Does achieving lifetime air status give you the freedom to explore other frequent flyer programs?

Quite inadvertently, I achieved lifetime midtier status on both UA and AA this month. I passed 2MM on AA on May 6 and 1MM on UA on May 25. It’s an interesting time to achieve lifetime status with both airlines financially unstable. I am hopeful that both will survive.

UA has been my primary carrier my adult life, other than a few years spent in the arms of TWA. I bought a lifetime Red Carpet Club membership at age 22, thus setting my allegiance. UA only counts actual miles flown on UA metal. None of my partner airline miles, my bonus miles, affinity card, or hotel points count. It has taken consistent flying year after year, for over 20 years, to achieve 1MM. I have a sense of real achievement in making 1MM.

My 2MM status on AA happened quite incidentally. I only become an AA flyer this year, achieving Executive Platinum status last year due to two OneWorld RTWs. I never held status on AA prior to that, and have probably less than 200,000 miles on AA metal.

AA made a quixotic decision. It did not honor my lifetime TWA Ambassador Club membership, yet it swept all my TWA miles and bonuses into my lifetime status on AA. At yearend 2001 I suddenly skyrocketed past 1MM on AA, and was well on my way to 2MM. AA makes it comparatively easy to achieve 2MM as it counts all miles earned in the program no matter their source.

I’ll achieve both 1K and EXP this year. Next year, lifetime status gives me the freedom to sit on the sidelines without all loss of privileges. UA has certainly demotivated me to fly them with the changes to my much cherished SWUs. I have now switched my husband’s flying to entirely OneWorld, as well as my forthcoming international travel.

It seems to me now that I will check out LH Miles & More, or the QF redemption scheme. And you? Once you achieved lifetime status, did you start flirting with a new carrier?

As long as the lifetime mid-tier level holds no real interest for me, and I still wish to make the top 1K level at Mileage Plus, I must continue to fly United to at least that degree.

But like you, the SWU issue and some other changes at United has cost them my over 20 years of total loyalty, and my 200,000 miles of flight this year will no longer go to them exclusively.

Those changes to their program will cost them that much of my business, and could end up costing them even more as I am exposed to their competitors product and become more and more comfortable on their competitor's turf.

They had my loyalty. Now they just have another customer that is flying their program and when that customer gets to the point where the program offers no additional benefits...they just split to program B (and C and D).

I was 1K for seven years, now 1P which I just barely made -- and only because of the extension offer. I'm at about 900K on my way to MM with UA. My problem is that all of my tickets are either D, C or F fares. This means that, with the 100% 1P/1K status bonus, I get nearly as many miles if I credit C flights to M+ as I would to M&M. With F flights (which are nearly all my flights on UA metal) I get 375% of actual miles flown when I credit to M&M versus 250% when I credit to M+. And that's before I consider that M&M has a 1000 mile flight minimum versus 500 for M+. So, when I fly SFO-LAX on UA in F on a CRWSTAR fare, I can have 1250 M+ miles only 500 of which are status miles versus 3750 M&M miles all of which are status miles.

When I bought V fare tickets, M+ was great for me and I was loyal to UA. Later, when I was buying B fare tickets, M+ was still good to me and I was loyal to UA. Now that I buy D, C, and F fare tickets, UA screws me. It's unlikely that MM status will turn out to be enough of an incentive for me to choose UA metal when flying internationally. The only M+ miles I'm likely to collect are on three class domestic when I have a D or C ticket and those only as long as I'm 1P. Once I fall to 2P then all the miles will go to M&M.

If I was within 20-40K miles of MM, it would be enough of an incentive.

In general, my concept of loyalty to airlines is pretty much dead. If I had a puppy, I think we'd be loyal to each other. Airlines and I don't share that relationship. It's more adversarial.

I'm very close to 1MM on AA - I'll probably hit that later this year. I don't fly as often anymore, so Lifetime Gold will absolutely be of value to me. I will look at AA first for my travel needs, which is probably the main goal of a lure like Lifetime Gold. But if AA isn't competitive otherwise, the status won't keep me from looking elsewhere.

No. Try getting it with AC. You're only as good as your last year with them regardless of lifetime miles flown. Just ask some of the SE's on the AC board

As an AA 1 MM miler, I have to say that I look long and hard before flying others and seldom do. Frankly, lifetime status is far more important that year to year status...thanks AA.

