photojojo

HA! 30 isn't so bad, unless you're me. I turned 30 in Nov and all of the sudden I have about 10 greys next to each ear.

indufan

BIS miles = Butt In Seat miles.

photojojo

LOL! Cerebral flatulence at it's finest.

Butt in Seats explains it then. We sat down to lunch one day and he opend up his organizer... Ticket stubs fell out like it was George Costanza's wallet.

jimrpa

LOL! A little jaded, huh? When you begin flying private exclusively, will you gaze at the A380 and refer to your "lowly" G-V?

Just kidding! It IS amazing when we begin to think of 1MM as "the bottom of the rung"

GUWonder

I'm a DL nobody .... but given the smiles I get from DL's reps in Italy, things can't be that bad for this PM.

Gargoyle

So what does that make you? You have 4.42 MM on SkyTeam (combined DL/NW), and I'm sure you've run up another .6 mm on generic airlines.

scoobie

Im 27 and have 66,021 Miles all leisure...i hope to hit 1MM miles one day. People always laugh when i plan travel because im the kind of guy that flies to EWR to get to LAS from HNL..lol

El Boocho

Rhymes with rusty but starts with a "C".

I think that it is near impossible to make the 4MM BIS. There are a select few who can do it and lifetime/annual platinum is something they deserve. The levels seem about right to me. As much as I would like lifetime/annual FO, in this day and age when you can earn skymiles from almost every purchase you make, I think that it makes more sense that only BIS count. I've only been travelling in ernest for 6 or so years, and would be close to 2MM if everything counted.

GUWonder

Someone who hits just the PM qualification today and continues to do so for the next 50 years will finally make lifetime PM at some point beyond the 50 year mark (unless factoring in non-flight MQM activity such as credit card MQM bonus or something like that).

Personally, I'd have almost no interest in going from DL 2MM to DL 4MM just to get moved up from Gold to Plat, especially given that such activity given to AA or UA or a number of other airlines would yield mid-tier benefits far faster.

martin33

fair enough, but then shouldn't the price have been cut from 4MM to 3MM when the top tier annual dropped from 100 to 75k? at 75k per year, a drop to 3MM would change 53.3 years to reach 4MM to "only" 40 years.

as to the original question, is 4MM doable, well an average of doubling the PLT MQM threshold every year would make 4MM reachable in only 27 years.
double that average again, to 300k MQM annually, and it falls to 13.5 years giving an outside chance that someone could have made it starting in the post-1995 BIS era.

El Boocho

3MM or 4MM. Doesn't matter to me, I'll never get there.

I'd argue that the decrease in MQM should have no effect on lifetime status. It is no harder than it was (except for a short period when premium fares accrued 2XMQMs) to earn 4MM. Plus, I'm not sure that the lifetime PM was something that was offered when PM was 100K MQMs. Maybe it overlapped for a year... There are a select few who will qualify for this under then new rules and they are the ones who are buying the expensive international Biz tickets. I buy a lot of Y/M/B and the occassional A fare, but my contribution to DAL's bottomline will never be anything close to what someone like PMMMDL or ClipperDelta bring to the table.

oldtirednbusy

You said it. I just started reading this thread. See I hate computers and Mrs. Old has been out of the country....of course playing....and so I haven't been reading this.
I am going to respond to the questions about my status when I get through this.

CrimsonHoo

While I am only approaching 2.5 million miles now, about half of those in the old days and half of those with the later BIS requirements, I have a realistic shot of reaching the 4 MM mark in the 12-15 years of additional business travel, I am going to be "old, tired, and (hopefully) busy" (with all deference and respect to Oldtirednbusy) before I get there!

oldtirednbusy

I really didn't start flying a lot until 85 or 86 and then I flew Eastern. I only flew Delta or anything else if I had to until EA went "belly up" and the program was taken over by CO in about 1991 I had over 1M with EA. Then Delta was the only airline with decent connections out of BHM although I flew some NW and AA earning a few free tickets before settling in pretty much exclusively with Delta in around 93. It didn't take long to earn the first 1M probably late 92 and the 2M was earned I think around late 94. I have earned over 3M since the change. There have been some years I had somewhere around 300,000 MQMs and 250,000 has been "normal". I have earned about 250,000 since I reach 5M at the end of 05. Most of my flying is all over the US connecting in the ATL hub although for 2 yrs I made several TPAC flights and CA and SA.
Yes it is hard, but I also broke my trips up to come home and spend the night when my daughter was young. I did not miss many dance performances taking the 5:30 AM and getting home in time to make a HS or MS football game.
I do not have a Delta AMEX just reg plat. Yes it is HARD. I actually spent two weeks wout traveling this year and my wife took off to Italy one of those 2 weeks. Someone had to take care of the dogs.
Don't think I will make the 6M but who knows.
One year, before my wife quit work she made gold and I flew over 300,000 so she doesn't envy what I do, having done it and knowing it isn't as glamorous as some might think.
The biggest reward I think I have with Delta at this point is the new VIP number, not that I don't appreciate the opportunity to have exposed my girls and other family members to travel.

DLfan

All hail to Oldtirednbusy. I hope to NEVER accumulate 5MM (under the current rules) and you have my respect for having done so!