Will Delta review status level requirements for 2021
 

I travel to Italy and other European countries that have been banned for travel by my corporation at this time.. If this continues I will not make Diamond on MQD. I wonder if Delta will soften the requirements for 2021? I have been Diamond since they offered the level. Platinum will not be an issue. I apologize if this has already been discussed. If so, please disregard.

Been asked a few times in other threads... many of us are in similar situations. I wouldn't expect any announcements yet until it becomes clearer on the duration of travel advisories and flight reductions.

my guess is that the "reclaim my status" is going to be in HEAVY use for 2021 instead of DL trying to analyze every person's flying patterns to off-limit countries

You got nearly 9 months left to re-qualify...why should Delta soften the requirements? Plenty of time left to do some trips to BOG in D1 for instance.

Everyone is just guessing at this point.

My guess is that Delta will offer some challenge, double MQM/MQD, buy-ups, or even targeted comps up one level.

The more simple and easy to "manage" the situation is for Delta to make an "adjustment" to the status requirement for this year.
Example: if the situation stand for 2 months (we have already done one month), they can reduce the requirement for all levels by 20%. It is fair for customer and Delta.
This will solve very easily the calculation. Keep your actual customers & attract new one.
I think airlines wait the end of the situation before making an announcement.

Back during the midst of the financial crisis and Swine Flu, I think UA and DL just offered double EQMs across the board. And this sounds like it'll be worse than back then for the airline industry.

I posted this in another thread, but I think one easy way for DL to mitigate the ongoing difficulties in requalifying would be to offer affordable upgrades to PS or D1, since we would earn an extra 50% MQM.

MQMs rollover. MQDs do not. That's is what should be doubled!

This did not solve the situation for a vast majority of FF (ex: business traveler, where corporation pay only for economy).

Not to be pedantic, but your calculation is a bit off. There are 12 months...so if it the situation goes on for 2 months it would be a 16.667% reduction in the year. I'd see DL rounding it to 15% if they did anything.

DL will be able to see the requalification numbers as it gets a bit latter in the year. If things are to their liking they won't do anything on a broad basis and will likely have some targeted promotions to heavy China fliers especially. If things are NOT to their liking, I would bet you're going to be closer to correct and they reduce the mileage requirements for at least DM if not FO and GM and PM.

But I'd still say the likeliest scenario is a reduced cost buy up your status at the end of the year.

I guess i am in the minority - I already requalified. Just dumb luck I suppose. I would hope they do whatever they do across the board - it would seem a bit unfair to help others when it was clearly obtainable.

Probably more interesting will be UA. with all their changes I wonder how it will impact them? DL seems to be fairly smart when it comes to treating their customers well - UA has a gift for doing the exact wrong thing at the exact wrong time.

I think the "reclaim my status" thing is probably going to be the tool they use though. It works well and requires flight activity to maintain it. I did that once and it was fair. They will ask you to fly like the level you are for a quarter and then reinstate.

Some sort of concession for those whose travel patterns have been interrupted would be nice, but if they do that it would also be nice if they had some way of recognizing those who traveled through the outbreak and requalified naturally.

As usual, we each have our own needs. Since my flying isn't corporate restricted I expect to requalify as a DM. There are also many others who have already done so. If DL provides relief for those who weren't able to requalify due to flight restrictions (corporate, health, etc.), which I believe they will do, they should also do something for those who will keep filling the seats during his crisis.

I have no problem with DL working out a plan to help people who are flight restricted for maintaining their status, I hope they do

Way, way, way too early to even begin speculating. I suspect that DL has this on its list of Covid "fallout" issues and will deal with it in the late fall when the situation is clear and it can run the metrics to see what it all means. If it does so, it will likely be based on a formula rather than individual decision-making and it will likely make some people happy and others not (as all programmatic developments do).

Telling people today that the requirements will be suspended / relaxed / annualized simply encourages people not to fly when it may well be the case that there is no reason for this in 30, 60, 90 or whatever days.

That's like saying, "I don't mean to offend you...<and then proceed to say something offensive>". :D