Originally Posted by
DEN_to_SIN
Hello, new friends.
I am moving from DEN to SIN. I travel approximately 16 segments/year on business as an individual, and approximately 8 segments/year with my wife and kid, who otherwise do not travel. Including business travel, we buy the cheapest available tickets. The (only) priority is reducing the cost of and improving the family travel experience. Virtually all segments will be on United, Singapore, and in rare cases Scoot/Silk.
If I were to accrue all United this year, I would likely end up *close* to the PQP requirement for the lowest level despite flying about 35k miles.
(1) What is your home airport? SIN
(2) What types of fares do you usually buy ? Discount economy
(3) How many miles do you usually fly each year? (<25K, 25-50k, >50k) 25k-50k
(4) Do you have any kind of status at present? What is it? (UA Silver, M&M Senator etc) No. I could attain MP Silver this year, currently have ~700 PQP and 6 segments.
(5) What is most important to you in a FFP? Economy earning and redemptions, lounge access beyond what is available through Priority Pass Select.
(6) Which routes do you fly most often - Domestic US for a few more months, then SE Asia.
(7) Preferred Airlines - None.
(8) Do you travel for work or pleasure? Work as individual, pleasure as family.
What do you think? My hunch is that I should chase status on whoever permits earning on discount economy tickets at 100% of flight miles, but I don't know who that would be.
Basically no one in Star Alliance really credits discount economy at 100% anymore, or none that I can think of offhand. UA used to on their own flights and PQMs on JV partners, but now with the PQP thing, that's gone. United and Star Alliance Silver is more or less worthless as well. I wouldn't really pursue UA status unless you can get to Gold. You might go for Asiana for easier Star Gold, but earnings aren't great for discount economy. However you only need 40k qualifying miles over 2 years.
The one and only benefit I can think of for going for UA Silver instead is access to Economy Plus seating, however as Silver you can only get it 24 hours in advance, so on busy flights it may not be a benefit at all.