You mean like United for Business? Is there a way to disassociate my MP account from that? I almost never use it for booking and it's caused me headaches in the past.

And UA has lie-flat or PE options for x-country. I think only once a day between SFO and IAD, but that’s one more than AS.

Unless AK merges w/ HA and keeps the A330s being replaced by 787s and re-deploys them on some mainland routes.

Sounds like the 1K gate lice group the GS customers complain about is getting bigger beginning February 1 :) (ouch).

Actually two at the moment....a 77W in the early morning and a 788 early afternoon, although it does switch up obviously. As much as I understand not wanting to give your business to someone you feel doesn't value you, I also can't imagine calling home with "flight was cancelled" "oh can't you get rebooked on the next as a 1K?" "nah. we're teaching United a lesson! See you tomorrow!"

I believe they were referring to larger companies that have contracts with UA for slightly discounted rates if they steer a certain amount of business to UA -- they are fairly common in large companies. When I worked a fortune 50 company we had contracts with all the majors....

Perhaps a new / different program for those in a corporate discount program

First timer on FT. 10 year GS. Consistent 50+ every year including Covid years. 61k last year all UA metal after deducting all the others. Mix of domestic mostly first and TATL and TPAC. Do mostly give away to friends and family my PP but use them occasionally for myself when they clear on booking. 2.9 MM life. Got booted. No corporate on my end as we are too small. Just me traveling for the company. When I did not get renewed early started booking on others. Very liberating. I used to jump through hoops to fly United when it was not always the best choice. Did that as I thougt it would help me maintain GS even when the alternatives made more sense. That is over. Will get to 3MM life in any event this year so will be 1k thereafter if Kirby does not screw me on that. Cannot imagine spending 60 to 70 on United to be a 1k. Inferior product and GS is not what it once was. Got stranded multiple overnights last year due to their sheer incompetence. When you get stranded overseas the line is hours long and when you skip the line they no longer want to reimburse you for your actual expenses. Years ago was not an issue but now you broke their rules if you did not stand in line for 2 hours so here is $500 travel cert and we will get you home 30 hours late after you write in. When they strand you domestically you cannot imagine the hotel they propose to put you in via their IT. Time to move to better product as it exists outside of United. Will get to 3MM but after that it has to be the only or by far best alternative as the product is inferior.

Welcome to FT! As a 12+ year GS I was shown the door as well -- but I only spent $25k this year o UA so it was expected. Have really been shocked at some of the numbers in this thread not getting GS -- but in a way I am also not -- this is the first year that things have been stable for Kirby -- and now he is back to running his typical game plan. I suffered at AA under him -- now the pain comes to UA....

And we thought Smisek was bad lol....

Smisek was a saint compared to Kirby. Kirby hates his customers.

Unfortunately this is the reality on most routes (especially if you’re in a captive hub such as DEN as mentioned upthread). I’m in SFO and there’s really nothing else I can fly domestically. Internationally I can fly JL, AF, etc. but domestically there are very few options for most cities.

What we’re talking about here is exactly proving United’s point; even if they take away GS, many of us don’t have a choice and will still fork over $50k+ annually to be a 1K. Smart on them: why give benefits when there’s no competition? (Seriously.)

Thanks for putting much more eloquently what I was trying to convey. It's one thing to threaten to take $25k in business to Alaska, but another to do it in practice when it starts costing you time and opportunities. I get there are some in the FT crowd who are big spenders AND AvGeeks (personally guilty as charged) but that's just now how the average customer will behave. Is this United's play? Maybe...or this could just be a giant mess-up on their part.

We'll never know, but I really wonder how involved Kirby and Co. are in the GS program. I don't know many CEOs that get that involved in micromanaging the details of such things. At the individual level, sure, GS are "important" but my last company did $20mil+ a year with United and that will trump 100 GS members any day. Let's be realistic: it's the large corporate clients who really drive the bottom line (and us GS are just icing on the cake.)

Exactly!
 

