joel67

I must have missed it, but I haven't seen any evidence presented that Infinite Elites "were promised in writing top tier." In fact this seems to be another urban myth used to justify the favoritism.

It's probably not worth debating this point any further, but since you seem to insist that "level" should be defined as the number of miles required to earn it (rather than, say, the benefits bestowed), let me point out that PMUA qualifying miles have traditionally been harder to achieve than on PMCO. It sure would have been great during years that I struggled to get to that next level if I could have just tapped my FEQM bank for another 25,000 miles. During my 50k Premier Executive years, I could have been Platinum on CO!

Baze

^

dgcpaphd

Absolutely, there is no question that you are correct.

One has to wonder what could have possessed the new UA management for them to come up with such unfair, biased and discriminatory demotions to the UA side of the frequent flyer program.
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halls120

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halls120

True enough. But the rank unfairness, left to fester, will not produce very much good will for the new United. Of course, they may not care.

Well, I'm pretty sure the people directly affected might not share your view that this is not all that unimportant. Don't you think those people have the right to complain?

The new United could very easily come up with a "consolation" measure that isn't all that financially burdensome. And if they can't, then why not just come out and admit that they understand that some people don't agree that this is a fair resolution?

pdx1M

I really don't see the point in berating the good fortune of the IEs. So they got lucky - such is life. If UA had said that they were going to pick 1000 random members and give them 1K for life would that also annoy everyone? How many active IEs are there at this point anyway? Is there any evidence that this change was is substantive? If there aren't many then pragmatically it is irrelevant to the vast majority of folks who will never lose an upgrade or standby to one.

I have said before that I am with Baze and others that don't see that the new MM = Gold is a change. Just suppose that UA hadn't added Platinum - then you would all be happy. If they then next year decided that they wanted to give priority to folks that were flying 75K miles per year would they then have had to go back and promote all MMs to that new level? If 2 years from now UA creates a 2K level should all of us get upgraded? It simply doesn't make sense. Complain about the loss of the CR-1s - that was (as I have said before) a rather silly deletion by UA that actually broke a written committment. Complain about the RDM bonus changes (which are not specific to the MM program but hit everyone) - that is of real value to people and puts UA in an interesting competitive position compared to AA etc. It will be interesting to see which camp of airlines wins this - I don't see the majors long term having differing bonus structures - it's too visible. So either UA backs off or AA takes advantage to cut their bonuses as they reorganize.

halls120

I'm not berating anyone. The IE's got a great deal, good for them. I've never suggested that UA rescind the deal they got. I'm just suggesting that UA do a bit more for the 1MM'ers to make the balance a little bit more fair. That's all.

EMAW

I find it interesting that there is so much passion directed toward defense of the decision to provide lifetime 1k status for the Continental IE folks when no one is saying that the decision should be rescinded. The UA 1 MM folks merely cite this as an example of disproportionate reward for one group and are only seeking fair treatment.

I think that there is validity to the fact that the Continental folks did stick with their airline during very tough times and that this loyalty should be rewarded. However, most of us did the same thing during UAL's bankruptcy and the wonderful summer that the pilots staged their labor action. We stuck with them during these difficulties and actually flew a million BIS miles which we feel should be rewarded with fair treatment rather than a pretty drastic reduction in benefits.

uastarflyer

and The answer to that is pretty obvious.

We were never loyal to CO. Therefore, they have zero incentive to be loyal to us.

joel67

Yes, but in acquiring UA and adopting the United name, surely they were hoping to capture the goodwill that United had built over the years, a big part of which being the loyalty of its longtime customers. I doubt that this favoritism is deliberate, but more likely a result of understanding their own customers much better than the new ones they now have.

uastarflyer

I think it's definitely deliberate. They didn't do much for valuing their own customers when CO was just CO. In the merger, they gave extra perks to CO folks at the expense of UA folks.

While I greatly support/admire many UA posters in this thread doing their best to influence the powers that be, a parallel effort to book away en masse should be readied as well. I was able to convert one about-to-be purchased UA transpac ticket by a colleague to one purchased on SQ instead just today.

zombietooth

CO values the PMUA elites very little indeed. They have left me with zero incentive to get to 2 MM even though I am only 180K away. The only reason that I might stay with UA is because 1K was still good last year--it remains to be seen what it will be worth this year.

I also believe that those trumpeting the value of Lifetime Gold (or Platinum) status are sadly deluded about its future value. I expect that Gold benefits will be degraded in the next phase of cost-cutting.

I am one who always flew UA if I could over the last 20 years, even if it cost more or had worse routings. Now, I am seriously considering other international carriers that often have Z-fares that are only a little more expensive than UA W-fares, which I previously always purchased so that I could upgrade.

dgcpaphd

So many complaints in this thread and there isn't a peep out of the new UA management!

Considering that Shannon occasionally posts here, surely she reports our comments to the new UA management. Maybe she does report our comments but the new UA management doesn't care what we feel.

The new UA management is aware that a frequent flyer program is essentially a loyalty program that works both ways. Customers remain loyal to the airline and the airline rewards the customers with certain benefits.

In the case of the new UA, instead of rewarding customers with benefits, the new UA management announced a series of discriminatory demotions to the million-mile program.

The demotions caused a loss of incentive for many formerly loyal customers to attempt to achieve the second million miles.

Considering the tiny benefits that would be gained for reaching the next million-mile goal post (they offer 25% more bonus miles and no change fees after the second million miles). Those two tiny benefits for achieving an additional million-miles on United!. What an insult.

One would think that at a very minimum someone from the new UA management would post a response here to say they are considering some changes to the demotions.

Nope, not a word. The silence and/or lack of a response could signify a lack of concern what passengers think about the demotions.

After lots of customers bail out of UA or if and when AA decides to grant a status match rather than a challenge, maybe we will hear some words of encouragement from the new UA management along with some rescission of the demotions.
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Xyzzy

That, too, was a few years ago. Shuldn't you have been rewarded then? If you were not, shouldn't you have asked about it then? These "IE demotion" complaints sound like a lot of sour grapes to me.

c502cid

Excuse me, but we were rewarded then. 1M BIS miles got a great reward, 2M BIS even more. United earned my loyalty, but Continental did not. We'll see who earns it now.

So you think it is sour grapes, well you know what I think? Who cares what you think.