travel.flier

When I first heard the news of the changes, I was very excited - United did a great job off really making us paranoid w/leaking the changes to Lucky's blog. And when it turned out to be smaller devaluations, I was jumping for joy.

As I've digested the news, it's apparent that for MM benefits, single people really get the shaft. Not only did we lose our 100% bonus miles as 1p for life (okay every gets that), or become 4th from the top instead of 3rd (GS, 1k, 0p then 1p), but the regional upgrades + SWU's were taken away in exchange for a spousal benefit.

Well great if you have a spouse. And if you don't, then you kind of got screwed. It seems like UACO could have done a much better job making this piece more equitable with little to no cost. I propose one of 2 options:

1) a companion status match which can be changed every year (kind of like the 3p nomination, but in this case they get nominated to whatever status you are), and forget the "must live at same address" nonsense.

2) 2 annual regional upgrades

Honestly, neither of those seems like it would have a huge cost to UA - in fact they were already giving away 2 CR1's. Allowing it to be any companion of choice and not limit it to a "spouse" whatever their definition is would be a nice way not to discriminate.

If you agree, please write to 1k voice and express your opinion.

GoingAway

Where does superior come in? Different, absolutely, more focused on the metal flown, totally but superior? The sticks arev eally unnecessary and add no value to the discussion.

- there is no way to adjust downwards, where would that even come from?
- bummer you got 50% for some flights, but there are plenty of fare codes, etc situations on both sides where sub 100% eqm are posted, that isn't changing with the one time adjustment. If you got eqm - any - that will now go into the lfetime figure on the UA calc, thats all. With CO, that 50% is already counted, so yes you would be and are ahead of the game.

leland

Just checked in on my lifetime miles on both UA and CO. I am a whole lot farther than I thought... Pity not much of a reason to think about gunning for it. I read the description that lifetime miles would include some bonuses, but right now my CO account is about double my lifetime miles. I might hit the MM mark in about 20 years at this rate

blue47

My comment was about the attitude expressed by some flyers, not the program. Obviously, I would have preferred BIS.

Not some, All. for some time.

You are right. UAInsider did say "boost" which would imply that negative adjustments are not to be given. I thought I remembered the term "adjust".

Eadward

I'm CO FF and got CO MM this year. I couldn't agree more. CO MM was great, but getting *G for life was a nice surprise.

golfingboy

Based on what has been announced it is correct. But, I am not too sure about GS since is a revenue tier and they need to protect that level for the actual GS customers... This revenue tier will inflate with the PPlats and some already/newly minted 4MMers. If they allow GSes to grant spouse GS status then it will easily balloon over 75,000 members for 2012.

So, it is possible that all GS's spouses or significant other will probably get 1K status rather than GS status, but we will see.

mstraveler

I went ual.com to look up my lifetime miles, which I thought were readily seen there, and can't find the balance anywhere. Where are those totals these days??

GoingAway

Look on the activity screen, its at the top ... Its the second tab, i believe

golfingboy

It is under the My Activity tab in your Mileage Plus Account.

NJBeav

I am sitting at 979K with CO and have around 225K with United. This works out better for me since I am 55 and facing declining flying and my wife is not a huge flyer. I had been working through options including at least 8K in Flexible Elite miles from my PP credit card. Since I am staring at silver for next year this is a great deal for me. I have been Platinum maybe 8 out of the last 10 years so this allows me to stop calculating all the ways to make sure that I get the spousal benefit that I was afraid that I would have to grandfather in.

Nearly all of my United miles were earned before I moved near EWR in 1993. I had earned a bunch of miles in the triple mileage in the post strike time in the 1980s. For some of greybeards I wonder how that was included in UA's lifetime calculations

oenophilist

I think people are forgetting what the big benefit to lifetime status is: that you can maintain a certain elite level after you stop flying as often, or during flying dry spells. To me, this is the most important aspect of the entire MM program. The one-time and annual awards were just gravy.

SAN 1K

Possible but I think that GS/1K detail would have been announced if true.
In terms of the number of GS members and/or "protecting" the program, bear in mind that very few families have two road-warrior spouses. The number must be absolutely minuscule. My spouse, as an example, only flies around 12 segments per year so there's really little issue of competition from her.
On the other hand, I do agree that the program (as rolled out in this announcement) is really a downgrade for singles.

nor4

In looking over the list of benefits of being a Premier Gold as a 1MM flyer next year, I found the following benefits and missing benefits to be most telling for me.

1. CPUs - which will be very difficult to redeem unless one remains a 1K, so I'm not too excited.
2. No RPUs or GPUs as in the past for 1MM - the biggest disappointment for me. Probably a game changer for me. Having them would actually cause me to fly United MORE rather than less.
3. 50% mileage bonus instead of 100% currently. A significant downgrade but not a deal breaker.
4. 500 mile minimum PQM accrual, a plus, but pretty minimal plus.
5. More availability of Saver Awards, a plus, but not in F/C, a minus.
6. $25 fee for close-in and award change fee. A real negative.
7. $100 award redeposit fee. What justifies this? Another big negative.
8. International flights lounge access - but I have this through lifetime CO lounge access, but a big plus otherwise.
9. Access to E+ at booking, a real plus.
10. No fee same day flight change, a real plus.
11. $25 phone service fee - a major negative, especially given the .com problems
12. No dedicated phone line. Double trouble to pay to talk to ICC. Insult to injury. A deal breaker for me.
13. And finally, at number lucky 13, the spousal benefit. No use to me at all and not having the choice to get RPUs and GPUs instead, is the most irritating "big brother" move by United. Probably more than anything the one thing that pushes me out of my 1K habit with UA. Perhaps I should thank them.

WineCountryUA

Other than the one time GPUs, you are talking about the the loss of 2 annual CR1/RPUs -- personally I would rank this far below the loss of the 100% RDM bonus which you rank as not a deal breaker.
1Ps are not routed to ICC

and as far as the fees you referenced, they are less or same for 1MMs as Premier Gold in 2012 then they were in 2011 1MM as 1Ps.

mre5765

More precisely, the spouse will have the higher of the member's current tier for the current year or the member's life time status.

E.g. A member flies zero eqms in year 2013, but has lifetime 1p. The spouse and the member are 1p in 2014.

E.g. A member flies 75k eqms in year 2013, but has lifetime 1p. The spouse and the member are 0p in 2014.