+1000. There are intangibles (rule exception for higher value customers, other things you mention) that the arrogant, one dimensional, unimaginative UA management either doesn't understand or chooses to ignore as critical to success in this very specialized business.

agreed. until recently i flew out of EWR, HPN, and LGA a ton. i was never upgraded out of EWR or on HPN E170 flights. LGA was usually a slam dunk, and i am only a gold. that, my friends, is telling.

ORD is now, once again, my main UA hub. I find that for flights with any advance purchase, DL and AA usually have lower fares.

Now, in the new normal, the only things that keep me flying UA are:
-to burn miles
-to sit in Economy Plus
-to board in the Group 2 herd - which lacking decent status (having recently put all my eggs in the UA basket) on other airlines means boarding last.
-I still have some pangs of "loyalty" and a certain familiarity even with the new CO dba UA.

But, now, in the new normal, I am more willing to agree with mitchmu:

1. Never pay a fare premium to be loyal to a specific airline again, and

2. Never choose a less desirable routing to be loyal to a specific airline again, and

3. Never fly more than I have to (or want to) for the sake of achieving status

Reality sets in. In many respects, the new normal means that the fun-filled days of playing the frequent flyer game are over. Flying is just transportation. The glory days of the 50s & 60s were replaced by deregulation. That helped bring on the world of the Frequent Flyer Program - and everything that Randy Peterson recognized made popular. The financial realities of today mean that flying is just transportation.

The new normal is becoming status based on spending - not on how many miles sitting on planes earns.

Planes are the inter city bus of today. As more and more people get used to flying low cost carriers, the majors are becoming LCCs - at least in service & amenities. Status - and sitting up front - are going to be for flyers who spend big bucks - not us "over entitled elites". Period.

And never do a true "mileage run" - a trip with no benefits or purpose other than to achieve a higher level of FF status. That's becoming sillier and sillier every day, at least IMHO.

Ok smart person - what would you do if in late December, you observe that you're less than 2000 miles away from either 0P (Platinum) or 1K?

David

I've had a rash of empty seats lately. LAX-ORD, empty middle. SFO-LAX, empty middle. DEN-LGA, empty middle and aisle! Seems flights are less full these days.

I disagree. I still find incredible value out of 10 confirmable upgrades vs 2, which means I'm hustling for my last 10-15k PQM. Although these days I flight/segment pad instead of flying straight mileage runs.

I guess it all comes down to how management will justify the financial performance of the comapny to the shareholders. As long as the shareholders are satisfied with the management story, the customers are secondary.

I think many of us still hope for the good old days of flying - we fly so much because we like to and we still want it to be somewhat special. Airline management nowadays is probably more about number crunching and contract management than anything else.

I'm at a loss to understand your constant mention of domestic customers? I'd be fairly confident to say the preponderance of domestic pax who go out of their way to fly an airline will also fly that airline internationally. Lose one and you lose the other.

I'll chime in with disagreement here. It doesn't make sense to MR from *S to Plat but there are certainly reasonable situations (and price points) where an MR would make sense.

Today I was asked what airline I often fly to/from the US, a question I get a fair bit. My response was the same as it's been for the last year: I fly UA but unless you're a savvy flier I'd recommend staying far away from them.

Why do i say this? Because UA feels it's over-entitled to kayakers. :D

I think you wish to ignore the objective facts.

On August 1, 2012, UAL was trading at 18.17. Last Friday, it closed at 32.67, for a gain in the period of 79%.

Using the same dates, DAL increased 98%; LCC (US Airways) increased 56%; AAMRQ increased 892% (but, since they are in bankruptcy, you can pretty much ignore that one); and LUV (Southwest) increased 51%.

Objectively, United stock is doing very well. You may not like it, but that is the fact.

Short term profitability emphasized? Hello! That's what virtually every company out there is doing. That's how the game is played.

Results talk and complaints can take a walk.

I agree with you from a customer standpoint, but you're not going to find anyone telling Smisek he is screwing up when he is showing results like this. Just not going to happen no matter how much you want it to.

But that short term performance is all the market cares about.

Of course they are. Most of the investors are institutional investors. They are very well aware of the numbers in the SEC filings.

That's what CEOs are supposed to do.

With the way earnings and expenses are reported, the market has apparently decided that the 1-1/2 billion is irrelevant, so it therefore is.

You may be right, but as of now, the market does not agree with you. If you start to see if a big sell-off or knowledgeable people shorting the stock, then you might be right. But as we sit here right now, you are just reading tea leaves.

(BTW, I read the leaves the same way. The point I am making is that the market is reading them differently.)