Correct, SL will have Group 3 Priority (PEY line)

Top 1% spending of DMs, not all members

I know of a diamond plus member. Apparently the list of DM Plus members is not very large. I think it’s less than 20-30 people. Last I heard, only about 10 people has it. A few years back, you would need to be spending at least $100k minimum per year. If you fly one round trip HKG to JFK on Business every month ($6-8k), you can get close to meeting this minimum spending requirement. But I guess with ticket prices so inflated now, maybe the spend requirement is different.

the number of members should be more of 300-500 range instead
100K is not the hard line tho

BA recently did the change into revenue based for tier points. Not long before that, they also aligned membership year to end on the same date like what CX is doing now. I wonder if history is going to repeat…

To be honest it is not that hard to earn 2400 SP, especially after changing the SP accrual grid in August
i mean for for the frequent business traveler.

rollover helps a lot gold and diamond member to maintain their membership level

Does the 1 free for 5 earned DM years replace the membership holiday thing? I assume so.

I'm in your camp of 1800. But I ghink this pushes me up not down but maybe my logic is wrong? A few things to consider:

*I do about 3-4k equivalent SP if I include all competitors flying and points tickets equivalents (my points are almost all Cathay, competitors are all cash usually); for now my only real reason for stopping at 1800 is I didn't get anything past it. and I do like the competitors too, and schedule, etc. not end of world to give CX more if they give me more.
*The new system has rollover, this is useful. First it was silly we always lost SP, and second it has relevance for your situation. So say you do 1800, which is normal DM not DME/DE in new system (whatever we call it. I like the three letters due to DMP parallel but I'll go with the crowd). You can roll 600 to next year, so say you do 1800 next year you get DME (1800+600 rolling from last year). Therefore an 1800 DM really will be splitting half time as DM and half as DME every other year.
*If we look at it in above light, then every two years you get 6 bookable upgrades: 4 F and 2 J.
*I'd have to imagine the accelerated path will build more DMs faster and DME will be intentional or not, a differentiated service level on board. Put bluntly, DMEs will be the new DM in crews eyes. This is more stick than carrot I know for existing DMs just saying what I think is reality. Just saying, if you want top treatment on CX as a civilian (non VIP non DMP), then I think DME is way to go in future.
*Buggy is a small benefit but they did upgrade it for DMEs, two pax now not one. (Of course it's deleted for regular DM.)
*Relationship manager formalized. What I've read about on here, seems great and if it was formal I would've spent more. I think they'll win me over with making this explicit.

As to the DMP mention, and comparison DME vs. IN, my guess is IN will be treated like regular DM. I am simply speculating. But I do know enough regular DMs, a few DMPs, one IN, and some who are VIP (and I have traveled with all on separate occasions) on their boarding pass, to tell you the ranking of treatment on board is very clearly VIP->DMP->rest of us, including IN. I only know one person who has Invitation, longtime HK resident who flew with CX in the true old school days pre handover. Maybe my IN anecdote is flawed. But a DMP friend spends a serious amount of cash personally (buying criminally expensive fares that many on here would gasp at for being unnecessary, including in presence of award fares!). Maybe a decade ago another acquaintance was a lawyer flying an unnecessary amount to JFK, paid for by the client probably, all J and was DMP too for a few years. Very different personal wealth profile but very clear both driving big revenue to CX. I think that DMP group is very spending oriented and CX manages it based on that pretty closely. I also know they have discretion with DMP and it's not 100pct spend exactly but close. VIPs are different situation, this is more person or entity they represent not the spend. The ones I've flown with are public persons and it's on the BP, and the service is quite different.

Another reason to think IN may be more like regular DM, is this DM Reserve thing. That's basically a watered down lifetime benefit which can be warned by DMs/DMEs now and definitely benefits me and many members on here I believe. Although of course actual lifetime would be way better.

Two questions
1) Does anyone know if the bookable upgrades will go back to pure A and I inventory? Or is it still this really unfavorable CX special availability inventory which we can't know? The BUDs are way more valuable if they just go into a fare buckets. By making this change and F is only for DME, it makes me think BUDS got unintentionally costly for CX esp J to F, but maybe they'll reconsider and go back to the original (A/I inventory availability) method now that it's harder to obtain.

Also, note to CX: now that you've crushed partner inventory in premium classes and are favoring CX award bookings (selfish comment from this DM: thank you!!), the partner award situation hoarding F seats is over, maybe BUDS can get A fare again! After all, this is basically a double incentive for the partner people to move over and consider CX as their program. (Crush partner premium award availability, and create easier paths for CX members to get in premium cabins.)

2) Mods, we've got two threads going about this! I know I've posted in both as have many others. Any chance we can get a consolidation? Much thanks! And v happy to have a new interesting topic to debate.

(Last comment: Also worth noting they ditched the lounge passes. Good idea but mine keep expiring worthless so execution was bad and no loss there. I doubt I'm only one who found them useless. When I'm traveling I can usually get my party in the lounge anyway, and the people I travel with most are my redemption nominees anyway, so I never could burn them for colleagues or friends without status which was always the best theoretical use of them. Just not well thought out good riddance to that "benefit". (If anyone at CX is listening: the lounge pass idea would've worked if I had an expanded redemption group nominee list and could change two, not one, a year. But I understand CX may be worried about abuse, prob people selling lounge access and no big deal anyway.)

CX is just following the industry wide trend. DM-E is the new DM, DM will be (eventually) the new GO, etc. Just when I decided to ditched United/MU/Eva and try to fly exclusively CX.... Should have taken the Singapore Gold challenge and went with them.... I should be able to make it to DM-E, barely.

I think it depends how much off brand flying you do. I am in the 1200 camp but do a good chunk of off brand flying and usually end up as the equivalent of Silver or Gold on *A and ST each year. The main change for me as a result of this would be the automatic rollover means I might move more flying to OW (maybe I'll have to overlook the crappy regional J on CX...but definitely not BA/IB) and maybe try a bit of ex-out port (even if ex-TPE for example doesn't move the needle) when I've looked at it since the excess gets rolled over easily. Probably play around with it for a year or two and see what works.

How so? If you can't even meet extension threshold how can you carry the excessive points forward?

I think this explained quite well why DME is set at 2400pts which is quite far from DM's 1200. With the rollover, they can't let ppl too easily achieve DME.

I haven’t heard any changes to BKUG inventory going forward

The logical reason of shifting the threshold of F-accessible BKUGs from 1,600 to 2,400 is mirroring the decrease of F-equipped aircraft (from 30+ when the BKUG mechanism was first rolled out almost a decade ago to ~10 now.)

besides, it was possible to get 12 (or 16, 20, 24…) vouchers in the same calendar year in the past with the ‘reset’ mechanism. Now that everyone is aligned to a calendar year without early renewal allowed, there will be much fewer BKUGs in circulation (in CX’s eyes: dilutive instruments to F class) going forward.

I reckon is a good change, I'm a QR Plat but actually fly more frequently on CX, never bother to switch over becoz of how retarded the MCP program was.

I do have 1 question, I'm a nobody green with 235 PTS in my account now, what would happen to my excess points if I get to silver before Dec 31st? Vanished into thin air, or roll over to next year?