Originally Posted by
PsiFighter37
I'm surprised at the fateful sense that people think UA is going to ditch p.s. outright.
In my mind the move alone is the outright ditching of p.s..
It doesn't matter what flights between EWR and SFO are called but it is no longer the p.s. that existed prior. Simply put, there can be nothing premium or exclusive about a service that leaves EWR for SFO almost every hour. It will be little different in perception from the hourly shuttles between LGA and BOS, for example.
This move is the death of p.s.. It may well be that UA continues to name flights between EWR and SFO/LAX as p.s. but we should not be fooled - it will be no more than a marketing thing, even if all have flat beds. Reality is regardless of the move out of JFK all those flatbeds being brought back from Europe would probably have ended up on EWR transcons anyway. The soft product and rest of the experience will likely align with the current EWR-SFO service.
As some have said before if UA wants to convince us that the new p.s. is indeed premium then let them enhance the entire experience - Y and C. Provide international service (including meals in Y and club access for *Gold) for entire plane and then we might take this serious. IIRC old UA p.s. at least had E plus in entire Y (please correct if this is wrong) so even Y pax experienced something different.