andrewwm

It's true that there have been some minor improvements here and there to various programs. On the other hand, I can easily make a list of about 20-30 *A wide devaluations off the top of my head without even doing any research or racking my brain.

Many programs have no inflation because they've cut down on the supply side. Up until early 2000s, most foreign airlines offered full mileage for all fares. The balance in these programs have shifted to trying to attract premium fare traffic at the expense of economy fliers.

Sure, but then if you do a fair amount of domestic flying, then you will be earning 100% less miles on those flights. Earning 2x the miles will give you enough miles to book standard awards instead of saver, eliminating the question of availability anyway. If you fly mostly international on international carriers (and the fares you buy offer full mileage), then you probably shouldn't be in MP anyway.

Really? SWUs end up for free on Coupon Connection? I think the going rate for SWUs is around $300 cash equivalent on Coupon Connection no? So UA gives each 1K about $1800 in upgrade "value" each year, in addition to whatever CR1s are worth. I think almost everyone would prefer to be in UA biz rather than any carrier's economy. Domestically, IME, business class is roughly: CO > UA ~ AA ~ DL > NW > US, so unless CO fits into your travel patterns, you can't really do much better than UA.

I certainly concede non-flying miles are not wise to put into MP+, with the blocking and increased redemptions. AC and others would be much better.

Flying on UA on an economy ticket versus NH (with *G or higher status) from ORD to NRT would give 12K miles on United, ~8k miles on NH. Which makes the difference between the two still favor NH, but much more in line. Also, it is significantly harder to get status on NH with economy tickets in the first place to get the elite bonus.

I completely agree - the secretive way they've done it is really reprehensible. Short-sided and greedy, well, I think most corporations are. But the economic imbalances in the MP+ had to be resolved eventually. Certainly the management could have done it better (h*ll, trained monkeys could probably have done it better), but it was hardly unexpected.

Do you do any domestic flying? How do you propose to get the mileage bonus for those flights? If a 1K does 50% of flying a year domestically, that's taking a total 25% mileage hit per year by banking elsewhere, assuming you do all other international flying on the carrier that you intend to bank on (not to mention the one-off loss of foregone miles while banking in the program without status).

Nicholas

So to sum up, since some people want me to write another column, we have to deal with:

1. Hugely increased redemption levels;
2. Continuing StarNet blocking;
3. Hugely decreased UA upgrade and saver award inventory, which devalues CR-1s and SWUs.

On the third point, it's sad to look at those NC0, XC0, NF0 and XF0 buckets for weeks, then see how they suddenly become NC9, XC9, etc. the day before the flight, and in the end witness flights taking off with half-empty cabins (like my IAD-FRA flight with the new seats last week). I'm the only person in F on my ORD-SEA flight this coming Friday on a 752, and it's still showing NF0 and XF0. Is IM for real? Do they really think they will sell 23 F seats in four days? This is the case with almost all ORD-SEA flights that day, but it's not much different on many other routes.

By the way, has anyone ever booked XF to/from Hawaii? I tried to find two seats on any day in 2009 and got nothing.

anc-ord772

I would very much like to see follow up on action item 3, as IM "seems" to have gone crazy. It's flipping nutty, and I have to believe UA has a rational explanation for it.

SFflyer123

These are great points. UA can't sell these tickets. Yet they string along their best customers until 24h before the flight, having them in limbo. I think either UA needs to do two things:

1) Lower the fares of the C and F tickets so they will sell out (unlikely), or

2) Begin to recognize that these 1K and GS flyers will do almost *anything* to maintain that status on UA. Heck, they will even fly on UA to go *NOWHERE* (aka mileage run) just to maintain this status. In return for this unrelenting loyal to to UA, all these flyers ask is for a few perks: some upgrades (not necessarily all the time), some free tickets, and some early boarding. But if UA just leaves these people in limbo, not let them plan their trips accordingly and only tells them 24h in advance if they've upgraded, this loyalty will soon wane.

It is only natural that people will fly UA if there is a positive feedback. When UA strings us along with these strange NC=0's all the way until the flight, it becomes negative feedback. I think UA really needs to sit down with their management and really think about how they will survive. If this MP program was one of the most successful (and hey, who wouldn't pay for an airfare, get on a plane and fly to an airport and return the same day if they knew they could eventually get upgraded to a business class seat later?), and they destroy this by alienating their most loyal customers, then if they end up going bankrupt again, they've no one to blame but themselves.

Guava

The fact there is actual improvements when others had TONS of devaluations is in itself a quite significant development. It's like your stock made +5% when others tanked by -40%, not sure why you would want the latter... I don't know about you but I am not into SM.

Oh yes? Please list them then, I am all ears.

