I'm a Plat and haven't received the email yet.

Didn't receive the email either but don't think it matters as it is listed under Program Offers on the Dividend Miles Specials page.

The above looks like only three points to me. PHX-PVR (1 Hop Mexico) PVR-CLT (1 Jump for new route?) and CLT-PHX (1 hop West) Does PVR-CLT also count as a 1 hop east coast?

I found a midweek in late August LAS-PHX-CLT-SJU-CLT-LAS for around $375. This would net 3 hops. If I can work in a day in CLT on the way back to do a CLT-MLB or CLT-BTR, that would net me 1 jump putting me at 4.

I'm plat, and I got the message last night. But I think the emails are very hit and miss - I know several times I've gotten the email several days after friends did and sometimes not at all.

If anyone out of PHX finds a good 4 point route, please post! I've been scheming, but so far haven't found anything resonably priced. :-(

Okay so is the DOO in Plattsburgh, Melbourne or Baton Rouge?

PVR-CLT would count as a east and a new route (1 jump and 1 hop). A single segment can count for a jump and a hop (or a hop and a skip if doing a shuttle route).

I have not received the email, but a non-preferred friend did. Perhaps the answer truly is as I feared. Pretty crappy.

I'm trying to ascertain whether they purposely did not email this promotion to CP's since CP's appear to get the shaft.

If a CP received an email, maybe there is some hope for us.

Awesome. Sounds like we are all going to have to get creative soon with our upcoming flight plans.

Help! Acronyms!
 

So you all use a whole lot of acronyms! Some I can figure out, others I can't - and I've searched the site and can't find a list anywhere. The Glossary is minimally helpful.

What is DOO? (and from a different thread TIB?)

Thanks a bunch for helping out this newbie!! :)

Here's one I'm playing around with:

PHX-JFK (overnight)
LGA-DCA-CLT-MLB

This is $317 ai for several dates in August. This gets 4 points. (West, east, shuttle, new route.)

But it requires an overnight and transportation between JFK and LGA. And it requires you to get home from MLB. You can do that for about $160 on Delta. Or, rent a car to drive 1 hour to MCO to use miles on a pretty easy route -- MCO to PHX. I'm sure there are less cumbersome ways to do it, but the key to the itinerary is the $99 leg from LGA to MLB, which also includes the shuttle portion.

would this work??

CLT-MLB (2 points)

MLB-IAH (1 point)

IAH-YOW via CLT (1 point)

= 4?

3 seperate trips

all in 2 days

I haven't gotten the email either (my wife, who's a Silver, did) but I've already re-qualified for next year so this promo is beyond useless to me (other than providing fun times watching everyone trying to figure it out :) ).

Until we start getting reports back the promo seems pretty complicated, but it looks right to me. East and New Route on the first. West on the second. New route on the third.

Is this promo valid for everyone or must you receive the email to be eligible?

A FlyerTalk Do is a gathering/meeting of flyers usually crazy about Miles and Points, meeting over a weekend somewhere (to get or use up Miles and Points). Look in the Community section under CommunityBuzz for the various announced Do(s). It's a good way to see a new place, and meet like-minded folks over drinks and dinner.

TIB = Track It Back, the luggage/electronics ID company and a non-airline partner of US. Late last year, they offered 40 Miles for every $1 spent with them, and if you played your cards right, US then added a 250% bonus - few, if any, promos have been better :)

What dates? So far I haven't found one that doesn't nail me with the ~$350 sector just for BOS-DCA at the end. Or are you doing an overnight?

I got lucky...booked a trip to MSP yesterday morning before knowledge of the promo, but it should count because it was done on 7/7. I have to travel to Boston in Aug, so I just booked that via LGA instead of taking the direct flight. So now I will have 3, looks like either a quick trip to MLB or BTR for me and I'll be CP for next year.

I'll be happy because I know I will be CP, but it will be short lived. As a segment flier, I would never achieve it the "real" way. I was just barely going to keep Plat this year. I think the existing CP's kind of get shafted. I would imagine that they would be the ones to get 4 pretty easy...so maybe that will at least maintain their status for next year if they hit that mark.