If that’s the case, where is the follow up email from united to the demoted telling them about this and APOLOGIZING. Their marketing department seems like amateur hour. I don’t think they understand what damage they are doing that will lose them $$$ to other airlines.

I still think it’s a glitch for a few reasons :

- Nobody seems to have been reinvited/invited on the January 12th third wave.
- The challenge offer makes no sense if thing had so dramatically changed (54K per year)
- Numbers for invited/reinvited people in December and early January are in line with regular GS invitation numbers.
- People without a corporate account are also being denied (myself included, living in NYC, flying 6x per year to a destination served by an amazing skyteam airline)
- The GS agents on the phone are flooded with calls and have no idea what is happening. They have not been prepared in any way to what is happening.

Now, will UA even communicate ? Probably not, but at some points some emails will arrive with “welcome the GS, the pinacle (LOL) of service”

You may be right but a bit of counter-programming:
- challenge offer is only out of line when considering the very high PQP non-qualifiers, who uniformly seem to be corporate discount travelers; once they’re excluded there hasn’t been any dramatic change
- I only see two people upthread (you being one of them) who are non-corporate-discount, who also had PQP that would normally qualify, but who nonetheless did not qualify; given UA's express statement about prior years, it may be that folks who got through on low PQP in 2021 and 2022 due to COVID are being judged differently from those who maintained higher PQP during those years
- I do agree that lack of Jan 12 quals/requals seems odd.
Stay tuned!

At my company, just a subset of the now former GS members represented $8 million in United spending in 2023 alone. That doesn’t touch the employees who were 1k and now know they won’t make GS regardless of how much they spend with United. My company is global but has no major employee bases in any United hub. A majority of its traveling employees can easily shift most of their travel to other airlines. Most will. Why not? The service is generally comparable on major US airlines, better on many foreign carriers, and it simply makes sense to fly on the airline that provides the best bang for your buck.
But in the larger picture, when a service industry business is willing to dump some of its most loyal and high spending customers, take note. Keep in mind that while Flyertalk generates a reasonable amount of traffic, its snapshot of high dollar flyers (at least in the United forum) is relatively small. The spreadsheet posted at the top of this thread has been posted for over a month, and has just over 120 entries, only about half of which were GS in 2023. At my company alone, one person informally collecting data in the last 48 hours received input from 110 employees who were dumped from the GS program for 2024. There are undoubtedly more. All of whom were dumped without warning or explanation and most likely received the generic email I got thanking them for their loyalty. If that’s how a service industry handles its most loyal customers, it doesn’t bode well for the rest of its customer base.
So while this issue may not directly impact a vast majority of United customers, or even Flyertalk members, or even GS members on Flyertalk, it should generate red flags for all. Business is business and service quality in the airline industry seems to run on a sine wave. Long term United customers can certainly recall some high periods and low periods in United service. If your life as a United customer is currently comfortable, stand by. It appears United is in the process of revising its business model. Maybe that means service will improve for most United customers. There could be real genius in the strategy revealed in part by their obvious shift in the GS program. Or, this could be United’s version of New Coke. Time will tell.

Yeah, it’s hard to believe they’re in the dark about a huge change that’s been suggested. If it’s a glitch, I’m sure it’ll be addressed sometime this week with the uproar.

On the other hand, maybe UA's come up with an actuarial "all in" analysis of OPM GS flyers - the benefits their using, the lost revenue opportunities due to the benefits, the change in all UA flyers' travel profiles, the likelihood of losing some GS, the likelihood of retaining them due to routes/network, etc. Perhaps the calculation says the loss of some corporate OPM business would be offset by increased revenue. Example: OPM GS is flying to work - books a cheap coach ticket for spouse and then asks them to be put in Polaris w/ PPs. Or has two no-status friends who book coach and then he/she upgrades them w/ PPs GS doesn't use. My guess is GS PPs go far more to others than themselves, and that's lost $ to UA and muffled gripes from "real" 1Ks. Change would require former GS (now 1K) to book spouse in OAR to have better chance w/ PlusPoints.