Delta Rolls Back Some SkyMiles & Sky Club Changes

When I left the new lounge at JFK last week there was a line of like 20 people. I will say the lounge was a huge improvement to the last one I went to a few years ago in JFK.

The headline as read by Tim Dunn.

"Tim Dunn Rolls Back Some SkyMiles & Sky Club Changes"

It's definitely a bonus to have one of the premium cards to get a $2500 MQD head start toward status, which eliminates a portion of the increase. The rate of inflation is approximately 20.4% since 2019 so obviously the price of status will go up too. The $20,000 you spent to earn Diamond in 2019 would equal just over $24,000 today.

LOL you are cold Lucky using that cheeseburger photo for this post!

Delta is still being an jerk.
When you still secretly devalue what you're trying to undo.
How shameless to sneak in another negative change under all the positive.

What bloggers didn't really catch on.
Delta backtracked on earning MQD on car rentals and hotels too. Now only vacations count.

So on the 100,000 rollover offer..
If I have 100,000 MQM in my account today - would they consider all of it as rollover or this time they will deduct 75,000 for next year Plat leaving me with 25k to roll over?

Hey Lucky can you do a "Cheeseburgers of domestic flights" post? Just with all the cheeseburger pics from domestic US flights. They all look horrible

But Delta is the most profitable and the bestest airline ever. And it will overhaul UA’s and AA’s engines. And it has its own refinery. Did I mention it is the bestest ever?

sorry, missing this: where does it say having a (reserve?) card gets $2500 toward status?

Meh, don't be tempted by these modifications just for them to be raised next year. It's over for Delta's loyalty program. Choose another airline.

Lucky, looks like you may have missed another good change for MMs:

More Recognition and Rewards for Long-Term Loyalty:

We want our long-term loyalists to know how much you’re truly appreciated. Effective February 1, 2024, we are significantly upgrading annual Complimentary Status achievement levels for all Million Milers.

6M+ from Diamond Medallion to Delta 360°™
5M from Platinum Medallion to Delta 360°™
4M from Platinum Medallion to Diamond Medallion
3M from Gold Medallion to Diamond Medallion
2M from Gold Medallion to Platinum Medallion
1M from Silver Medallion to Gold Medallion

Lifetime Sky Team (not Delta 🙂 lounge access for 1MM!

You can put lipstick on a pig and call it Delta, but it's still a pig.

I don’t see why anyone would consider Delta a premium Airline?
They ditched their Intl First Class many years ago, dont have Premium Intl lounges (like Polaris or Admirals club) Their Alliance partners are not very premium (sans maybe Air France) what am i missing here?? 🙂

Too little too late. All of it will come back to bite them when current demands are not as resilient as the legacy carriers expect; they're not immune to the challenges the LCCs face, it's just delayed.
Loyalty encourages irrational behaviour (one could argue that's the entire point), and Delta is killing that right here.

Another thing bloggers didn't catch on.

Delta is really sucking up Amex real hard.
You can now BUY Silver Medallion for $800. (possibly Gold for $1,600)
That is HOW CHEAP they value their members.

Yeah this is correct. They're coasting on a reputation that they once had which, tbh, it was more for reliability than premium offerings, and they don't have either anymore - at least not in a way that materially distinguishes them from competitors. The well of consumer goodwill is very nearly dry at this point.

being a premium company is what people pay for your product or service.
You need only look at Delta's revenue compared to AA and UA to see that DL is very much a premium airline.
If you don't like that they are premium, convince the passengers that are paying more to fly Delta than on other airlines.

This comment is reserved for Tim Dunn to address.

PSA: Expect to punch "Q3" and "earnings call" on your Tim Dunn bingo card.

You forgot "DOT" stats to support it.

I bet Tim Dunn is waiting hours for OMAAT to post about this.
After visiting other sites, now it's OMAAT's turn.
We're all waiting for THE person who lives rent free in our heads.

Provided you met MQD for Platinum and/or have Amex waiver they'll deduct 75k for Platinum leaving you 25K MQM.

