David J. Danto
Travel thoughts in my
own, personal opinion
eMail: ddanto@IMCCA.org Follow Industry News: @NJDavidD on 
Lifetime– March 2025
There are certain things in life that truly last a lifetime. When you have children, they are yours
forever – no matter what you do. (Trust
me, I’ve looked into it.) If you have a
medical condition that requires medication, you’ll likely be taking that
medication for the rest of your life to maintain balance. These are things where lifetime actually
means what it should: for as long as you’re alive.
But in the travel industry, where doublespeak and
outright lies are standard practice, lifetime means almost nothing. Airlines make you jump through years of
hoops, spending thousands – if not hundreds of thousands – of dollars to
achieve what they call lifetime status. Yet,
once you reach it, they don’t hesitate to change what that status actually
means. The promises they made while you
were chasing it? Completely malleable. The
moment it no longer serves their bottom line, they rewrite the rules. The airlines make Lucy holding the football
for Charlie Brown seem trustworthy in comparison.
Take United Airlines, for example. Their lifetime Million Miler status once
guaranteed that you’d always hold a status one tier below their highest elite
level. Then, under the particularly
ruthless Smisek management era, they decided to downgrade Million Milers to a
much lower tier. A brave passenger took
them to court over it. The court found
that United’s lifetime benefits were misleading and deceptive – but also ruled
that their terms and conditions allowed them to make whatever changes they
wanted. In other words, the court
recognized that United had lied, but essentially ruled that they were within
their rights to be dishonest.
And now, United has struck again. Their latest tweak to the Million Miler
program concerns the companion benefit.
Previously, you could gift your lifetime status to a
companion – like a spouse – for life. The
latest change, as best as I can decipher through the airline doublespeak, means
that while your Million Miler status still lets you gift Gold elite status to a
companion, if you achieve a higher status through your flying activity, your
companion remains stuck at Gold. They’ll
no longer get the same status alongside you.
For me, this change is irrelevant, because United lost
my loyalty the moment they first devalued their Million Miler program. I’ll never be more than Gold Elite again
because I no longer chase status with disingenuous companies that reserve the
right to lie. But it’s yet another
example of how United’s management has no concept of what lifetime should mean. Any company with a shred of integrity would
apply changes to future members while grandfathering in those who’ve spent
their lives working toward a status that was promised to them.
United, like the entire airline industry, has no honor. They constantly move the goalposts, betraying
the very customers who helped build their business in the first place.
So, as for my lifetime status? For the rest of my
life, I will buy tickets based purely on cost and convenience. Loyalty in the airline industry has been dead
for years. And for anyone born in this
millennium, it’s safe to say that United – and the rest of the airline industry
– has been dishonest for their lifetime.
This article was written by David Danto and contains solely his own, personal
opinions.
All image and links provided above as reference under
prevailing fair use statutes.
Copyright 2025 David Danto
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As always, feel free to write and comment, question or
disagree. Hearing from the traveling community is always
a highlight for me. Thanks!