sararainey

Copying what I wrote on reddit, because a few of you gave me these suggestions to push to have MQD's recalculated. Hopefully, it's at least a cautionary tale about earning skymiles.

Last year, I was ~$300 short of making status (I had accumulated more than enough MQMs), and after posting here about whether or not it was worth spending $300 to achieve silver, I decided to take a trip to meet the required dollar spend. After speaking to two Delta agents on the phone, both of whom assured me this trip would qualify me for status, I booked a RT 24 hour to Phoenix from Chicago. After returning, I looked at my account to see that I was a mere $2 short of status.

I called customer service to see if there was anything that could be done (I was willing to spend the $2, but was frustrated as I was promised I would have already been qualified with the Phoenix trip), and was told my only option was to buy miles at $290 dollars. After calling customer care once more, I was told that if I asked to have my dollar spend recalculated (maybe cents were missed or rounded down) they would find the $2 and I would achieve status. When I asked why, the customer service agent said "I cannot confirm that you will achieve status, but you need to ask to recalculate your dollars and you will achieve status." This was also confirmed by a few flyers on this forum. That request was denied.

I was then offered by Delta, at the beginning of 2018, to purchase more miles, in a final (post 2017) attempt to make 2017 status. I, instead, took a RT to Paris from New York. After finding out that a trip taken with the airline on Jan 9 DID NOT count towards this last offer, I became furious. That trip was taken during the same time the promotion for buying into 2017 was offered. When I wrote Delta for the third time to ask why these dollars hadn't counted, but those spend to purchase miles would, the email I received stated that all qualifying miles and dollars had to be earned/spent in 2017, which directly contradicted the offer that was made (via email) to buy into the program in January 2018.

I have spoken with multiple status holders here who have assured me that Delta has bumped them into the next status category even when they fell short. Apparently, this is not the case for those attempting to achieve silver. I have also had the discussion about the slippery slope argument, and I understand the concern, however: 1. I was assured I would achieve status after the CHI PHX flight, and relied on that assurance to take a flight I never would taken had I known I would have been short, 2. I was told about rounding down issues in calculating MQDs, and I have been on enough flights that this seems like it could be a possibility, 3. I then spent more money in 2018 only to find out that I had spent money the wrong way?

I am so disappointed in how this was handled, and I will never fly Delta again (thank you forum member who, possibly snarkily, possibly seriously told me to consider WOW air. They were wonderful, albeit a little disorganized). I was disgusted that a customer who spent thousands of dollars and flew tens of thousands of miles is turned away for $2, a $2 that was most likely rounded down in multiple trips taken where the numbers past the "." were below 50. I always caveat these stories with - I did this with my own money and on my own time. Silver, $3000, and 25k miles may not seem like a lot to most of you, but I really stretched myself for the MQDs. I guess I need to spend much more to be considered a customer Delta cares to keep.