If I'm evaluating flight options - say Frontier, Allegiant, and United. The cheapest is Frontier but I choose United because I don't want 28" pitch and a one dimensional seat. Am I paying a premium for a full service carrier? yes. Does that make the carrier "premium"? No.

Delta is the best of the US3 but it's not exactly a high bar.

I did the JetBlue status match… I already have low level American status…

But I’ll probably end up flying mostly Delta next year, again. The schedule and product works best for me. And I can always fold in AA and JetBlue when I need. I think I can reach Diamond pretty solidly for 2025 with these new changes. Diamond on Delta is very good.

On Delta's site.

"More Accessible Medallion Status Requirements
To make the requirements for achieving 2025 Medallion Status more accessible, Delta has reduced the number of Medallion Qualification Dollars (MQDs) for each tier:

Diamond Medallion Status: $28,000 MQDs (down from $35,000)
Platinum Medallion Status: $15,000 MQDs (down from $18,000)
Gold Medallion Status: $10,000 MQDs (down from $12,000)
Silver Medallion Status: $5,000 MQDs (down from $6,000)
Members with the Delta SkyMiles Reserve, Reserve Business, Delta SkyMiles Platinum and Platinum Business American Express Cards will also receive an MQD Headstart of $2,500 MQDs for the current Medallion Qualification Year."

"Beginning February 2024, Delta SkyMiles® Platinum, Platinum Business, Reserve and Reserve Business American Express Card Members will receive an MQD Headstart of $2,500 MQDs per Card for the current Medallion Qualification Year."

They are not by any objective measurement a premium airline. They may have "sucked less" previously than other US carriers but DL has lowered the quality of their on board product of late and frankly I don't find it any better than AA or UA domestically at this point. Add to that their alliance is hot garbage with the exception of AF, and while their lounges may be better than AA/UA membership lounges (assuming you can get in) Flagship and Polaris lounges are far superior. Domestically DL F is really no better than AA or UA these days and for international flights DL is bottom of the barrel. If you get an A350 D1 suite I'd say that's on par with AA J from a seat perspective, but DL also has some really crap "D1" aircraft that are nowhere near as good as AA. Also when flying intl OW gets you F lounges (and there are many solid ones out there) where DL gets you crap SkyTeam lounges plus both OW and *A have real premium airlines you can redeem miles on, including some of the best F products in the world.

Add to that the SkyPeso being rather worthless for redemptions and that you can 100% guarantee that the "rollbacks" here will be rolled forward for 2026, they were quite clear that they didn't think the changes were wrong just too quick.

Not close to premium enough to avoid having to walk back changes that would have made status earning (and 'free' premium perks) much harder.

They effectively tried to push through a big price increase on a premium perk coupon book and were forced to reduce the ask. Not the hallmark of a true premium brand.

Regardless of where you think Delta wants to go...they can only go where maintaining a high level of spend on Delta Amex cards will take them. No doubt the proposed changes endangered the spend levels and they had to reverse that.

I don't think they will get back to their original level of proposed MQD requirements unless they are offered with incentives for credit card spend.

Without AMEX Delta isn't profitable.

I guess 10 sky club access per year for Amex Platinum is pretty reasonable given that you can visit many sky clubs within 24hrs and it still counted as one visit.

Tim, DLs revenue advantage has a lot to do with its market power in core hubs, which is almost independent of whether or not it offers a substantially differentiable product quality wise. Address this.

Maybe it’s a Pelta? Or a Dig?

What about access to Sky Clubs on a Basic Economy ticket? Did they backtrack on that?

And yet DL somehow earns less revenue in their premium cabins than other legacies but still leads in CASM despite possessing a more fuel efficient fleet. DL doesn’t even have have the highest revenue in their transportation sector which is why they’re so desperate to grow non-transportation revenue to compensate.

I hadn't seen these Choice Benefit changes officially. I didn't get an email on it. Did they make any changes to Global/Regional Upgrades? Ben says these are "new" benefits. What about the "old" ones?

