Originally Posted by
u600213
$15K to match Delta would not be acceptable to me unless the eligible spend also matched Delta. For example the United credit card spend waiver does not apply to 1K but Delta credit card spend counts towards Medallion. Similarly, "Economy Comfort and Preferred Seats purchases made through a Delta channel (including delta.com, Fly Delta mobile app, Delta Reservations, Delta kiosks, and select Delta airport locations) are included in MQDs" while United does not count that spend.
Actually, UA does count E+ purchases -- that's about the only thing besides base fare on 016 tickets that counts, though. DL does give some MQD for non-Delta tickets; it's a percentage of the mileage that gets awarded.
IMO, change fees, upgrade co-pays, TODs, and other cases of handing UA money for free should count also.
As for $12K being too low -- for me, it's almost, but not quite, too high. If they'd made the requirement $15K, I wouldn't be about to hit $12K -- I'd be somewhere between $5K and $9K, depending upon which flights I elected to switch from paid to award. So, it's doing what they want -- enticing incremental spend that I might not otherwise have made.