Diamond Medallion
 

What percentage of Plats do you think will qualify as Diamonds?

In the markets I fly in, fares would double (or more) overnight if WN pulled out. It was also Southwest that recently led the (very reluctant) industry in a fantastic $30/60/90 sale -- got of bunch of trips to STL locked in @ $140 (which will be cut roughly in half once I figure in my wife's companion pass ticket). Your airline charges a lot more? Sorry about that!

I work with a lot of people who pay "A" fare on business but stay home if they can't buy a "C" fare for personal travel. I'm one of them, although the business trips are rare.

Nothing to be sorry about. I personally have no desire to be in a cattle car, fighting for seats with some guy wearing a wife beater t-shirt. I'll pay more for a better product, and prefer to accumulate benefits on a program that will take me where I want to go (and it sure as heck ain't STL).

So how does this lack of them flying C fares eliminate the profitability of the A fares they purchased? Where is your source that the C fares they do fly completely eliminates the profitability of the A fares they purchased?

Your strawman argument was complete horse hockey.

You demand facts, figures and sources from MikeMpls yet you accept ClipperDelta's passengers A, B and C without challenge because you are in agreement? I think there is a bit of horse hockey on both sides.

Most DL customers are not Platinum, and even less are likely to achieve Diamond, and thus unaffected by the change.

Not sure who those people "emotionally wedded" are, but my recommendation to them would be to let go. Airlines are likely to continue downgrading the "benefits" of their "false economy" FF programs. You'll end up switching from being emotionally wedded to emotionally against that airline and most every move their management makes.

I totally agree with you; I apologize if the one you quoted did not clarify YBM for business travel has some merit based on their reimbursed expenses are in coach and not BC. If a company does not mind a person spending more money so they could end up in BC and get 50% more EQM than so be it. I wonder how many people go to the person signing off on the expenses and explain they just spent $1000 more for a ticket in the hope they were going to upgrade, and BTW tell them they get extra EQM out of the deal.

I usually clarify the YBM thing for personal travel, and not having a guaranteed, seat up front deserves a trip to the rubber room.

On NW I flew "B" to Europe several times to use miles. NEVER did I do it if space was not available. I would be the one in the rubber room if there was any chance being stuck in coach and pay a higher fare.

I stated the manipulative game DL pulled by adding "M" to mix in Europe does not hold same for Asia. In my research, not some poll, I've noticed "M" fares to Asia are close in price to "M" fares to Europe.

That's a good question. I have always felt that PM ranks were a little swollen, but that is based on RDU and ATL that are elite + high to begin with. On the two RDU - ATL flights that have recently announced it on board it was something like 6 MM, 6 PM, 5 GM and 3 FO. The PM were in addition to the MM and this segment is the hardest to score upgrades on even in Y/B/M fares but I doubt my home base is representative of the average DL plane elite distribution.

I like that the DM will create a distinction between the person who spent $2k - $3k on a couple of MRs during a promo to achieve PM versus someone who flies a lot more BIS and spends $40k - $60k on DL as I anticipate I will this year. Previously if you didn't qualify for EP, the higher paying business PM was no different than the promo junky PM.

You are right on; that is why I was very surprised that DL did not go with a points system. The easiest way In my opinion to do a spend based system without advertising how much someone spends when you see their luggage tag.

In a points system, both NW winers and DL loyalist would have to shut up. The ones that did complain are the ones that would deserve nothing unless they were legitimate high $$$ or very high miles. This would have stopped all the talk, from both sides of the aisle, about SWU's of value; with a points system DL would be stupid to have omitted that bennie since the number of people would be legitimately low.

From reading these threads in the last few days I am starting to see some DL loyalist going to the side of the aisle of NW winers. This is bringing out the DL loyalist that have tried to forget the 50% on LUT and no upgrades on LUT from years ago.

ClipperDelts made a logic argument that was sound, and never purported statistical significance. His numbers were generic any only served as an example of the logical progression. That an airline can lose money while some of the fares sold (specifically the higher fares) are profitable. Nothing earthshattering about the revelation. Do you care to dispute his conclusion?

MikMlps made a statement of purported statistical fact without a source, that the higher fare flyers ("A" fares) are actually in large part the reason that DL has lost money in the past, because those flying the A fares for business end up costing DL more in losses because these A fare flyers will not pay anything but the cheapest fares for personal travel, and that negates any profits from the higher A fares. I asked for a source for this, as I believe it is complete hogwash.

I am tired of the over-the-top rhetoric being used without factual basis. If MikeMlps would have wondered aloud if the A fare flyers business travel offset the personal possibly lower fare travels in terms of profitability, that would be a topic of discussion, but to assert as fact....

Big difference.

I think rather than one side agreeing with the other it is that many of the future DMs (whether NW or DL side) see a glaring omission. It doesn't mean that reasonable people can't see things differently, just that it appears (and I know a sample of FTers is not quite scientific, but may be a decent gauge of high mileage flyers) that by a large measure the greatest and really only major complaint is that true SWUs were not included as a DM benefit.

I'm not trying to fight anyone else's battle, but are you really asserting that Mike made a factual statement based upon the "logic argument that...never purported statistical significance"? I think he was simply making his logic argument on top of ClipperDelta's logical argument. Playing along, if you will.

In any event, with few exceptions, we are not privy to many facts, figures and other data because they are proprietary and a/ls would be foolish to release those. So, when you demand such facts and figures, you know that even those who have such information will not and cannot post them. However, we do have a broad membership of high mileage flyers and with their experiences and the information from the DL people who do post here, corporate reports, SEC filings, and other sources we can make educated guesses about many areas. Direct evidence is better, but many a case has been won on mostly circumstantial evidence.

Maybe the answer is that the legacy airlines need to change their business model if they want to make a profit.

Someone who pays $2K-$3K on a couple of MR's to achieve PM could just as well spend $3K-$5K to achieve DM. So the higher paying business DM would still be no different than the promo junky DM.

A question is whether it would be worth a promo junky's efforts to achieve DM when the benefits are not all that great for a majority of flyers (from the sound of this thread, many DM's already have lounge access, 80% or a high percentage of PMU's will still go unused, etc). And at this point PM is not a whole lot better than GM except upgrade priority and the somewhat useless PMU's. So the promo junky might just spend even less than $2k and keep attaining GM status.

I agree; but, there have been posters on FT who posted and then defended opinion, conjecture and made up statistics as indisputable fact. It seems to me to be the height of arrogance to expect thousands of FlyerTalk members whom one has never met, to accept without question whatever "facts" one chooses to invent. I won't and I'll throw a flag on this every time I see it here (as I do in person).

I will fully support your disagreement in those types of scenarios you described. The issue I was trying to address was the discounting of someone's opinion unless and until a full spreadsheet were produced, verified as authentic by the airline, directly addressing the point being debated. Ok, that was a bit of hyperbole, but I think you get my drift. :)

When spending one's own money there is a fine line between spending an extra $2k - $3k on MRs to go for DM when the benefits are only slightly better. If they did offer better INT'L SWU for DM, then a bunch of folks would spend an extra $2k to be DM and enjoy free INT'L upgrades on discount fares saving them $$$ (much more than the MR cost). Maybe this is what they are trying to avoid.

Solution: Require a minimum segment count to be DM - like 100 segments. Offer them SWU good on discount (not deep) discount fares as a DM Choice Benefit. This will keep the MR promo junkies from becoming DM on a handful of trips while rewarding loyal BIS travellers. Win - win and provides some revenue protection.