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Estimating the Diamond Medallion Population

Estimating the Diamond Medallion Population

Old Aug 30, 2018, 6:59 am
  #76  
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250k/year domestic is a lot but doable. BNA-HNL is only 2 segments - it's more likely he's hitting multiple cities each week. 8 segments a week in paid F will get you 300k MQM (at least) - 500 MQM minimum * 8 = 4k MQM/week = 200k/year + 50% PAG bonus = 300k.

At 300k/year you're "only" looking at 30 years to hit 9M.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 7:14 am
  #77  
 
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Originally Posted by pvn
250k/year domestic is a lot but doable. BNA-HNL is only 2 segments - it's more likely he's hitting multiple cities each week. 8 segments a week in paid F will get you 300k MQM (at least) - 500 MQM minimum * 8 = 4k MQM/week = 200k/year + 50% PAG bonus = 300k.

At 300k/year you're "only" looking at 30 years to hit 9M.
And out of BNA, if one needs to travel mostly over the SE, a lot of short hops to ATL with another short hop to SAV, JAN, TLH, RDU, CHS, etc, with the paid F bonus's it's possible to rack up the segments hardly being in the air more than an hour at a time! Plus so many of those SE cities have a ton of connection options, that he wouldn't even spend that much time in the airport.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 7:17 am
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Originally Posted by kop84
And out of BNA, if one needs to travel mostly over the SE, a lot of short hops to ATL with another short hop to SAV, JAN, TLH, RDU, CHS, etc, with the paid F bonus's it's possible to rack up the segments hardly being in the air more than an hour at a time! Plus so many of those SE cities have a ton of connection options, that he wouldn't even spend that much time in the airport.
Agreed... I think it is more a testament to the longevity of his/her career with sustained travel than anything else. 300K a year is highly attainable in paid F (not sure how MQM bonuses worked 30 years ago mind you!) even on segments given that you'd earn a minimum of 1500-2000 miles each way if you have a connection.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 8:13 am
  #79  
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To me, the statement that he's DM on segments means less than 125,000 MQMs per year. If we take the number of segments required for DM (150? I typically make DM with only about 30 segments) times 500, this would give a lower bound for his MQMs per year, assuming that elites always got at least 500 per segment. Paid FC of course would increase this by 50-100%, although was there a time that domestic FC tickets earned 300%?
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 8:31 am
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If hes maximizing AX MQMs, thats another 100K/year.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 8:46 am
  #81  
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Originally Posted by MSPeconomist
To me, the statement that he's DM on segments means less than 125,000 MQMs per year.
I guess he's been diamond for... (squints at calculator) 72 years then
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 8:48 am
  #82  
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Clearly in this case saying that he's qualified on segments just means that he's waaaaay over the diamond MQS level. You can't qualify for million miler status on segments, it's just a figure of speech.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 11:57 am
  #83  
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Originally Posted by pvn
Clearly in this case saying that he's qualified on segments just means that he's waaaaay over the diamond MQS level. You can't qualify for million miler status on segments, it's just a figure of speech.
I interpreted the statement to say that he earned DM every year by the segment requirement rather than MQMs, but as someone pointed out, only MQMs count for MM status.

Another historical question for PMDL folks: When did it start to become possible to earn MQMs from DL AmEx credit cards and was there a time when simple spend on a CC became status miles without limit? I know on some airline programs, certain old timers earned lots of miles from CCs back in prehistoric times like the 1980s and 1990s

He might *only* have been top tier DL elite via segments, but maybe he also had a bunch of MM miles from PMNW, and others such as Republic and Piedmont that became part of DL at some point.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 11:58 am
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Originally Posted by pvn
Clearly in this case saying that he's qualified on segments just means that he's waaaaay over the diamond MQS level. You can't qualify for million miler status on segments, it's just a figure of speech.
Definitely a figure of speech. The Ambassador made it sound like this gentleman had more segments per year on average than anyone she had ever met.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 6:04 pm
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Originally Posted by MSPeconomist
I interpreted the statement to say that he earned DM every year by the segment requirement rather than MQMs, but as someone pointed out, only MQMs count for MM status.