Uh...no, OZ gives full miles on all Y fares, so does BD (on US, UA domestic), AC, LA, MX and etc. just to name a few. Your generalization is most definitely incorrect here. And a lot of foreign FFP under the American sphere of influence such as the Japanese, Korean, Canadian, Latin American FFPs have not shifted in favor of attracting premium fares seeing Business fare = 25% bonus and First = 50% bonus in virtually all of them, just like most U.S. FFPs.

sigh...you do know that BD exists and still do, right? In fact, after 55K, you earn 225% on all UA, US domestic flying, even the most discounted of all economy fares which beat UA's 200%. Not to mention, the minimum mileage earned is 600, in lieu of UA MP, which is 500 or less. It doesn't take a scientist to figure out that 225% is > than 200%. Not to mention, 1 BD mile worths a lot more than 1 UA mile so even without the supply side advantage, I think many are happy to take 12.5K BD miles in lieu of an inflated / blocked 20K UA miles since the former is good enough for a domestic/Mexico/Carribbean First / Business class return trip award already whereas 20K UA miles can't even get you a coach ticket within the U.S. When and if BD disappears, we can revise this conversation. Until then, you are just plain wrong on all counts.


Care to quote me where I said SWU was free? I said pretty useless for me. Actually, I have been on the receiving end of FREE SWUs but that's another story. As for this:

First of all, you can't sell them. If you did, I hope you turn yourself in to the related FT authority so that they can revoke your memebership in Coupon Connection forum. Secondly, like I stated very clearly before, that's the only major opportunity cost of not crediting status miles to UA MP and one for which I am happy to bear since I, personally, had no use for SWUs. The free ones I received were used in lieu of CR1 for transon domestic.

Personally, I don't care about UA domestic F service anymore. I used to like it, now I am almost indifferent. If I had a choice, I rather prefer to fly AS except I don't earn *A miles. Like I said, my international travel are in paid First and Business - so domestic travel in coach is an acceptable trade off to me.

Your calculation is wrong. Also, your post is rather unclear and in any case, the fairer comparison is to assume a UA 1K would deliberately fly UA metal on this route whereas a NH Diamond (equivalent to UA 1K) would opt for NH metal since both airlines fly this route and do code-sharing.

Here is the actual calculation for each way, ORD-NRT:

UA 1K = 6,284 miles + 100% elite bonus = 12,568 UA miles

NH Diamond = 6,284 miles X 0.70 + 125% elite bonus (calculated based on the basic mileage*) = 12,195 NH miles

ANA is very clear in what they meant by basic mileage = actual distance between two points as published by IATA every year : https://www.ana.co.jp/amc_e/guide/ic...le_int_hd.html

So the top tier member in both airlines earn about the same amount of miles when flying cheap economy class but the spending power of NH wins, hands down.

No, I don't think you understand the ANA program very well. The status miles calculation is a little different than the conventional American style, 1 mile flown = 1 status mile. There are generous extra status miles for all flights to/from HKG and China, which is a 1.5 multiplier to the mileage flown and any COS. There is also a per sector status mile calculation of an extra 400 status mile per flight, which also applies to many *A flights where UA has no equivalent. If someone flies exactly 100K miles / year, yes, it would be easier to achieve 1K than NH Diamond most of the time, however your generalization is hardly always true since it also depends on where people fly to/from and whether they have a lot of segments or tend to be long-distance flyer. Someone who racks up lots of short flights may benefit signficantly from the NH extra 400 status miles per flight, even on UA for instance.

Short answer: BD

The BD earning/buring on UA domestic flights beat UA MP itself by miles, and miles and miles. End of story

anc-ord772

Until it becomes M&M.

Guava

#1: While frustrating, the sad reality is airlines can hike the point level anytime they want and however they want it. They are in the business for profit so I guess it's worth a mentioning but not sure what important message is there. I think there are more pressing points you can focus on and deliver a greater impact.

#2: I think that's the meat of the problem because it encompasses some serious questions of ethics and potentially, misleading marketing and dare I say legality. If UA wants to exercise *A Net blocking, they MUST come clean with their employees and customers. Since UA MP has made the ability of redeeming UA miles on partner airlines a major part of their marketing pitch, hence many customers bought into this program (i.e. sign up for UA credit card, stay hotels to earn UA miles, do UA dinning for miles, fly UA and etc.) in hope to do just that - it is unethical and misleading for UA to lie to customers about what exactly is happening.

#3: This is a tough point to hammer hard, I think. The reason being you don't have any stats / tracking on how this actually evolved over time. All you have is anecdotal evidences, which makes it difficult to create a compelling and impactful message on what exactly is happening to award availability. Your are a journalist, not a statistician so there is no need for your column to be full of numbers. But, if the criticism of lack of award space or concerns about any decrease is not backed up by at least some more concrete evidence, I think it's very easy for UA's PR to deny that's the case and they may even play the victime card.