Let's not forget that Lifetime = Life of the program. Not life of the member. In these lean times, don't be surprised if some of these programs 'lose their life'.

Just as the TWA lifetime club memberships vanished, so too can the lifetime statuses on any of these guys.

I'd be real surprised if AA 1MM and 2MM's are still given elite status 40 years from now.....

I have 2MM status with Delta which gives you Gold (I reached Plat however). Having the lifelong (of the program I assume) status I started exploring other Airlines (LH M&M AA)and liked what I saw. I reached PL with AA and thought the upgrade process is one of the best. With a Y fare you get autmatically Business on a 3 class aircraft and than upgrade to First! I also reached Sen with LH (which is not that difficult) and use them exclusively for transatlantic travel. Easy to upgrade with either miles or free vouchers (after 50000 status miles) Lots of status miles for C and F fares. I completely stopped using my United account. That said I guess I recommend to check out different carriers after reaching lifetime status with one of them.

Loyalty, in this case, is a business deal. I have no illusions that any airline cares about me as a person. Indeed, they should not: it would be a (minor) breach of fiduciary responsibility to shareholders to do so.

Status earns my loyalty because of its benefits: bonus miles, early boarding, upgrades, etc., etc. These are worth enough to me that they will offset somewhat higher fares, somewhat less convenient schedules and so on. It doesn't matter to me if I earned that status year-to-year, have it for life, or got it for rubbing the right oil lamp.

So, will I be "loyal" to AA after I earn lifetime Platinum in a few months? Yes, but I am loyal to them (that is, I fly AA and partners unless there's a really strong reason not to) anyway because of EXP benefits, and I'll be at least Platinum through 2/05 even without lifetime status. Will I be more loyal than I would have been otherwise? Not at this point. If my status post-2/05 would otherwise drop to Gold, having PLT will encourage me to fly with AA, but if my status drops that far, I'm not flying much (relative to today) anyhow!

This is a tough question. I have lifetime Platinum on AA and consider AA to be my primary carrier.

That being said, AA's schedule cutbacks and wacky fare pricing has led me to test the waters with WN again. I use to be a Companion Pass level flyer on WN, but moved over to AA (originally QQ on the LAX-SJC route) for the preferred boarding, assigned seating and international redemption opportunities. Now that I probably won't requalify for EXP any time soon and don't have to worry about requalifying for PLT, I am attracted to WN for the reasonable fares (I generally buy non-restricted Y) and better flight schedule. Would I be flying WN if I had to worry about requalifying for PLT on AA? Probably not.

I've earned Lifetime Platinum on AA and am very loyal to them because of it. I don't fly as much as I used to and could never get the Platinum equivilent on another airline.

Thanks again AA!

DL used to have a life time FC level. You got free CRC acess at some airports and other perks. The "lifetime" was not "lifetime" and as a result, I don't trust anything they claim to be "lifetime".

I have made Lifetime Gold on AA and I am close to Lifetime Plat..I would have to say my loyality stays with AA and OW. I feel loyality goes both ways...AA has been good to me. I am Plat now after spending a few years at EXP..having lifetime PLAT at 2MM is my goal.

I just achieved lifetime platinum and intend that AA will continue to be my first choice. What is the point of achieving status, having perks that you don't use. For me it means that I will feel freer to use my miles for trips knowing that I will continue to get perks even if I don't fly enough paid miles to achieve status each year. If the fare is cheap enough I will still buy a ticket knowing I will get double miles.

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Ms.DtG

What is Loyality? When applied to a service we buy, it surely is different that to people or pets.

Loyality is a means to an end at airlines. You purchase a bunch from them, and they give you something back you find of enough value to continue with them.

When you don't feel you are still benefiting enough, you move your "loyality" elsewhere.

When the airline does not believe they are getting enough out of you, they change the benefits "you" get.

So this business of loyality with airlines and ff's is a bunch of cr*p. Both are just "using each other". Don't you just love it!!!!!!!!!!!

There are some rare cases where loyality and airlines do exist. Like trying to keep an airline alive and/or serving a limited market imporatant to us (hometown?). This too is motivated by self interest, so I guess it is not loyality either.