televisor

Sure. But how much profit was UA really making from those 1k-from-economy-only flyers? At least on TATL they seem to be expanding the amount of seats in J, so they clearly have a plan on how to make money which doesn't include many Y flyers. (At least that's the impression I get from the use of Hi-J 763's - e.g. my home airport just went from 2 daily 763s to 3 daily Hi-J 763s.)

Amusingly, I used to be one of those 1k-with-economy-flights only flyers (with the PQD waiver to boot) - that was a lot of BIS miles. Now I'm on track for 1k thanks to having to do business travel from an expensive location, with not much more than 50k BIS (under the old system would've gotten around 75k PQM thanks to P-fares which nevertheless cost a lot). How things change...

Quite obviously, the infrequent but expensive traveller gains a lot under the new system. And they're the ones bringing in the most revenue per mile - I can completely understand UA's logic, as much as it would have annoyed me in the old days.

(United's program still wins out compared to anything local thanks to the annoying fuel surcharges on redemptions with LH et al.)

STS-134

It's not really about how much money they're making from each pax (airlines can't operate a business without people filling all types of seats, from the front to the back of the plane) but about how much money they're making from current pax vs. potential replacements. That's where I think they erred. I really challenge them to find two new pax who will pay up to a 30-40% premium on Hawaii roundtrip tickets in the summer of 2021, and who will do it twice in less than 3 weeks.

ContinentalFan

It’s really the big unknown. Allowing 1Ks to pre-board opened my eyes to the fact that there are so many. Bumping the PDQ from $10 to $12 and finally $15,000 didn’t appear to have an impact, but without information from United, there’s no way to know.

The bump to $24k may be too much to some, but I bet a reasonable number find a way to reach the goal. My expectation is that come February 1st, 2021, this program will have no discernible change on the number of elites flying on any given day.

JimInOhio

UA's physical assets are flexible and so they don't need to fly as many seats to Hawaii if they don't want to. Remember, some time last year, when an AA exec said they were scaling back in Asia because the revenue generated wasn't enough for the amount of time the aircraft were in the air? He said they could make more money by deploying to TATL (and elsewhere) where aircraft can fly more flights per week... or something to that effect.

UA knows this just as well as AA does so I'm sure it's a factor in their thinking whether they act on it or not.

Lifetimenotelite

On my Long haul there’s maybe 5-10 at most.

However when connecting domestically I see a smaller number and the same 1Ks from the long hauls are on the same connections.

I know this year 1K is a lock.

Beyond 2021 once I consume my plus points I’ll most be bailing on UA for my overseas trips.

Domestic will depend on ease of travel and price.

STS-134

Back before I had any status with UA, I once took a SFO-NRT flight and the GA announced that there were something like 73 (!?!?) 1Ks on the flight. This was with pmUA.

Aussienarelle

I am looking for a domestic airline that suits my domestic travel plans and I can match my status. In 2021 I will be Gold (due to MM) with UA which is a significant drop in benefits from 1K AND I think there will be more purely domestic flyers who will attain 1K with PQF/PQP. I could get to the PQF requirement for United as I travel domestically at least 1 - 2 trips a month and do use WN as I like the luggage policy.

On the west coast for me it is AS and they also have good TPAC and TATL partners. Although I suspect t I will be free agent for most TPAC and TATL flights using the Premium Deal thread.

Lifetimenotelite

I’ve been on a lot of TPACs and SFO is clearly GS and 1K central.

Not challenging your experience but I’ve never seen a number like that that would be 1K.

People with at least some status or group 1 being 73 deep sure but 73 1Ks would be extremely uncommon even PMUA.

ContinentalFan

It differs greatly from my experience, where there’s typically a dozen or more 1Ks even on an A320. On flights to SIN, MEL or HKG, there are typically one to two dozen. FRA and LHR are pretty 1K heavy too.

STS-134

So I looked up my account history. UA introduced PQD in 2014. In 2014, 2015, and 2016, I met the PQD requirements with no waiver required. At the end of 2015, I switched jobs from one that purchased J tickets outright to one that requires no travel, and starting in 2016, began funding my UA status entirely from personal funds. In 2016, I personally bought a UA TPAC J cabin ticket outright so I could experience the SFO GFL and the 744 in F in seat 1A before it was retired (no double upgrading was allowed of course). I finished out that year with a PQD run to SEA; I already had sufficient PQM for Gold requal, but even after having purchased that J ticket, I had a slight amount of trouble with the PQD. In 2017, I signed up for the MPE card and began spending $25k a year on it, and qualified with the PQD waiver in 2017, 2018, and 2019. Last year in particular, I had my lowest PQD total ever, around 2300, and around $3k of total airline ticket spend ($700 of which went to CM).

So whether I've needed a PQD waiver or not really depends on the year. I might once again end up in a job that makes it easy to hit PQD (now PQP) targets but for now, it's just not worth it. And last year, I didn't even come close.

mrmoo

This is me, the domestic warrior. I have consistently hit spending requirements for 1k but was mostly Gold (this year, plat and only by a segment run). 9/10 flights last year were CLE-ORD, so I never make up the miles. With the change I will be 1k around mid-August based on my projections.

Lifetimenotelite

What doesn’t make sense is if you pay 18k and do 54 segments and flyer 2 pays $18k but on less flights doesn’t that make flyer 2 more valuable? Flyer 1 gets 1K and Flyer 2 does not despite the same spend.

The numbers don’t make sense.

jsloan

Apparently not. UA has the data. Everyone else is just guessing.

Lifetimenotelite

Simple economics says otherwise. We can actually do the math on this with fairly close accuracy

At the end of the day on the balance sheet of revenue - expense comes into play.

Revenue cancels out.
More flights and baggage means less cost of Flyer 2

So you have left the value of upgrades and FF miles on UA expense.

Please explain to me how 18k revenue is worth more than another 18k by flying more segments (rhetorical, please don’t chase this fools errand).

UA is using consumer behavior (game theory) element too this new system.

Im not going to spend hours ba k calculating how they got to their choice. On the balance sheet 18k revenue = 18k revenue.

Human behavior is non linear and I’m surmising that UA didn’t account for it....

ContinentalFan

Revenue appears on the income statement not on the balance sheet.

You’ll find it almost impossible to figure out definitively why United selected the choices it made. None of us has the background information.