Originally Posted by
kangarooflyer88
correct and historically ua (and any airlines for that matter) treated their international elites differently than domestic travellers. Case in point, pre-pandemic, if you were not based in the us, your status would be based on purely the number of miles flown (e.g. Pqm) whereas those based domestically would need to spend so many dollars and fly so many miles to earn the same status. Regardless of what one may have thought about the prior program's requirements, ua recognized that their elites had different travel patterns and tailored the program accordingly. Even to this day, the new ua program provides favourable treatment for us foreign elites by providing milage based pqp accrual when we fly alliance partners like sq or nh.
My sense is at a minimum they will likely divide things up like that again with international members receiving another waiver for this year, and perhaps domestic elites receiving a further reduction in the number of pqps they need to earn status. Something i think even those at ua would agree is that now is not a good time to travel. Border restrictions are constantly changing, there are testing requirements, quarantine requirements, poor onboard service and on-ground service (e.g. Polaris lounge) due to the current restrictions. Nevermind the fact that route networks are constantly changing meaning that the ticket you booked for a particular destination may no longer be valid because an airline pulled out of a market.
The silver lining to all of this is travel will rebound, and those airlines that survive will more than make their money back. Does anyone on this forum honestly believe that once this pandemic is over, everyone will still be sitting on the ground? We've gone over a year with conferences and tradeshows cancelled, business meetings postponed, some of us haven't seen our relatives in over a year. We'll see a surge in travel the likes of which we haven't seen in decades and with the limited number of pilots and birds available for service, fares will go through the roof. Ua and the airlines may be losing money now, but they shouldn't make any decisions about elite status based on this short-term bizarre situation we find ourselves in. The real test of elite status will be how we respond once things have opened up.
-'roo