Originally Posted by
BOSskier
My take was that if the FFPs become more or less equal, then his friend may choose to spend his dollars elsewhere for reasons such as service, schedule, etc.
Sure, and that I agree with, but if someone is spending $35K on UA, presumably at least some of those trips are offering the service, schedule, etc. that the passenger is looking for.
I understand "I'm going to become a free agent." I understand "DL offers better service." I'm not sure I understand "If it's going to cost hundreds of thousands of miles to redeem for an award, I don't want to fly your airline," because I suspect that's going to be approximately equally true for every airline as soon as they can all figure out how to make it happen.
For me, UA is trying desperately to fire me as a customer, and they may well succeed. My personal problem is, while DL and UA would work equally well for me domestically, Star Alliance >> SkyTeam for me internationally. It's not an easy decision.