Originally Posted by
ucfjoe
I think I qualify in the group you are but at this point, screw loyalty. I care more about a J/F trip that gets me there on a flat seat (ideally) over 3.5 hours for a somewhat competitive fare vs hard/soft product. Why? Because I can't depend on upgrades so I'll just pay the "best" base J/F fare this week for me that means UA both ways and I'm not even crediting miles to UA. Somewhat OT but I'm flying the SFO-BOS in a few days on a 757 so I'm excited for this over my last AA LAX-MIA 767 trip. If price and schedule are the same then I suppose I still prefer B6 but either fares seem to be wonky or schedule so I don't fly them much.
I think you (and probably I) are the exception. I've flown UA several times this year (15K miles total) always on PS or in paid F. The fares were better, and I wanted to try the Polaris Seat out. I've flown VX in paid F a number of times (25K or so miles, all longer flights) and I've flown DL 40K miles in paid DeltaOne or F.
But I have a preference to Delta
on my shorter trips (e.g. SFO-SEA, SFO-LAX) as I often get upgrades, and so they are at this point my major program.
There are a lot of people out there who don't fly paid F domestically, or who fly enough to reach high status in one program, which is valuable to them. For these people, the program matters. So even if they can pop for paid J for a great fare SFO-BOS they may go with their preferred program. And of course, if GPU/RPUs don't clear, and you can't pay for F, flying United in 3-4-3 configuration for 6.5 hours is not exactly an enticing prospect.
