Predicament between OnePass and Delta SkyMiles
 

I have a strange situation. I have my FF accounts on both Continental and Delta. My home airport moved from RDU to ATL. By then I had around 18000 miles on CO and 4000 on DL. After moving to ATL (where I see myself living at least for a couple of years more) and after CO deciding to join Star Alliance, I did not feel I would be using CO much.

A few weeks ago, I was booking tickets on the ATL - BOM sector which was served non stop by DL and was hoping to get a ticket on it and thus probably making all my CO miles go waste because DL gives a solid 23000 miles on ATL -BOM. But , unfortunately around the time I was planning to book, the fares on that routes were around 1900s return while CO gave me 1200s on the ATL-EWR-BOM route. I went with that thinking that I would be accumulating miles atleast somewhere (in fact a good amount on CO for that ATL-BOM trip...about 17k). So, I booked the ticket and then after a few days DL shifted its ATL-BOM nonstop to JFK and the ATL-JFK-BOM fare dropped to 1200s !!!

I was badly disappointed as I know there is no way I would be traveling CO on the domestic routes and my miles would end up split between the two airlines and never to be used for some award benefits any time sooner. I make my India trip once a year during which I am able to make quite a large amount of miles and my main intention in getting miles is to get a one way upgrade on one of my future trips. Also, I am close to Elite Staus on airTran but I don't think I like the idea of my credits expiring in a year forcing me to make reward trips just to use them. Although that is a different story altogther but I was thinking of shifting all my travel to DL from airTran too. (By the way, all my travels are for leisure and on my pocket. I take close to 10 - 12 domestic flights a year)

I was wondering if anyone could guide me on what should I be doing next. I was thinking of canceling my CO ticket and getting the DL one. But again, I would have to use close to 1000$ in vouchers within a year which is next to impossible considering my home airport is the DL / airTran kingdom, not to mention 250$ in change charges.

Welcome to FT, gradybush!

Perhaps I am missing something here, so my apologies if my advice is misplaced.

If your trip to India is before October 24 of this year, and if the CO flight is booked into an appropriate fare class, then it should not matter. You can take the CO flight and credit those miles to the DL program and they should give you redeemable miles and (perhaps) elite qualifying miles.

This link should give you some information about earning elite qualifying miles (called MQM) on Delta by flying on a CO flight.

Just by way of reference, I have earned probably half of my CO OnePass elite qualifying miles this year by flying on Delta flights... the SkyTeam benefits continue to exist on CO until October.

Thanks gary.

Unfortunately , that is where it gets a little muddy. My flight to BOM is in November :-)

I called Continental to ask them if my flight would give me miles on SkyTeam (I asked them because the CO website allowed me to enter my SkyMiles number for the booking - which is a bug on their system, if you think of it) The CO customer service agent just read off the website what I had already read - stuff about how the earning of miles on each others programs ends on Oct 24 and stuff !

You will definitely NOT earn miles on Delta for a CO flight in November.

And there is no way I'd pay extra money now to make the change. Credit the miles to CO (or a *A partner if that is online by then) and accept that things didn't go perfectly on this one.

PS- Welcome to FlyerTalk!!

change
 

Delta and CO no longer the same.

Switch CO to Delta. Delta still has the best loyality program once you hit the million mile (lifetime silver, etc)

Delta has the best loyalty program? Since when? They have seriously eroded their frequent flyer program in the last few years.

I don't think it makes sense to cancel the trip on CO. If you don't want to credit to CO, then one of the new *A carriers may be more your cup of tea.

Well... I think sbm12 has hit the nail right on the head... you have some CO miles now, and after flying this itinerary you will have more. I wouldn't stress about it.

If you are going to live in ATL for any length of time, you might as well focus on DL (or AirTran, I guess, but that would depend on your international travel needs).

The comment about DL's program being better than CO's is somewhat arbitrary, as it depends on a lot of factors. Each is better than the other in different ways. Personally, I am Million Miler on both DL and CO; both have given me lifetime Silver status, fancy luggage tags, and that's about it. So I would use criteria like importance of international upgrades (or other things important to you) to compare.

CO has the exact same benefits for their MMers PLUS a companion gets the same status as the MMer. DL is simply not the most competitive in this space.

Thank you all so much for trying to help me decide.

Yeah, it seems I will have to stick to Continental for this trip as I already have 18K miles on it so the extra mileage addition would only be an improvement over what I have now.

Also, the issue with adding those miles to another * A member would be that domestically, United or US Airways also don't have as many connections from ATL and that would again lead to a further split on my miles as the ones I already have on CO would go waste. Internationally, Singapore Airlines really takes long if I have to fly from the East Coast as it goes to SIN crossing India and then back in the opposite direction to BOM. Lufthansa also has relatively expensive tickets.

The only reason I was setting my eyes on DL was that in the future if I have to travel , I can get good deals on KLM, AF too who also offer really good connections to BOM from ATL via AMS/CDG at decent prices.

Are those 18K miles this year? If so, adding on the miles to/from India you'll make elite on the trip which isn't such a bad thing to have.

No, sbm12, sadly not :-(

The situation has become more...err...confusing I'd say. Got an email saying that Delta will be giving out twice the number of miles on all flights taken between Jul1 and Dec 31 for SkyMiles Cardholders, both new and existing. This sounds too tempting an offer considering I can make close to 36K miles on the trip if I book Delta.

Tempting indeed, but is it worth shelling out $250 cash plus another $1200 travel certificate on CO that you may not be able to use up within one year?

Personally I would NOT pay $250 to change ticket given the situation you described so far (e.g., double redeemable miles on DL). If the offer was double elite qualifying miles, I would be more tempted to switch.

If you do decide to fly with Delta instead, you don't have to cancel the CO ticket right away - just need to cancel before the outbound flight. You don't pay the $250 penalty until you rebook the changed flight for the first time - remember to rebook within one year of the original ticket issue date. Once you make the rebook, any remaining value would be issued to a travel certificate that's valid one year from its own issue date (not the original ticket date). This way, you could prolong the time you have to spend your CO travel credit.

Thanks a lot deltame.

Yeah, if they are not giving out double MQM then it basically won't help my case a lot.

Also, thanks for your guidance on the cancellation process of a ticket. That way I can for all means extend the time I have to book another ticket on CO for upto almost two years. I assume the vouchers I get after I book the first ticket in my name within the first year of issue would allow me to book for other people as well.

Yes, OP, you can use your residual value from travel certificate to buy tickets for other people. Just want to add that the $250 change fee you pay is new money, i.e., on top of $1200 ticket credit with CO. This is different from other airlines where their change fee could be deducted from ticket value.

I personally would not pay extra cash ($250 in change fee to CO, plus another $1200 for DL airfare) in this economy and also tie up the CO ticket value for a long time.