Another historical question for PMDL folks: When did it start to become possible to earn MQMs from DL AmEx credit cards and was there a time when simple spend on a CC became status miles without limit? I know on some airline programs, certain old timers earned lots of miles from CCs back in prehistoric times like the 1980s and 1990s

He might *only* have been top tier DL elite via segments, but maybe he also had a bunch of MM miles from PMNW, and others such as Republic and Piedmont that became part of DL at some point.
To the best of my recollection, the DL Amex MQM boost has been in existence since the introduction of MQMs as a separate concept.
Prior to that, miles fell into one of two categories: Base miles and Bonus miles. Only Base miles counted towards status (which is not unlike the MQM concept of today). Miles generated from CC spend *always* fell into the Bonus miles category, at least as long as I have been keeping track of it.

While I've been a medallion member of one tier or another for the last 20 years, I was never a member of the Frequent Flyer program that preceded SkyMiles, so there are a lot of people here with a longer history than mine.
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Old Aug 30, 2018, 9:53 pm
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Originally Posted by 18sas
To the best of my recollection, the DL Amex MQM boost has been in existence since the introduction of MQMs as a separate concept.
Prior to that, miles fell into one of two categories: Base miles and Bonus miles. Only Base miles counted towards status (which is not unlike the MQM concept of today). Miles generated from CC spend *always* fell into the Bonus miles category, at least as long as I have been keeping track of it.

While I've been a medallion member of one tier or another for the last 20 years, I was never a member of the Frequent Flyer program that preceded SkyMiles, so there are a lot of people here with a longer history than mine.
But there was a time when all miles, flown miles, partners like car rentals or credit card, counted towards your lifetime total. So some of those 4MM folks were helped along with what are now bonus miles, not MQMs.
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Old Aug 31, 2018, 11:18 am
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Originally Posted by 18sas
To the best of my recollection, the DL Amex MQM boost has been in existence since the introduction of MQMs as a separate concept.
Prior to that, miles fell into one of two categories: Base miles and Bonus miles. Only Base miles counted towards status (which is not unlike the MQM concept of today). Miles generated from CC spend *always* fell into the Bonus miles category, at least as long as I have been keeping track of it.

While I've been a medallion member of one tier or another for the last 20 years, I was never a member of the Frequent Flyer program that preceded SkyMiles, so there are a lot of people here with a longer history than mine.
MQM boosts went into effect with the introduction of the DL branded AMEX cards.

In the early days of the original Delta Frequent Flyer Program, AMEX spend on Delta counted toward MM status. Sadly, my employer gave me a Diner's Club card for travel. The DC card spend DID NOT count toward MM status. Also in those days, minimum mileage credit was 1000 miles per segment. I DID benefit from that! ^
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Old Aug 31, 2018, 1:30 pm
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Originally Posted by RobertS975
But there was a time when all miles, flown miles, partners like car rentals or credit card, counted towards your lifetime total. So some of those 4MM folks were helped along with what are now bonus miles, not MQMs.
I'd bet most 4MM+ flyers received help from the pre-skymiles days. For a while old miles were even segregated as a separate currency with much better redemption value. Eventually old miles rolled into skymiles. I'd be in the 4MM+ club under the old rules, but only have 1.8MM MQM or so since all the time I've served on DL was in the post-everything-counts regime.
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Old Aug 31, 2018, 1:59 pm
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When was the changeover from the old rules to the new ones?
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Old Aug 31, 2018, 3:25 pm
  #90  
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Originally Posted by DL-Don
MQM boosts went into effect with the introduction of the DL branded AMEX cards.

In the early days of the original Delta Frequent Flyer Program, AMEX spend on Delta counted toward MM status. Sadly, my employer gave me a Diner's Club card for travel. The DC card spend DID NOT count toward MM status. Also in those days, minimum mileage credit was 1000 miles per segment. I DID benefit from that! ^
I think the Diners points did count if you transferred them to Delta back then.
When they had AA as a partner, I transferred to get my lifetime AA platinum status.
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