Originally Posted by
BA0197
50 seems to be the magic number for frequent flyer programmes. At 50 segments you would earn status etc... 500x50= 25000. Enough for an award ticket for a very frequent traveller that takes short routes.
Not sure what you mean by that. At 30 you make gold on segments. Which is where I draw my confusion.
It seems the 500 mi/min is meant to catch people who need to take short flights, but not *only* short flights. I.e - not somebody who does LAX-SFO weekly, but somebody who has to do SAN-LAX-XXX frequently. So then does it only exist as an elite benefit because the others have it? (the theoretical pax in my example could just as easily be loyal to UA. however, if AA or UA were to get rid of the benefit, She/He would stand to lose 782 miles each RT, and would thus might be incentivized to switch to the carrier which still had the 500 mile min elite benefit)