Thousands in some cases (any fare difference more than $50 I won't pay.)

Does award travel count as out of pocket?
Reimbursing a passport would be better for some people.

Not sure I follow. Mostly empty may have been a poor word choice, somewhat empty more accurate. The tcon flights next week (just outside the DM upgrade window) have a fair number of empty seats. If 6 people have bought BE on 12/18 442, are 20 more people going to buy it next year because they no longer get upgrades? If your corporate policy doesn't allow you to buy domestic BE/F, seems like DL just fell to last place for tcon business guys. So you lose the last minute Y fare and gain a few gallons of fuel from having an empty seat up front? Or a VDB voucher since Y is oversold? Or you give it to a nonrev and lose the Y fare? Kettles aren't paying $3000 to fly up front, so who is going to appear to buy those tickets? The corporate contracts that DO pay to fly up front are already in hand and aren't being crowded out, so what's the gain here?

Alienating the FFers in a competitive market like NYC seems like a net loss to me.

Well, it does have a certain element of DYKWIA to it, no?

I see Z3 for one SFOJFK next month (on AA)

Ah...not sure why I was thinking it was $180 to join GE.

And if someone's employer/clients are generous to pay for someone to sit up front on a JFK/LAX flight, why not just take American on that route. If your employer/client will pay may as well fly American and have a real first class experience than fly business on Delta.

Being a CPA, I can tell you most clients/employers aren't going to pay for first class domestic tickets for their weekly flyers. If I turned in a bill to pay for a $6K airfare for JFK/LAX my clients would go through the roof and if a vendor was flying to us and they insisted on flying their employees on that kind of airfare, I would find a cheaper vendor.

Great, I can't get upgraded on my primary JFK-SEA route. Ur the few times a year I head to PIT, I can get upgraded to what comes out to be a glorified folding chair in a CRJ....JACKPOT!!!!!
FAIL DL....big time

That's what I was thinking, perfect selection for the true DYWIA

*this is my first post, I hope I am in the correct forum*

Hello Rylan, you are correct my friend, I am no longer flying business elite routes. Also, more interestingly I wanted to share that I just managed to get a refund on my future NYC trips due to the new policy. (tickets were non-refundable X/V class)

I had booked 2 mileage runs back to back NYC-SEA-ANC in June 2014. I booked them off peak on a thursday and on saturday (they included red eyes and overnight flights). I know upgrades are not guaranteed as a PM but I figure I'd score at least 2 out of 4 on the NYC-SEA. With the new policy that would have made it a brutal run, and I was looking forward to the possibility of flat bed, which is out of the question now.

I called Delta PM line to ask if they would be upgrade eligible since they were still showing eligible and I had bought them before the policy change. They said no since they were business elite (it also took 10 min discussing with supervisor to confirm this). After back and forth I told them I would not have bought them if they were not upgrade eligible. The person on the phone told me upgrades are not a guarantee, but I told them that off peak PM will clear a high percentage of the time.

Anyways, to make the story short, after 30 minutes I got my money refunded, they also offered a reroute but that would not have taken me to seattle and I would have missed the double MQM promo - and makes my MR less attractive.

I am afraid Atlanta is next in line with business elite to west coast and there go our benefits down the toilet. Going to have to reconsider my status...

For high volume Delta Am Ex users on the JFK routes, I would recommend emailing and/or calling Am Ex as well complaining about the changes and stating you are no longer going to use your Am Ex card if you are going to be jumping ship due to the change.

Complaints to Am Ex from their high end users may get better results than emailing Delta.

The high end users on that route are more likely to have corporate J discounts, which are the ones that DL cares about. I guess they weighed the cost of pissing off elites vs selling more heavily discounted J seats on corp contracts and we see where it went.

Not at the moment, because elites have complimentary UGs, space permitting, and the current policy is not to sell the UGs until the complimentary UGs have been given out. (I include in that list the people UGing with a SWU.) In elite-heavy markets that leaves zero to sell (UG list of 60-70+). Once that goes away, and the only BFUGs are DM's with a GU, DL is free to sell the UGs at the gate to their greedy little hearts' content! Yes, bubba we know you're an important stockholder and this fills you with joy.

Currently I get 4 systemwide upgrades, for platinum and under the new program I get 0 upgrades. For diamond I go from 6 to 4. As an international flyer the domestic upgrades are useless, so I go from 10 per year the 4. That feels like getting screwed by Delta!

I wonder if the Delta cheerleaders consider people on a discounted Corporate fare to be a "moocher" since they aren't paying full fare to be up front?

If the front cabin goes out with more non-revs than paid passengers, I wonder if Delta will start discounting those routes more up front.

Or if American continues to upgrade theirs EP's on this route post merger and Delta diamonds jump ship to American if they will reverse this policy. Two people in my BUR office say they are jumping ship to AA next year over just the LAX/JFK route no longer being upgradeable (they fly this flight 12 to 15 times a year) and both of them take a lot more trips on Delta than that route. And if they are flying international the flagship lounge available to EP's is suppose to be really nice at LAX. Free premium liquor and hot food as opposed to paying for anything drinkable and cookies at LAX SC. Even if AA eliminates free upgrades on that route, they figure on the times they have to pay first or when they fly international in Y, they will get treated a lot better by AA