bsdstone

Well...it WAS a priority!

geo979

Whew, UA was finally able to complete the massive undertaking to update the website. Happy New Year. Now the ball can drop in Times Square.

jjmoore

My better half spent $17,000 on UA in 2015 with 51,000 PQM. She received a packet in the mail with an offer to buy up to Platinum. No price was listed but a link was provided to log in to see the terms. THEY ASKED FOR $2199!!!!

Ridiculous.

She is going to make platinum this summer anyway, and they have the nerve to ask her to pay $2200 to buy up the status for a period of 4 months.

Very poor tactics.

phxrsng

Sorry, I don't understand why this is poor tactics. Maybe I'm missing your point.

The requirements to earn 2016 status are PQD (met) + PQM/PQS (missed by 24k miles). A decent rate I've seen on the premier accelerator is $100/1k PQM. So at $2200 she's actually getting a $200 discount. I agree that's not worth it, especially if she'll qualify early this year....but not sure how that's an unfair or unexpected offer.

jjmoore

Poor tactics because they are making a disgusting offer to someone that spent nearly 1.5X the required spend to make top status on UA... PT vs G doesn't afford hardly any differences (except for checked bags and the 2 RPU's). Hardly worth it, and kind of a slap in the face after spending a pretty hefty sum on pricey tickets last year.

UA needs to transition into a purely revenue based program. Rewarding based on spend solely is the way to go in the future. I would like to hear someone justify that someone that spends barely $12,000 flying 100,000PQM should be rewarded more than someone that flies half of those miles on 1.5X the spend. It is pretty obvious who is more valuable to the airline.... but that person is rewarded less.......

Yes ... there are rules dictating criteria for qualification... but the manner in which they presented this particular offer is pretty tasteless.

Bruin1K

As most platinums and 1ks would tell you, the main incentive for plat is not the RPUs, it's the lack of charge on award ticket redeposits. They save you a ton!

phxrsng

I see why you could be upset but I disagree. By your spend-only based logic, if I take two pricey long-hauls I get high status? Or if we only care about revenue why not just let me buy 1K without flying at all?

I mean I get where that argument comes from, but IMO loyalty should still play a factor, and this mix of rev-based and BIS-based is a pretty good setup. I miss purely-mileage based earning because I earned more, but I recognize thats in the past. The way it is now seems to be a good medium of benefit for the company and benefit for the loyal flyer.

If we accept UA's current qualification criteria as valid, then the offer makes sense. I only find the offer insulting if I take your view of what the criteria should be. If UA transitioned to revenue-only then yes, I would be insulted by the offer given the circumstances. Until then...eh. And given that I mostly agree with you on relative value of Gold v Plat, and that your wife will earn plat in a few months, seems like theres no real harm here?

I will say that I've had better CPU luck as a plat than a gold, and obviously better upgrade luck overall with the RPUs and higher priority if/when I apply miles. So there is some value there.

gold23

This, and Group 1. Group 2 is 2/3 of the plane now, so Group 1 access- to me- is worth a ton. No gate stress whatsoever.

IAH-OIL-TRASH

When I was working full time and travelling on OPM, I could easily spend $18k on 3 trips (2 if the timing was really bad). Since I made maybe 6-7 int'l trips a year for business, there would very little incentive for me to stay with UA if the $18k alone got me 1K. I certainly would have (seeing I didn't need 100k miles) opted for more convenient carriers at times. I think the argument is that the miles encourage loyalty (and hence more $) from the truly frequent flyers. It is a conundrum.

The recently increased PQMs for certain fares should help people in your friend's situation, maybe?

emcampbe

Poor tactics because they gave your partner an offer to buy up to the next level at all? Ridiculous because they didn't predict she will make it to the next level halfway through this year? Or is it because they didn't waive their stated requirements completely to give her a status she didn't earn.

There was a time when these kinds of offers wouldn't have even been available. You either hit the thresholds to get you X status and got it (or maybe you would with a very small leeway), or you didn't hit them, and you didn't - there were no buy-up offers. I kind of wish it was like that today - much simpler if they stick to the requirements and that's it. People would know that's the only way to get the status, and no super-long threads about why person X didn't get an offer, or why person Ys offer was terrible (well - every offer is probably going to be pretty bad - no chance to make up for the past and so UA can charge whatever they want, pretty much).

Unfortunately, many folks think they should get stuff they didn't earn. You see it in the complaints that some person doesn't get nearly enough free upgrades (while often booking into mid-level or even the lowest fare classes). I like my upgrades when I get them, but I'm not going to complain that, heaven forbid, UA actually sold those seats instead. Or the threads asking FTers how to convince agents to get a free change (when the rules they agreed to when buying the ticket don't allow).

Let me tell you, years ago, before the spending requirements came into effect, I spent close to $10,000 a year, the first 1K threshold, and only made silver. Because I flew mostly expensive transborder flights - those are pretty costly per mile. You didn't hear me complaining, even though I knew there were folks spending probably less than a third of that making 1K on cheap transcons. I never thought to complain, because there was a threshold I didn't cross - simply miles or segments. So I went on as a lowly silver - no upgrades in those days either, as I rarely even hit the quarterly milestones for E500s. Did it suck that others who spent much less then me with UA got much better benefits? Sure it did. But those were the rules, and unfortunately, it disadvantaged me over some others. But that's life, sometimes.

I'd say [Moderator edit] move on. And if you or your better half are so disappointed, move elsewhere. And also, tell us what better status your partners stats end up getting her on competing carriers.

jjmoore

This is what will help her get 1K this year most likely. Now that Z and A earn 200%, this should push her the rest of the way into top tier, especially with at least 1 TPAC looming in her horizon.

And thank you for {the} response