrades on US hub to hub. I got "0%" hub to hub upgrades as CP in 2012. Another rant is that the worthwhile DM special rewards for reaching halfway to the next level (40k, 60k, 80k or whatever) are almost impossible to redeem. The most useful is the free spouse USAClub membership. But if your expiration date falls almost anywhere other than a few weeks after you reach that milestone, it's impossible to redeem. So bye bye US/AA. UA sucks but not as bad as US at this point.