Originally Posted by bdesmond
I've never heard a good thing about NW, but, I trust the advice here about this sort of thing more than anywhere else, so I'm certainly willing to try it if recommended. If CO is just NW metal then I might as well just go NW ticket stock too. The only advantage of ATL to me is that I have my UA RCC membership which has a club there.
NW isn't going to wow you with their luxury airplanes, int'l upgrade opportunities or amazing employee attitudes (all of which are lacking). But I'd rather connect through DTW than ORD or ATL any day. And if you fly NW as an elite, you're going to sit in first class more often than not (NW domestic F is only slightly better than UA E+).
I'm not 1P yet on UA, so if I ask NW to comp me status it's only going to be their 2P equivelant which looks like silver. Does this still put me on the list for upgrades? I'm not used to getting that given I take UA everywhere right now so it's not like I'm going to make a decision based on that.
None of NW, CO or DL offer any sort of E+ product like UA's, so you're either in front or you're in steerage. All three offer complimentary upgrades to elites, however (assuming you're not flying RJs), and if you can snag bulkheads or exit rows you should be reasonably comfortable (note that the exit row on CO's ERJ is comfy, but there are no comfy seats on NW's or DL's CRJs). NW and CO have the advantage of reciprocal upgrade benefits, while DL is off by itself. On NW and CO upgrades are automatic. I think on DL you may have to request them (I'm not sure), but they're still free.
As a NW or CO silver you'll probably have a very good shot at upgrades on ROC-DTW. At most flight times I'd guess you'll be upgraded more often than not--even as a silver.
The little fine print and this thread says DL and most CO ticket classes don't count as EQM/EQS on NW. Is this the case reciprocally?
On NW you get 100/150% EQMs for all DL metal flights, but no EQSs. You get 50/100/150% EQMs for CO metal flights, depending on fare class, and EQSs for the 100/150% EQM fare classes (but not the 50% EQM fares). Note again that CO Connection flights like CLE-TOL are not eligible for Worldperks miles. You get 500 minimum EQMs on every segment, regardless of whose metal.
See
http://nwa.com/worldperks/earn/air_partner.shtml for details on which fare classes earn what.
The rules are roughly reciprocal if you credit miles to DL or CO. DL offers minimum 100% EQMs for NW metal, and 50% EQMs only for cheap CO metal. CO offers 50% EQMs for cheap NW or DL metal. I'm not sure of the details regarding EQSs. You'll have to comb through their websites for that.