Agreed. I'd happily take two easily-redeemable PWU/SWU certificates on discounted classes over something that requires a YBM fare.

On the flip side, Rollover MQMs makes me very happy.

Now if we could just get some transparency, consistency and even-handedness in viewing/pricing/booking award tickets, I'd be a happy camper.

Thanks, bwhite - I really hope you are correct. It is important to me b/c I actually use the SWUs for TATL.

Repeating a lie won't make it true. Bottom line is that NW was self-financed in the bankruptcy and overall in much better shape financially. DL needed NW to (maybe) survive; NW did not need DL. As the (slightly) smaller company with the slightly smaller market captitalization, NW ended up as the acquired company in the merger than as the dominant partner.

The old and shabby fleet & bitter workforce is a myth.

.....

This goes double for claiming that an airline which went through bankruptcy was in any sort of solid financial shape. Seriously. We are left leaning on the manner of bankruptcy financing to support an absurd notion that the NW business model worked?

FWIW, perhaps NW should have sought some better financing such that they could have emerged from bankruptcy as the hunter, rather than the hunted? Just a thought, but doing things on the cheap doesn't always work and this seems to apply for their financing decisions.

A myth? I made the mistake of flying an NW TATL 757 a couple of times. Twice in J. Old and shabby couldn't be more appropriate.

And one of the world's largest fleets of recently delivered A330's -- much nicer than most of what Delta was flying internationally. Citing a couple 757's as representative of the international fleet is a bit disingenuous, especially given that all of the international 757's had been refurbed.

And then there's Delta, which gave us ASA (brags about its 100+ CRJ 200s, all flying for Delta :( ) and Comair, plus a few other regional airlines & several hundred additional flying cigar tubes.

Want to talk about denial?

.....

Wow... This is probably not the right thread for such a debate. I've always been loyal to NW, but I can say that most of Delta's fleet is newer and nicer (except the NW A330's, which are nicer than most of what DL has).

That having been said, I also can say that it was always at least nice to know that most of NW's customer service agents actually gave a crap about its most loyal customers. Most of the airheads at Delta give robotic answers to problems that they caused in the first place. Anybody receiving one of their "canned responses" 3 or 4 weeks after e-mailing them about a legitimate concern will agree with me there.

Which is a actually closer picture of reality than the inane posting that started this tangent. Neither airline (viewed from a passenger's seat) is the greatest, nor is either all that bad -- for the most part they're just two average/mediocre legacy carriers.

Let's trot out the ONE plane that NW had that was above average and pretend that represents the NW fleet! This is exactly the sort of misinformation and selective memory from the former NW crowd that has reared its head here. First we pretend that NW Plats got SWUs when only those that hit 120k got them. Now we are pretending that the A330 represents the totality of the NW fleet, as opposed to the 753s or the DC9.

And, FWIW, even the DL 763s were impeccably clean and well-maintained. I would love AVOD, but have no complaints about maintenance or cleanliness. The same cannot be said for NW planes of similar age.

And, while we are praising the NW fleet, what is with the "rain" on the A330 exit rows? Seriously, I love these seats - best TATL Y seats available - but NW can't figure out a way to keep me from being dripped on by condensation?

And Jeff said straight out at the ATL DO that NW was better at caring for it's elites, but DL was better at caring for the average pax. He stated that they knew they had improve on both areas, taking the good from each side.

BTW, A number of DL employees have told me that they feel like NW came out as the dominant partner in this merger, that more changes are driven from the NW side than from the DL side. Note that the buck stops on the desk of an NW person, not a DL person, and that's where the ultimate decisions are being made.

It's precisely because Delta is now the world's largest airline with a broad network touching all continents with their own metal that they are able to afford NOT to give more stuff away.

So you can use an AA eVIP cert with any fare, but only on AA metal flights. You need to go to SYD or CAI or JNB or SIN. How far can your AA evIP cert take you? Pretty much just to NRT (for SIN) and LHR (for JNB or CAI)...
Can you use your CO miles to upgrade with co-pay to BF to SYD or SIN or JNB or SCL or SVO?

Delta-NW Debate Belongs Elsewhere -- This is about 2010 Program!!
 

First, please take the DL NW debate elsewhere. While I appreciate both perspectives, it's debating the past. They're one airline now and there's no going back. Let's focus on the 2010 Program. :cool:

I agree with the above from ClipperDelta. Delta as the number one airline is in a powerful position. They could have said "we're making our 3rd tier 100k" or "we're conducting segment upgrade coupons" like American and United. Instead, they put forward a program that kept everything pretty level and threw in some nice surprises. :-:

If started by rating the Delta / Northwest programs before merger each a 5 (their base level), then I would say the 2010 Program is now a 5.5 for Delta flyers and a 4.5 program for NW flyers. I really like the upgrades of award tickets. That's the biggest new perk, but we knew about that months. Some of the other stuff is cool (like PMUs being something else), but there are no big surprises. Having lived through a time where Delta kept taking away from its PMs, I like anything that keeps us even or better -- and this is a little bit better for DL flyers. I completely understand how NW flyers are still bummed.

Actually, at the DM level, I'd be happy to take some AA style evips even if they were only useable for travel to NRT and LHR. At least that way DL would be competitive on those two popular routes.

It's one thing to voice an opinion, but something else to throw out your own statements pretending they are facts. "The only positive income"? Have you reviewed Delta's internal financials? So you know how each profit center performs?

If you've got real numbers, let's see them...