Dumped delta

[Al Kay]

Ive been flying Delta regularly over the past few years from Melbourne to Phoenix every few months (MEL-SYD-LAX-PHX) and managed to easily maintain Platinum and one year even got to Diamond. The best benefits were the fast track customs lines, the LAX Skyclub lounge and of course the complimentary eco comfort seats and upgrades, the extra baggage allowance didn't really mean much to me.

Now that Delta has changed how they reward loyal customers I ended up this year as Gold. They make it pretty clear that you now need to book with, and use generally, a Delta branded credit card to get anywhere.

In a couple weeks I'm doing the same trip again but this time with Virgin, I was a bit disappointed to discover (later) that even though I booked through their website I got a ticket that realises the lowest level of status points...

So whats the best deal for someone who flies to the US about 6 times a year. Both Virgin and Qantas seem to say a lot but give little, I've heard about the American Airlines/Qantas alliance and benefits there but I don't quite understand it. I have a small business so always send myself economy.

Am I missing something fundamental or is it all just becoming harder?

 

[Mattg]

I think your main problem here is the SkyMiles program. Frankly, it's rubbish and is becoming increasingly so.

Do you have a preference to fly Delta? If so, perhaps start crediting your flights to Velocity. It's a reasonably good program (better than SkyMiles, anyway!) and you'll get reciprocal benefits when flying Delta.

Otherwise, Qantas & AAdvantage are definitely worth looking into. AA is generally regarded as a pretty good program, although I would be careful to make sure I took a Qantas flight (even if it's on an AA code) on the Trans-Pacific sectors. Having done a few long-haul economy flights on AA, it's not something I would wish upon anyone. By contrast I've found Qantas a great airline, but AA does have a better frequent flyer program if you're going to be visiting the USA frequently. The main thing that stops Aussies from taking advantage of Advantage... pardon the pun is the "minimum 4 AA sectors to maintain status" rule, so obviously this isn't an issue if you're a regular visitor to the USA.

I would highly recommend you read up on AA status challenges if you want to go down that path. That will help you potentially gain elite AA status after 1 or 2 trips: http://www.australianfrequentflyer....-airlines-status-challenge-options-73194.html

 

[RooFlyer]

Yes, it is becoming harder, but there are still benefits to be had.

If you were to join QFF, and travel flexible economy MEL-SYD-LAX-PHX and return 6 times in a year, you would qualify for Platinum status. This would get you earning points pretty rapidly and you'd use the QF First lounge in Sydney (one of the top lounges anywhere IMHO) an the Qantas First lounge at LAX (also pretty good) and benefit from a greater priority for upgrade requests and earlier better seat allocation.

Qantas and American are much more closely aligned than most pairs of OneWorld member airlines, which means if you fly American, your point and SC earn will be better than, say if you flew Finnair or even Cathay. And of course there are lots of QFF earning opportunities with credit cards in Australia. With Plat status, you get the opportunity to use those points to much better effect than someone without Plat (or Plat1) status.

Finally, with AA taking over US Air, Phoenix is now an AA hub!