Changes to MPC announced for 15 Apr 2016
 

Just found this on twitter. Doesn't look all bad actually, but YMMV.

http://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_H....html?switch=Y

Cathay has put new MPC scheme on its website
 

https://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_.../overview.html

There you go...


New ways to earn

Under the new points-based system, you will be able to earn faster in premium classes, and with more eligible fare classes on Cathay Pacific and Dragonair than before. This is a more balanced approach towards rewarding members across all club tiers. You will continue to earn and redeem Asia Miles as you do today. Learn how the new system will work and how your club points will be calculated here:

It went more BA-style than UA/DL-style...I guess good for those travelling extensively in premium classes; but just seems to me that SL will be much harder to qualify now. I'm glad I jumped from BA to AA instead of CX (now, just a matter of time before AA's changes hit...)

Important Developments at the Marco Polo Club
 

Hi there,

Earlier this year there was a lot of great debate and feedback here on possible changes to the Marco Polo Club. Cathay Pacific is announcing to its members some important developments to the club and I’d like to take this opportunity to update everyone and share some insights.

Points Based Earning
The club will move away from miles and sectors to a points based earning model. The points earned will be based on class travelled, sub-class and zoned distance travelled. The new points earning table can be found here.

https://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_...ng-points.html

The first thing you will notice that the points earned will be proportionally higher for front end travel than in Economy class. While better recognition of the value of front end travel was something that was debated here, economy class travel is being more widely recognized with the addition of some previously excluded sub-classes.

There are no changes to the tiers themselves, but obviously achieving each tier will be based on an annual points threshold rather than miles or sectors. These are:

• Green - 100 points
• Silver - 300 points
• Gold - 600 points
• Diamond - 1,200 points

Recognizing the large numbers of current Green members and the impact that sometimes has on areas like priority boarding, the renewal criteria for Green tier will be set at 100 points or an annual renewal fee of US$100.

Asia Miles earning and redemption will not be impacted by these changes, they continue to be based on the existing mileage model.

Mid-Tier Benefits
The club is introducing an interesting new concept of mid-tier benefits. As members reach milestones along their membership year, they will accrue additional benefits which recognize and reward their performance. These benefits include:

• One Business Class lounge pass at 200 points for Green members
• Two Business Class lounge guest passes at 450 points for Silver members
• Two Business Class lounge guest passes at 800 points for Gold members
• Four bookable upgrades for regional sectors at 1,000 points for Gold members
• Two First Class lounge guest passes at 1,400 points for Diamond members
• Four bookable upgrades for any sectors at 1,600 points for Diamond members
• One companion Gold card at 1,800 points for Diamond members

Additional New Benefits
Membership Holidays – will allow members who need to take time out from travel to park their current membership status for up to one year, to study or say if they get sick, and then resume the same status when they re-start their travel.

Age Qualification – The current membership age qualification will be reduced from age of 18 to 12. This reflects both the fact that over 12’s pay full adult fares, are increasingly travelling more frequently and the desire to offer greater family recognition.

Changes to Existing Benefits
While the club is keeping all of its existing benefits, there will be some changes:

• Guaranteed seat reservations will be tweaked so that in Economy class they can only be booked in Y sub-class, in Premium Economy in W sub-class and in Business Class only in J sub-class
• Diamond members will now need to travel on CX, KA or oneworld airlines to access lounges

Why Change?
There has been a lot of fantastic debate on this forum over the weeks and months and a lot of the business rational for this has been thoroughly aired. Some of the key drivers for these changes include:

• The points structure does more accurately reflect members’ revenue contribution and is part of a growing trend occurring across the airline industry
• New benefits address some of the feedback and requests from members over the years
• The changes look to make the club more family friendly and more flexible to individual member needs

Timing and Transition
All of these changes take effect on 15th April 2016. At that time miles and sector balances will be converted to the new points balances, ensuring no one loses out and everyone will continue to the end of their individual membership year.

All Green members will be automatically renewed for another year provided they have accumulated any club points when converted. Moving forward, annual re-qualification will be 100 points or US$100.

All travel before 15th April will earn miles / sectors and on or after the 15th April will accrue the new tier points and everyone will re-qualify based on the new points thresholds above.

In Closing and Support
As with any changes, some of these will be popular with members, some perhaps less so with some members. I am looking forward to reading your comments and feedback in the days and weeks to come. For any specific questions about these changes, CX have set up a dedicated hotline: +852 2683 6788 / +800 2683 6788 and an email support address: [email protected].

Full details of the changes and support tools such as a club points calculator can be found here:

https://www.cathaypacific.com/cx/en_...polo-club.html

Best Wishes
AgencyGuy

looks like the QF approach for zone based points with the emphasis on driving pax to choose CX flights and penalise those who fly with OW partners.

the upgrades are nice but probably just formalise what many experienced before with op-ups (although now fairer and guaranteed).

loss of guaranteed economy class discount fare buckets is a big blow to the value of gold.

Unless my travels change, in the foreseeable future I'll permanently stay SL after this qualifying year. But it's not as bad as it could have been.

I've calculated for the flights I'm doing this year to regain GO, I'll only get 410 Club points. It's a bit disappointing but for someone who's been relegated to the back of the aircraft on cheaper tickets for now, I'd prefer this than losing my status altogether. Which is what could have happened had CX gone to premium class revenue based as had been speculated about here earlier.

Bad! Seat guarantee will only be for J, W, and Y only.:td:

So if you want to re-qualify for another year, you need to do it before the April 15th transition?

Here's a brief summary of what I've noticed so far:

1.) No more being able to attain silver by flying an HKG-YYZ/ORD/JFK round trip 2x annually by flying Y (big bummer!)
2.) Expect to pay HKD$2-3k more if you want to earn 100% club points flying in Y for intra-Asia routes (ie Japan)
3.) **Positive Change** Mileage runs will probably be cheaper now since S, N and Q classes can now accumulate points towards status.

I'll let others do the more in-dept analysis.

I'm also glad that MPC did not comprimise any major benefits with tiers like that 4x lounge voucher per year BS...

Seems weird to me that S, N, and Q classes on CX earn so little, much less than the cheapest fares on AA and JL, or example.

For those Diamonds who were hoping this was going to reduce lounge crowding, the opposite will occur. Previously it would take around 10-11 round-trip business class trips to London to reach Diamond (a typical Diamond trip). Now in D/I class, it will only take around 6-7 trips.

So there are going to be many more Diamonds around moving crowds from the J lounge to the F lounge.

Diamonds won't feel so special anymore.

This might sound stupid, but "per flight" means per sector right? so a RT MNL-PVG via HKG on I-class would be about 80 points?

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/749/2...7d446f4a_c.jpg

One more thing, I noticed that the SWU-like upgrades for GO will not be 'systemwide' but just for short/medium-haul

Yup I pretty much think so. So they're encouraging ex-XXX activity...:D

+1. Very bad. Virtually removing the seat guarantee benefit.

And the 'new benefits' are a joke - a 'membership holiday' during which one cannot enjoy the club benefits? And lowering age qualification is even branded as a 'benefit'? Seems CX people really can't find any positive things to promote!

As for the mid-tier benefits, lounge passes for GO and DM are only useful when you have a large travelling group. Bookable upgrades may be useful but let's see what the priority will be. Anyway, most of those getting enough points for bookable upgrades would have probably been DM in the old system when they often enjoy op-ups.

What a huge devaluation.