It’s not unusual to see airlines give loyalty program members the opportunity to buy up to the next elite tier if they don’t quite qualify naturally. Along those lines, the Delta SkyMiles program has just launched such a promotion, with an interesting twist (thanks to Joe for flagging this).
Continue reading: Delta’s Costly Sustainable Aviation Fuel Elite Status Buy Up Promo
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Poor Ben is trying so hard to convince everyone that Delta is so badly run and yet it made $1 billion more in profits year to date than even its next closest competitor.
In the supermarket of ideas, this is yet another option. Too bad Ben won’t be able to tell us how much Delta sold of this offer
Oh, and others will copy. When you are out front, others try their best to copy your strategies
@ Tim Dunn -- Why are you up so late, or which Boeing 767-300ER destination are you vacationing in?
@Ben maybe you could also cover M&M promos (I don't mention this to bolster LH as they are terrible, but as I'm based in HAM and ZRH there are no alternatives for me):
1. There is an autumn special providing up to 50% extra status points for business class flights until end of year (awesome to achieve status, sadly I already booked all flights needed before they released it)
2. Probably this was available the whole year but now Miles & More started advertising it: By buying climate offset after a flight (possible backwards for all revenue flights of the year) you can buy points roughly for 1.14€ per point. Meaning to achieve Senator you would have to (theoretical) pay 2280€ as you can only buy a certain number of points per flight, so you would already have points from those.
I don't see Ben trying to convince me DL is poorly run. The business of DL is run exceptionally well and they have been incredibly creative on diversifying their revenue stream and managing costs. (read as turning their mx operation into a profit center and using Amex points from fuel purchases to pay oversold flight volunteers). I'm not a fan of the Delta ego.
I read this as this buy-up is an awful deal, but to each their own. It may be worth it if someone is within a few MQDs of the next status level, but not worth it for those further away.
…. and now Ben, how about some aviation new of the future?….
Tim - once in a while you would improve your credibility by simply saying "yup, that's pretty dumb" instead of being an unceasing Delta butt-boy
What an awful idea. Don’t chase, and especially don’t ‘pay’ for status. Let it happen. And if it doesn’t, fly more next year. Sheesh. Oh, and attempting to ‘green-wash’ this money-grab is extra-shameless. Yuck.
Feel free to post a count of the number of stories Ben has run over the past week by airline and it will be clear it is not me that is fixated with Delta. Surely there are a few stories about Indigo or Gol out there
And Ben’s posting schedule clearly says he is not at home. It is a big world.
I am nowhere near a city Delta will ever serve no matter how much Ben thinks otherwise
What a bizarre flex. Nobody suggested Delta is run badly. The point made was that this isn’t a great deal, so let the buyer beware.
The amount of envy that this guys shows towards Ben screams desperation. It feels so good to be a mentally healthy person who wakes up every morning and accesses OMAAT to read interesting stuff and also appreciates and admires the incredible work that Ben has done over the years instead of showing the whole world how jealous you are because you’ll never be able to achieve anything remotely close to what Ben has.
If Morgan Stanley is a very profitable brokerage firm, I might want to own shares of it but does that profitability suggest that I should use it as my brokerage firm?
It’s not a bizarre flex. It’s just the way the minds of mentally sick people work. This is Psychology 101. Even thought they are triggered by different “things”, the way it happens is the same:
A person goes out in public with tight clothes.
S*x offenders: “wow, they’re throwing a bone for me.”
A kid walks home all alone after school.
Pedos: “wow, they’re throwing a bone for me.”
Ben writes about Delta.
Tim Dunn: “wow, they’re throwing a bone for me.”
In reality, no one is throwing any bones for anybody. These sick people see the bones at the same time that mentally healthy people only see people comfortable with themselves, a kid just trying to get home and Ben writing about DL in the same way that he writes about all the airlines out there.