I would hope it included CPs, because if it doesn't and the only way I can be a repeat CP is 100K bis miles, and everybody else can do it by flying a few flights (albeit oddly constructed ones....!), I really will be p#*&ed off! They can replace all the former really mad CPs who status match with anyone else but US, with the newly minted ones!

And no, I have not received an email, and have no clue what it would take to retain status, beyond the normal way.

So does anyone know for sure if it's based on your current status or your expected status for 2011?

I'm gold now but will be silver for 2011 - it's worth it if I could make myself platinum with only 4 things checked off...

Plenty of dates with same day return, but are M,T,W, Thr. Pulled up as one flight via Matrix ITA so might need to book via expedia because of the short connection time in BTR.

You have to get creative - I can only get the BTR-CLT-BOS-DCA leg to show up on kayak as a 1 way. Might call US?

Edit:

You can use the multi-destination tool on expedia to build the proper itinerary.

Current Chairman's Preferred Members NOT ELIGIBLE for HSJ Promotion
 

Ok, so I just got off a lengthy phone call with the Dividend Miles folks on the Chairman's Desk. The initial representative had not yet read the promo, so I was transfered to someone else. This person said first that I would need 4 promotion qualifying segments to re-up up CP status for 2011 program year^. I was then put on hold and she came back to tell me I needed 16 segments:td:, then the story changed back to 4^.

Finally, I was transferred to Dividend Miles supervisor MARK who told me definitively: Current Chairman's Preferred members are EXCLUDED from this promotion:mad:. I told him that I appreciated the fact that he didn't create this promotion, but this was extremely unfair to current CP members in that the CP level will become diluted in the 2011 program year by MANY Platinum members who will take advantage of this promo and would otherwise not qualify for CP.

He said that he purpose of the promo is to introduce lower tier members to new routes, not allow CP's to re-up with four segments. :eek: He then said he understood the concern and there has been talk about this already. He said that there will be some sort of promotion or offer targeted at current CP members coming soon. :rolleyes: I'm not sure whether to believe this or not, but that's the information I got.

I think ALL CP members need to make our voices heard that the current situation is NOT acceptable by emailing the Chairman's Preferred Service Center. If you need the CP service center email, please PM me.

El Jefe:mad:

Thanks for donating your time to the cause and taking one for the team. I knew it would be a painful phone call, rife with misinformation. Glad you eventually got to a reliable source.

Confirmed: Nothing for Chairman's members (at least for now)
 

I received an email response from a supervisor at Dividend Miles, explaining that the current promotion does not include any provision for current Chairman's Preferred members.

The supervisor clearly understood the problem with this approach and said that they are working on management to fix it.

I'm with you! Moving people up a notch on the totem pole of upgrades while smacking people who were already on top down isn't just unfair it's cruel! I've been loyal US Customer for 2 years since switching from Delta. I'm CP currently on US Airways. I just emailed CP desk and told them what I think of this promo. Time to start shopping around I guess. Right now I'm on track to hit GOLD, maybe Platinum for 2011 with real airline miles.

I had 4 trips booked before DEQM promo so I got rubbed on that one. They really have screwed this promo up and I'm afraid that next 18 months chances of upgrade at GOLD and PLATINUM will be ZERO!

Sad Sad day for a US Airways Fan!

Just got done talking with a chairman rep (somehow got connected to her even though I'm gold).

Status bumps are based on your current status with US Airways and it does not matter what your current flying amount is. For instance I can be platinum for 2011 with 4 checkmarks even though I'll only have enough flying to qualify for silver next year....

It's pretty difficult to get more then 4 without spending some serious money so I doubt many, if any people at all, will go from nothing to chairman's.

Not a surprise - that's what the FAQs say.

