Well said ^ -- I certainly did not mean to imply that E+ was solely for elites as you correctly state, many, many options for upsells. :)

Good stuff. At least now they're aligned and we can see what the new program will look like.

It's a hit on the CR1s from a UA perspective, and a hit on the SWU restrictions from the CO perspective. Though for someone flying significant volume, this could be a plus, as there are unlimited CR1s and SWUs that could be earned (e.g., someone flying 200K would get 10 SWUs and 10 CR1s).

That said, I think that UA's Elite Choice program could now be in jeopardy, as they now seem to have incentives for each 25K of flying. In the past, Elite Choice would throw us bones for various levels extra flying.

As an aside, I wonder if the CO CR1s will work on BF Hawaii flights. That would be a great value if they did.

Next question will be who is the first OP member to get their hands on CO CR1s by hitting 75K next year? Paging J.Edward...

I cannot imagine that there will be a different upgrade bucket for the CR1s from the SWUs and mileage upgrades. Just doesn't make sense.

On the plus side, it is worth noting that the two programs even managed to align their stock photography for the announcement of the alignment of the programs. This woman is looking longingly out the window for her elite benefits on both the UA and CO websites:
http://content.united.com/ual/asset/...at_214x253.jpg

LOL!:cool:

The 100K thing doesn't take effect until 2012. If you got 100K this year you're still just a Platinum who happens to have SWUs.

I could see this going either way. The CR1s are valid on p.s. which is the closest thing to CO's HNL service I can see but CO is also rather protective of that route so maybe not. Probably just flip a coin and hope you guess right.
Remember that they won't actually be issued until "mid year" so it could be October before they see the light of day. :eek:

One question, if you are Gold this year and did not requalify for 2011 Elite Status does the change Effective Jan 1st mean status is not valid after Jan 31st instead of the "Valid Through 2/11" as printed on the card?
or does this apply to next year's status year?

Of course. But it's so obvious, don't you think they could've figured it out on their own, without UA?

The fact that they have merged with UA, synchronized the frequent flyer programs, but never once made a mention of E+ is troubling.

CO's principle is to pack as many seats as possible in the smallest possible plane. They believe that you only make a profit on the last seat you sell. And while they will certainly monetize existing features (bulkhead, exit rows), and necessities such as checked bags, they will not go out of their way to take a risk and then count on customers paying for the monetized services in order to recoup marginal revenue.

Look at the BoB program. They have ridiculously undercatered each flight. In most cases, the BoB is sold out before the exit row. Are they doing this because they're foolish? Of course not. It's completely intentional. They will always pack a minimum of Bob (i.e. reduce their risk to near zero) so that a BoB meal never has to be thrown away, even if it means half the plane goes hungry (which is really not their problem).

E+ required UaCo to rip out all those most valuable "last seats sold." To me asking CO to do that would be like asking the Catholic Church to remove the Cross as the symbol of their religion.

The only way I see this even as a faint possibility, is only on CO's domestic fleet, and because of EUA only, which they hate. Here, they would remove a row of FC on their domestically-configured aircraft, allowing them to both install E+ and add a row of Y at the same time. Four seats taken out and replaced by six seats is the type of bargain CO would go for, because it would remove the 4 seats of FC that they virtually always have to give away for free, add E+, at no additional cost of soft product, and have more total seats available for sale.

Damn! :o

Oh well, at least I can get my SWUs early. :p

Also remember that if revenue management is doing their job the lost seats should be from the lower buckets, not the full fares.

In practice UA might not always trim from the bottom of the fare spectrum, but I suspect they're good enough to keep the loss of seats away from affecting the higher end of fares.

Note that that's a CO seat...she's probably looking out the window to see how soon the flight is over.

And the operational synergies begin!!!

I read it as applying to the 2011 program year, which will end on 1/31/2012.

Please notice that she is doing it from a coach seat :o

Oh cr@p, missed that. "Mid-year," huh? Here we go again...

It's a shame they call devaluation as benefit:td:

I don't think the new restriction on SWU benefits CO 1K either.

Let's act together UA&CO 1Ks!

I think that is the case as well, but just wanted clarification.

These changes look like a definite neutral for me---but they will provide extra incentive to do a mileage run to get to the next elite tier up.

They are less valuable but you get more of them. For folks who are flying long-haul Y on the company dime and not necessarily able to find the sub-W fares it isn't a huge deal. For the leisure customer who only flies when it is dirt cheap, that's a different story.

1. These upgrades are eligible for all fares except S, T, K, L and G in all BusinessFirst markets. -- BAD

2. The combination of OP and UMP still didn't tell you whether the miles would expire or not. If it doesn't, then I could get my 20k RDM back. :S

Nice To Know You Are OK
 

I'm just grateful that Scott made it out of detention

Ditto. Glad I decided to book a cheapo MR to secure 100k for 2010. This will be the only chance ever to get those unrestricted SWUs...

+1

I am not a fan of this enhancement. :td: to the fare class restrictions.

Depends when you get the tickets. It seems like starting late May 2011 can never be an off-peak, so the prices are always expensive. Instead of getting M fares for $1500 ROC-HKG RT, I'd prefer $1800 B fare RT. If you could snip a deal like $900, then let's hope it's not S, T, K, L or G.

125% Bonus or back to 100% for 75K CO PLT or +?
 

I don't see that in the terms either. Let's hope it's not a devaluation. CO stands out from other airlines because of its *immortal* RDMs and 125% bonus. I never like the UA product to be honest with you.

125% bonus has been gone for a while now on CO.

