I recently moved to Australia and so had resigned myself to forgetting about any FF programs. I wasn't going to move to AA and I didn't think Virgin Australia and Delta were that close of a partnership. Certainly most pacific partners aren't treated well anymore in terms of earnings or reciprocal benefits.

Boy am I happily surprised! I get the following benefits on Virgin Australia so far as a Diamond:

- Lounge access (and much better lounges than the Sky Club)
- Free checked bags (I even checked four bags on one leg with no charge! I doubt this is legal but gives an idea of the great service)
- at least 100% MQMs on all the flights so far (150% on one flight). I know some give less but it seems most published fares are 100%
- Skymiles earned on DISTANCE TRAVELED! Lord have mercy
- Diamond mileage bonus of 120% of distance traveled
- Priority check-in, priority bag tagging, priority security, priority boarding
- Premium seating (exit rows, low row numbers, etc).

The only thing missing really are upgrades, which in the grand scheme of things matter little to me. Velocity members get upgrade certificates but very few, and the front cabin is often mostly empty. A different philosophy in terms of the forward cabin, but overall I am going to be very happy staying a Delta FF here and flying a different airline entirely I am going to enjoy not having to worry about MQD for either status or RDM anymore. We will see how long it lasts before it is 'enhanced'!

Yup. I moved to Australia in 2011 and found that switching from AAdvantage to Skymiles made sense; it worked out very well for the three years I lived there. I'll take VA lounge access on domestic flights (every time) over the upgrade lottery to domestic F/J anyway. Particularly with the SYD lounge entry directly from the curb. And the real priority boarding with VA is being last to board: wait until they announce boarding in the lounge, then get up leisurely and walk to the gate as they're finishing boarding in the economy queue. They actually keep the priority boarding queue completely separate from the economy queue, so there's essentially never any wait. And since they use both the jetbridge and the rear stairs, there's rarely much of a queue on the jetbridge either. So civilized.

DL treats VA well because VA is a joint venture/revenue sharing partner. Same reason they treat VS, AF, KL, and AZ well. And same reason they treat KE so poorly: they're trying unsuccessfully to push KE into a joint venture.

Note that Velocity upgrades are even worse than you say: top-tier members only get four one-segment domestic certificates per year, and only valid from flexible economy fares. No other Velocity elites get any complimentary upgrades at all.

My speculation is that MQDs will become required for non-US residents in 2016, since partner-ticketed flights now earn MQDs as a fraction of miles flown. But the MQD/MQM earning ratio is high enough so that it's unlikely to much of a factor even if all flights are on cheap fares; my recollection is that the lowest MQD/MQM ratio on VA is 0.1, compared to the 0.125 you need to minimally maintain status.