Maybe Plat at 75,000 is pushing it a little for SWU; what about DM where there is a required 125,000 (25% > AA or UA) and not getting some. All the airlines had DEQM during the year.

Exactly. It's about relative expectations/disappointments. The more DL insists on how the merger wouldn't erode WP benefits and the more DL insists SM is industry leading FF program, the more pissed WP elites would get when those promises came up empty. If DL had just come out and said "yeah, our program is nowhere as good as WP. You are pretty screwed by the merger, oops. Don't expect much from us.", I'm sure this thread wouldn't be as negative.

Why would anyone flying >100k EQMs per year NOT choose either AA or UA? Isn't the new DM 125k tier significantly inferior to either UA's or AA's 100k tier?

I will go along with that. I think, for the long term, U.S. based airlines need to do a lot more than merely keep their Elites happy, especially, when you can become a plat by flying 25000 miles and triple EQMs. They need to pay attention to their service, in coach, as well as business class, if they want to compete with foreign airlines, which is all together a different issue and OT. Revenue from economy class, even on international flights, far exceeds that from business class, although not on an individual ticket basis.

Good service is far better business model than signing up new elites and than give crappy service. Cell phone companies follow this defective model of "Get new customers, keep them captive and give crappy service".

Everyone's reasons are different. I'm sticking with NW/DL because:

1. They are the only airline that offer an abundance of SJC/SFO-MSP direct flights;
2. I have never not been upgraded to F as a Platinum.

I'd still fly NW/DL if there wasn't any other benefit, including point 2. The BIG benefit of flying them is time - they save me time. No other carrier, short of flying charter/private, can offer me that.

For everything else, I have $$$. Why count on an airline when I can count on myself?

I still am saying that the "new" Delta's business plan is... "get rid of our most loyal flyers and try to build from bankrupt up"
Game is offically over soon for me with DL/NW.. no fun anymore and they do not care about the Elites!
I am lucky that I have a choice of how I fly with MY $$.

Couldn't have said it better!

I started a thread last month with a similar suggestion, but unfortunately it didn't fly.

I'm in the same boat, I fly a half dozen TATL r/t's a year and buy out of my own pocket; I could justify a couple HKQ's, (DL's mid tier Y tix, like KQV), but I can't justify paying $2800 to $3600 for a single YBM r/t when LUT(I believe that's KLT on NW) is typically $650 to $1100.

Yeah the PMU is just horrible.
If I'm going to buy a YBM fare out of my own pocket, I should be able to use the certificate at the time of booking so that I know that the significantly extra $$ will get me a Biz seat, not having to wait until day of departure.

This how I would fix it:

Though I really would like SWU without restrictions (this is the best for customers) otherwise, YBM get immediate Biz seating, middle fares, maybe 1 week prior to departure, and LUT heavily discounted fares day of departure. Why not give your best customers a nicer seat if they are going to go out empty?

Having options is nice, but clearly what they are doing is not going to keep people happy nor motivated to keep all their biz with Delta.

so where is everybody moving their business to? United might be the lesser of two evils./...

Not only AA VIPs can be usable with any fare (except for lowest and netsavers for International and netsavers on Domestic) from what I read (UA certs are usable from most fares, similarity would be from NW Q fares and up), it also books into C which is almost always available.

Also, as an EXP you get 8 of them a year. Its so much better than DL crap that it blows my mind. I am booking all my trips on AA for the remiander of the year so I can get my Platinum challenge and then EXP in 2010. AA here I come.

If you have a NY/NJ/CT address on file as your primary AAdvantage address, AA will give you double miles on all flights on their planes flown until the end of the year. NYDBL is the promo code and it's a great promo that is good with other promos and elite status bonus.

This is just another way in which AA's program is much better than DL's program for those who fly 50k+ miles per year.

I didn't folllow double/triple eqms at all. Did anyone have triple EQMs besides NW? If they all had triple EQMs, they AA and UA will laso have hordes of elites competing to get upgrades.

We all have different priorities, travel patterns and reasons for staying with NW or crossing over. For us, my family and I, travel has gone down and will stay that way for the next few years. I will probably stay to burn the miles we still have left. I wasn't able to burn them all with the reduced travel we have been doing the last two years. I burnt miles from other accounts while I tried to keep my status. Once the last of the accounts (those of my wife and children) are depleted, I will start using mine to book biz tickets for my my family for the few trips we take. I have to keep my status to use the miles. My consolation is that I can still fly my family in comfort while. The price is coach travel for me as I neither plan to spend for MBY fares, nor I can afford them since we, as many others here, have been travelling on my dime.

NW didn't have triple EQMs. They had double EQMs for non-discounted fares. The other airlines had double EQMs for all fare classes.

Thank you so much for this information! Excellent ^