It's been 100% bonus for Gold/Plat for a couple years, IIRC. You can get a 25% bonus on top of that if you have the PP MC.

This is really a mixed bag. Let me paraphrase (loosely) what I read between the lines:

1) We will give you 2 more SWUs, but we know most of you will likely never be able to make use of them. (devaluation for CO and UA ffs)

2) We will give you access to CR1s, but it's more difficult to earn them than it used to be on UA (devaluation for UA, enhancement for CO ffs)

3) Presidential Platinum will effectively be deep-sixed in 2011 and if you're currently a PPlat and keep up spending a bunch of money with us, you may or may not get an invite to be GS sometime in late 2011. (No change for UA ffs and slight devaluation for CO PPlats)

4) 1ks will have update priority over lower earning members....does that include mileage upgrades? Or is this the real deal like it currently works on CO/UA. If so, then this is the one thing that I see as a HUGE improvement. (No change for UA ffs and HUGE improvement for most CO ffs)

5) Crickets on E+ does not make for a good omen.

In all, I am suprised and disappointed by the lack of specificity of the new program. WHy not come out and give it to us straight:

- Name of the merged Program
- Official Elite tiers of the merged program
- Upgrade rules of merged program
- Mileage earning rules of new program

I see a lot of wiggle room in what has been announced. Too much for my personal comfort.

I was wondering that myself. I guess we will have to wait until next year and see if they keep BF to Hawaii, move to standard F service, or keep it west coast-Hawaii and complimentary upgrades and mid/east coast-Hawaii as BF. There are a few ways this can play out.

Gold, Plat and PPlat are at 100% bonus, not 125%.

If one has the PPlus card then you get an extra 25% bonus, which hopefully will be kept going forward.

Folks, UA W fare could be very expensive if you want to use SWU.

I have seen $2,200 W fare to PEK, PVG next summer.

This is higher than some B fares on CO. :eek:

Very disappointed with the nerfing of SWUs.

Will SWUs from 2010 be nerfed too, or are they still actual System-Wide Upgrades?

http://content.united.com/ual/asset/...at_214x253.jpg

Actually she's watching an AA 757 take off from JFK while circling to land at EWR wondering "Why didn't I jump the ship when I had a chance to".

Then might be a little better for FlyerGuide Wiki to specify the details. :S Thanks for the clean-up.

This one is a mixed bag. For UA FFers it's status quo. For CO FFers it's 2 more SWUs but with restrictions. Depends on how expensive the fare class is, and/or what your buying habits are.


Agreed, for the most part. It's definitely a bonus for the CO member. For the UA member, it depends how much and on what metal fly. If you fly UA and 100K, it's a hit. If you fly 150K, it's probably a wash. If you fly 175K+, it's more for the UA flyer. Also, the UA BIS and quarterly restrictions are gone, so it's a YMMV situation. Long flights on LH or OALs did not qualify for CR1 accrual with the current UA rules. Now it seems that you can earn CR1s without ever flying UA. That was not possible before.


+1


I think the writing is on the wall for much of this. The name doesn't matter, but there appears to be a 25K/50K/75K/100K level now, and nothing material has been announced in terms of upgrade and mileage earning rules, so I wouldn't fret that.

E+ is the big one that we need to be concerned about.

Fixed it for ya! :D

My gut is that BF to Hawaii is toast. CO simply did not have any aircraft capable of serving IAH/EWR-HNL with a domestic F configuration. UA has plenty. UA is big on using premium aircraft when possible, and if Hawaii made sense for that, I would think they would have tried it by now.

I might be off, but that's my gut on it.


:D

Sign me up! But I'd be flying AA from SFO to ORD for that "parade".

UA 1k here. If you want entertaining reading, head over to the UA boards to read about the changes. Almost everyone is furious (count me in that group as well). On balance, CO was improvoed while UA was devalued, which is what we all expected (but were still upset about when it actually happened). My prediction is that WHEN (and you know darn well it will happen) E+ is removed the mass exodus from old UA will start (which will be another benefit to old CO people).

I'm switching to AA when they deep six E+. Hope to see some of you there.

TWA Fan said:

"Again, the complete, Soviet-level blackout of information on E+ is not a good sign..."

...And he's right. If the decision had been taken to retrofit CO planes with E+, then they would be shouting it from the rooftops. The silence on the matter means that the absolute best case scenario here is that the final decision has not yet been made.

Cheers,

Paul.

Well, as much as I like to give CO Revenue Mgmt a hard time, it is true that the "last seats" are the money seats.

You don't discount the last seats for business travelers with no flexibility. You just can't.

But, of course, there is more to it than that. And the fact is no configuration is set in stone.

The funniest thing to me is that whenever anyone brings up E+, the example that is immediately trotted out is the decade-old failure of AA's MRTC.

Without getting into any unnecessary detail about that, I suggest a closer look at B6. After they reduced their density (fairly considerably) they improved their profitability. The success of B6 in this regard is a significant blow to the oft-used canard that airline travel is nothing but a pure commodity and nobody cares about anything but price.

B6 is virtually never the cheapest out of NYC, is flown primarily by presumably unsavvy kettles, and yet flies at an LF virtually copmarable to CO's (without, I might add, ever overselling any flights, which is impressive).

So this tells us that, in this age of the internet, of easy information, of greater, more widespread sophistication deeper throughout the travel ranks, people do not necessarily treat travel as a pure commodity.

Of course, those who continue to advance that argument are usually those whose product is little more than a pure commodity.

Given them the minimum, and your customers will only give you their minimum in return.

When will CO learn that there are never any winners in the race to the bottom?