I agree with writing another column but am unsure whether this is the right time to do it.

stevenshev

Guava raises good points.

I wouldn't touch 1). Everyone's doing it, slowly, but surely.

2), well, you're familiar with 2).

Three I would do. You can quote 1Ks and GSs who cannot confirm upgrades at all on routes that in the past would not have been an issue in similar timeframes.

Guava

Well, many in the U.S. initially believed the UK wouldn't have survived the attacks by Luftwaffe in 1940's either. But RAF held, and the rest is history.

Yesterday, I received a gift from BD mailed from England, all the way here to the U.S., to thank me for my patronage as a Gold member. The gift came with a leaflet that asked me to refer BD membership to 2 other people and then BD will give me 4,000 status miles. They said to reply by Feb. 28, 2009. Since this is way past the expected purchase date of BD, which is the end of this month, I am hopeful that this kind of action signals that BD DC will remain as is as there is a definite sense of continuity and independence. Otherwise, why bother spending money to send gifts to Gold members and ask them to refer BD membership to friends when they could save some cash in this tough time (BD, like many others, are losing money in the last quarter) and get ready to be rolled under M&M?

As a result, I just booked another full fare F ticket on ANA, NRT-IAD which I was unsure where to credit the miles to but now I am going to stick with BD and get 625% miles for the distance flown. Incidentally, the booking had a connecting Int'l sector on UA, which is TPE-NRT on UA Int'l F suite, the only *A F on that route. But instead of booking it as a UA flight 838, I booked it as NH 7083 so that the bulk of this full-fare F revenue ticket goes to NH. Don't get me wrong, I don't hate UA. The front-line UA employees have treated me well, most of the time, except some occasional bad apples. But it's what I learned in this thread and elsewhere recently that had really turned me off, especially the unethical behaviors of UA management and their lies.

So whether BD survives or not, my disdain towards UA MP is unlikely going to change anytime soon, let alone be part of it.

aagoldflyer

Its so sad right now only a day before the flight and a week before the return you can book saver C What is UA thinking you can not book a trip a week before the date

travelcomments

as for 1) fact of ff life. there are many ways to "adjust" redemption value, either on the earning or spending side. i have yet to find an airline which overall improved redemption quality over a 10 year time frame. even bd which is probably the value leader ff *a program right now.

as for 2) this is a bit more complicated than an all or nothing situation. i have often been able to get *a award flights, though recently not the more direct ones or flights which show up in the ana tool. yes, ua blocks a lot - but not all - *a award inventory. i have noticed that hitting a 150,000 eqm threshold with ua has made it easier to find inventory. one possibility is that ua may have a finely tiered blocking approach based on stats and tiers within 1k/ugs. which still does not make this right on many levels.

3) yes, but the impact is probably only minor - for ua. the question for ua is whether ua looses significant elite customers' revenue streams by opening award/upgrade inventory late. i am frankly not sure. ft member annoyance is not a good measuring stick in this regard since it is not representative. and the question is if expectations simply will re-set. personally, i have been upgraded on 11/12 of my last ua flights (one was sold out in c/f before booking). 4 cleared early, 2 within 48 hours, and 5 within 24 hours (all 12 hours before departure). a year into such an experience, i might just view this as a normal process...

stimpy

One counter-point that must be made here is that due to the new lay-flat business class seats, there is a smaller inventory on the airplanes. I am very happy that UA now has lay-flat seats. I clearly prefer these seats and a reduced inventory to the alternative.

gleff

On those planes that have new business class, sure. Put a different way, one would expect fewer unsold seats out of fewer total seats and thus fewer available as awards. Though at the other extreme you wouldn't expect zero upgrade seats reasonably in advance from an airline that advertises it offers its top elites advance confirmed upgrade instruments.

But the reduced inventory is across even narrow body aircraft flying domestic transcons. So until my 757s flying IAD-LAX get the new business class or a p.s. configuration...

And of course the new business class has nothing to do with blocking of partner award inventory.

stimpy

True Gleff, but one other point that I seem to have gleaned from a long conversation with a veteran agent is that UA has reduced ALL business class seats on UA metal award inventory. My guess is that UA's IT staff, most of whom have probably gone on to better and more secure jobs since bankruptcy, just isn't up to the task of adjusting the award inventory as airplanes get upgraded.

So perhaps you can add IT competency as a concern as well as being overly cheap with awards.

gleff

Fair enough.

But there was a real seismic shift in late July (or was it early August? I seem to recall late July) in advance upgrade inventory on domestic transcons.

It wasn't just IM reacting to new business class and not knowing how to distinguish between old and new aircraft. (And they were in fact distinguishing between the two prior to this..