Did You even READ the post? He clearly states up front that he will cover this in a SEPARATE POST.

Lucky's new name has to be: Ben "Ice Cold" Schlappig after using that nasty cheeseburger pic for the blog photo! LOL! I can't stop laughing! Tim Dunn is rolling around on his Cult of Delta alter as we speak!

Emotional damage burger makes an appearance.

Upvoting suggestion!

I am not surprised by this revision.

It's an age old trick. Take a whole lot away and than give a little bit back. People will fall in line. And based on most of the responses looks like that trick worked for Delta. I wonder why people are so gullible.

So by your logic McDonald's is the most premium restaurant in the world. Lol, try again pal

I live near Sydney for work, so every time I go home to the US East Coast to see family, I hit the Skyclub in LAX plus at least one more in ATL or elsewhere. The "10 days per year" for me makes a HUGE difference vs "6 skyclub entries per year". I'll take it!

You can fool some of the people, all of the time, you can fool all of the people sone of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.

You cannot be a premium airline and have poor value.

Next time post a photo of a Delta Lounge with a long line outside and no empty seats inside. That’s what you’re getting when you pay $6000 for a D1 ticket. That’s the real Delta “Premium” experience.

@Tim Dunn, can you answer my question I asked you in another thread when these changes were being rolled out? You had said that UA and AA now see how far Delta is willing to go, and will eventually catch up with them, implying that DL are the leaders, and UA/AA are the followers.

These rollbacks notwithstanding, what exactly has Delta innovated here that UA didn't (unfortunately) in 2019, or that WN/B6 did before that, by awarding status based on dollars spent, rather than miles flown? (I suppose restricting lounge access to a fixed number of visits for all but high rollers is new, but that's a uniquely DL problem, because of all the Amex Platinum cardholders.)

Essentially it looks like their program mirrors AAdvantage. Won't do much now to address the crowds at their SCs.

That's exactly it. They are the least bad. Delta is still way closer in experience to Spirit than it is to an Asian or Middle Eastern airline. Looking at prices for spirit flights, even piece mealing it, you can get a big front seat and all the luggage for about the price of a Delta economy seat. What exactly do I get that's premium? I just flew Delta first with my wife and got a meal box on a 3 hour flight.

Being a free agent feels good. Just booked round trip tickets to Michigan for Christmas on Alaska for myself and the wife. Before these changes, I would have never considered not flying Delta. I've already flown United several times on business. I used to take some pretty inconvenient flights and connections to keep it Delta. They set me free.

Over the last 8 years, I definitely had some irrational behavior to keep it Delta. I paid more on my own trips, and took weird connections or flight times on business. No more. I'm actually happy with these updates because they set me free.

To those that say the clubs and premium cabins were too full, the answer to having too many loyal customers isn't to kick them genitals. It's to expand the clubs (which they're doing) and expand the premium cabins (which they're not). It would be funny once their current Sky club expansion is finished, if they end up down that they become unnecessary.

Explain how you can buy silver for $800? It would be $50,000 on the reserve card.

I’m an American Express Reserve card holder. We just returned from a vacation. We both flew first class to Canada and back. I was very surprised that I had to use a guest voucher for my husband at the Sky Club. He has the American Express platinum card in my name.
Since when does a spouse have to be considered a guest? We’ve never had this happen before.. This is ridiculous. Spouses traveling together should not have to use a voucher or pay for the lounge when you have a premium American Express Reserve card.

As a Diamond and a United 1K, my main issue is that Delta doesn’t have as many 1st class and extra legroom seats as United.

For my last minute business travel I have found that I basically will book whichever airline has premium seats available. That’s usually United because Delta makes it so easy to buy paid upgrades in advance.

Status isn’t worth it when there are no seats to sit in.

Delta new Choice Benefits. LOL

@Tim, Delta has more hub captives than any of the US3 and can charge those passengers more than others.