It's just so cringe and nauseating that Delta is trying to link itself to righteous values and causes (while this the company that donated millions to the Trump inauguration fund, actively prevents its FAs from unionizing and talked smack about Pete Buttigieg when he proposed consumer protections). The processing fee!! What nerve! It's the same with Delta associating itself with the Breast Cancer Research Foundation. The employees wearing pink - they actually have to buy those special edition uniforms themselves and that money counts as a donation to the cause (after whatever "cost" and processing fee Delta extracts from it?) Hey Delta, how about you do a 1:1 match at the very least?!
Alright I will “feel free” just glancing at headlines for the this week…
Delta: 6
American: 5
JetBlue: 5
United: 3
Alaska: 2
Last week:
Delta: 3
American: 6
JetBlue: 0
United: 3
Alaska: 0
One more article than the next airline on any given week does not a fixation make. This a simple matter of how much an airline has done over the course of the week that’s newsworthy. When AS changed to Atmos it was 10-15 articles a week for a few weeks. After all this is a travel & miles blog…
Flawed logic as usual.
once again, I am capable of generating more responses to what I write than anyone on this site.
Clearly it is not me that is triggered when other people are the ones that are drawn to what I write
if YOU PEOPLE had any kind of mental health, you would allow me to say what I want and ignore me - but you can't
I prove it over and over and over again - and you say that I am the one with mental health issues.
Not sure if you flagged it as well, but AC was doing a similar promo where you could buy 500 SQM for ~169 CAD (plus local sales tax) for a contribution to their SAF program. It seems a little more attractive, but looking at reasonable (non crazy mileage run) comps you could fly YYZ to YYC RT in flex consistently for around 500-700 CAD which would earn 1669 * 2 = 3338 SQM, so poor value. Only use case I can see is if you are a few hundred SQM short of the next tier and you don't want to or your schedule doesn't permit you to go anywhere on year end, it's a useful top up for a few hundred bucks. I was actually in that situation but ended up just booking a previously planned trip so that I would earn enough SQM
And once again, someone posts the data you request and you ignore it, at least your nonsense is consistent.
Rule of thumb: when you see 'Green xxxx' or 'Sustainable xxxx' just ignore it. It's a scam dressed up as environmentalism.
Another rule of thumb: when you see @1990, you can safely ignore that too.
Please, please for everyone’s sanity Dim Tunn, just let ONE story about DL go without any comments from your biased view of DL can do no wrong.
We get it okay, DL FA’s pour water from a bottle of Dasani and when it hits the glass it magically becomes a 1951 Penfolds Grange Hermitage and rose petals fall from the overhead vents.
Save your poor fingers from typing with purpose to be the sole defender of DL’s honor.
“ once again, I am capable of generating more responses to what I write than anyone on this site.”
Wow ! I wonder where OMAAT would be today without this extraordinary ability of yours !
nobody is defending DL's honor.
the point is that, as was confirmed above, DL gets a disproportionate share of attention in Ben's articles.
This promo isn't that big of a deal; others have done it and will do it.
It matters to those who care about environmentalism and want a short edge to a higher elite status.
It probably is not the best bargain but it has and will have zero impact on DL's ability to remain as the most profitable airline in the Americas - even with the highest labor costs among global carriers - and will be the highest revenue airline in the world.
and the response that I am at a 763ER shows Ben's fixation with me which isn't much different from the rest of you that have replied.
@Tim Dunn
“Act Your Wage,” “No Need To Be Extra”
“You do not get paid to argue. Just stop. There’s absolutely no need to be extra. This is not within your job scope. Act your wage. You’re a nobody, not a Delta Spokesperson.”
“ the point is that, as was confirmed above, DL gets a disproportionate share of attention in Ben's articles.”
Once again, this guy just ignores the data that clearly proves that (surprise surprise) his theories exist only in his sick mind.
As another user and the union said, act your wage little Timmy. You’re not paid to do this. Not anymore, as you were fired.
You'd have to fly Delta enough for it to possibly be worth it and then that depends which tier. Silver to Gold I could see a benefit but not many others.
Worth mention is this is optional. You don’t have to buy status, you can just fly. So I get why it’s more expensive than qualifying the right way. Other airlines just sell status, nice to see delta putting the funds to good use. You don’t like it, don’t buy up, it’s not that deep.