Originally Posted by
Lllahim
My understanding of the UA spend program is that it is conditional on mileage achievement. I stand to be corrected on this: you still have to earn 100K miles or 100 segmants to qualify in addition to a spend of $10K. Spend without miles will not qualify for status. There is no chance that an Airline willl give you top-tier status for spending 25K on one return J fare to SYD. If that happens, I will spend $100K/a year for 4 different top tier programs. Where is my loyalty?
Non-US resident accounts are exempt from the minimum spend requirement as these are also tied to the UA cc (except for 1K) and which is not available to members outside the USA.
And once more, let's not be coy about it, for 99% of those who fly, it is their employer (who can deduct higher cost tickets) who pays for the ticket not them. It is the company that has the loyalty based solely on the deal they cut with the airline. Around FT, a large number of elites are actually paying for their tickets out of after tax dollars with no hope of deducting from their taxes.