If DL received higher fares than other airlines because of the product, they wouldn’t have closed all those stations in Asia while also having difficulty building a presence in stations like MIA and AUS.

I still think going for Platinum has value. Diamond - no way.

Between the companion certs for my Platinum and Reserve card and the 4 regional upgrade certs, I'm still able to justify putting the minimum spend on my Reserve card to get to Platinum. These changes makes it much easier to get there

There’s nothing premium about Delta other than their prices. Their service, products and network don’t justify it. Delta really needs to compete hard to re-earn our business. They do need a new leadership that’s customer centric (and yes less focused on dividends). Once you build a solid brand, and regain confidence, the dividends will come naturally.

By introducing these changes, delta has their work cut for them… their pricing department is going to be surprised.

Oh… and the new choice “benefits” are laughable.

So if I have the delta sky miles Amex platinum card, am I allowed access to the lounges at all?

I agree, I pay cash for my travel, which is not nearly as frequent as before. It is liberating in the sense that I will not be elite with anyone ! I always fly Delta when it makes sense, schedule wise, because it is a consistently premium product.
I also have Amex Platinum Skymiles, which provides me my lounge access when I wish to use it. I am well aware I am the odd person out here..and I do agree that DL went too far... too fast.

Read the Terms and Conditions of both cards. The Reserve card itself does NOT afford guest access to immediate family or fellow travelers other than via the two one-time guest passes provided annually. The Amex Platinum Card is the same but without the one-time guest passes. Both cards allow up to two PAID guests.

Authorized users of each card have the same access as the primary card holder.

When you say that your husband has the Amex Platinum Card in your name, what does that mean? You are the primary card holder and he is an actual authorized user? If he is not an actual authorized user and is simply carrying your card with your name on it, that does not qualify.

For all the comments, none of them matter. Whether this changes or that changes and has this effect or that effect, the only things that matters to Delta are revenue and earnings. That's what ultimately drives decisions. Just look at Marriott: anti-loyalty moves and record revenues. Why would they care? I'm not saying that is the way it should be. I'm just saying that is how it is.

why am I so loyal to DL, even though I live in DFW?
Have you flown AA in the past two decades???

Curious, out of Delta's 204,000,000 emplaned passengers in 2019 (the most recent data I could put my hands on in under 15 seconds), how many do you think looked at two equally convenient flights on two different airlines, and chose to pay more for the Delta option because they perceived it to be a more premium airline? This comment is nonsense and everyone reading this blog (including Mr. Dunn) knows it.

Is it 10 visits per Platinum card or not? I mean primary member and additional members each get 10 visits? And also for the 24 hour rule what if your travel goes beyond 24 hours (if you are changing planes or flying across the world on multiple flights it could happen) would the make an exception considering it is the same flights/tickets.

I am a Canadian Delta Diamond Medallion. The new rules to qualify are terrible for Canadians. First I'd need to add 30% more in currency exchange fees to use U.S. dollars. Here's an example of why it is pointless to try for Delta Medallion status: YYZ to BKK Delta One is about $15,000.+ AND it is mostly on Korean Air! A ticket I'll book on Korean Air Prestige Class directly is about $7,000.
I used to have a Delta Branded Credit Card - Delta discontinued it.
Conclusion: Delta doesn't want Canadians flying on Delta.
Bye, bye Delta!

He is an authorized user. They still had us use 2 passes. The card has his name on it.

So, if they'd announced this a week or two ago, I'd probably have held back from switching some of my stuff over to AA. Since they dithered...

I am a retiree of this airlines. 1979 is the year I started with Republic Airlines which became Northwest and now Delta. Many perks I am grateful for. Sonetime in the 80's I purchased a lifetime WorldClub membership. In July I entered the Sky Lounge in MSP but was told non-,revs with membership no longer allowed in the Sky Club. How disappointing. Is there no help for me? I teavel about 4 times a year so.not using the Sky Club thar often. And without notice I am no longer welcome.
Mariann Dupre