Will all you CPs out there be mad if the rest of us keep scheming the best ways to take advantage of our good fortune? ... FWIW, I think they've put you in a totally unfair situation, and I really hope they decide to grandfather your CP status for 2011 or something equally easy for you! :-)

So for the rest of us: I think this gets 4 points from PHX with minimal pain AND a couple of days at a beach!

PHX - MBJ - 1 Jump (new route), 1 Hop (Carribbean) = 2 points
a night or two (or however many you want) in Jamaica
MBJ-CLT-PHX - 2 Hops (US East and US West) = 2 points

Through US Airways vacations, this is pricing around $600+ (incl taxes and fees) with 2 nights at an all-inclusive (price changes depending on hotel chosen) for one person at various times in August (Flight only on USAir website is around $550 ai, but doesn't seem to be possible in one day). Probably not the cheapest way to get 4 points with one trip, but probably costs about the same amount as getting 4 points in mulitiple trips. ...

This ideas assumes, of course, that the points count if you book through a travel agent rather than the US website. I don't see anything that disallows that, but I may have missed it.

Thanks for confirming this. I had a PM with another PLT and he confirmed with the PLT line if we get four hops, we'll requalify for CP even if I only have enough points for GP. I do agree most can only move up one level without some super super creative work or spending some cash...

I do hope they do something for the current CP's since they do deserve some recognition for their BIS miles and not the current slap in the face.

I'm a CP who's probably going to barely make Gold this year.
My wife is currently Gold who may not make Silver this year.

She has a flight to Denver this month, which should count as 2 hits. East/West.

I was thinking of driving her to LGA. Having her fly one-way LGA-BOS-PBG for 2 more hits for $200. I would drive from LGA and meet her in Plattsburgh and drive her home the next day.

This would make her platinum for next year. She doesn't seem to want to do it. I don't understand some people:p

It's a crazy promotion where I will fly 30,000 more miles than her, but she will have higher status.

Yep. There's no incentive at all for me to do this-- I'm a CP from last year (and years before) and currently have enough travel booked to make CP again this year. My boyfriend was Gold last year and has enough travel booked to hit CP this year without hopping through any hoops. Disappointing promo for the top-tier elites. I hope we don't end up with thousands of paper CP's. That will be a lot worse than the paper Silvers everyone's frustrated by.

You could save the 12 hrs of driving to PBG and the overnight by just sending her to MLB. Cheapest would probably be PHL-MCO, car rental MCO-MLB (1hr), and return MLB-CLT-DCA-LGA. Pick her up in LGA and back to PHL.

For $212 air and $40 car you would be done and have a few thousand extra miles as well.

CP's ARE included
 

Just got a call back from the Chairman's Desk and the voicemail he left tells me that "if you earn 4 credits in any combination you will earn Chariman's status for the next benefit year ending in Feb 2012"

Edit: I had called earlier and the rep was researching this with the Dividend Miles Customer Service Desk and the marketing department.

Okay, so I'm Plat right now, with 24K EQM so far in 2010. I will earn up to about 60K in travel this year, mostly in November/December. That said:

Seriously? If I do 4 H/S/J under this I'll get bumped to Chairman's?? That just seems wrong somehow...

Hard to believe, but that's the promo. What US misses is that now all Plats and CP's are given a simple way to qualify for CP next year and have the remaining 5 months of 2010 to focus on other programs.

I may be there next week - possibly my last trip to BOS, so I'll probably include a shuttle and a PBG stop. But it will have to be a fast DO - I think there's only 30 minutes until the return leg ;)

Note that the FAQ has been updated to reflect this change.

Were you able to actually book this ? I have been trying different combinations and even though I know it's the same AC it won't let me book a departure from that airport without at least an hour after scheduled arrival. Is there a trick I don't know of ?

And the luxury of treating your wife like a piece of lost luggage ;-)

Book as 1-ways or on a different site (expedia, travelocity etc)

Not a bad idea.

But now that CP's are allowed into the action, I got to figure out a new way for the both of us to pick up the extra 2 hop/skip/jumps that avoids LGA.

I actually don't mind DCA.