United Airlines is making major changes in its premier membership criteria.
Under its “Premier Status”, the United Airlines provides its members special perks, such as free upgrades, pre-boarding, priority service and extra checked baggage allowances.
As of now, Mileage Plus frequent flyers can qualify for premier status on the basis of amount they spend, the number of miles flown or total eligible flight segments. The Premier status qualifying criteria is going to be changed from 2020. From 2020, the criteria will be based on the number of qualifying flights purchased, which would not include basic economy tickets.
Achieving premier status will be less about the distance flown and more about the value of tickets purchased and the number of trips flown in eligible classes. Travellers will have to spend more in order to reach each Premier tier.
Presently, the Premier status calculation takes stock of Premier Qualifying Miles, Premier Qualifying Segments and Premier Qualifying Dollars. Premier Qualifying Credit will now be based upon just two factors including Premier Qualifying Points and Premier Qualifying Flights.
United has done away with complicated fare-class multipliers under the new system, which is considered to make tracking their qualification status more difficult for customers.
Each dollar spent on Economy Plus seating and preferred seat purchases will earn the purchaser one premier qualifying point while members achieve status for each Premier tier through a combination of acquired PQPs and PQFs or through a higher number of PQPs alone.
The evolution of Premier status calculations will not change the way the average United MileagePlus members accrues his or her award miles, and the way the customers qualify for Million Miler status has not changed. It is still based on the actual distances flown.
The Airlines has also eliminated its expiration policy on reward miles and has begun offering discounts for MileagePlus members to join Clear, the biometric airport security screening service.
