Delta announces elite enhancements and tougher eligibility criteria

Delta has made some changes to their elite program, both positive and negative.

Delta Elite Status Overview

Delta’s descriptions of elite benefits can be found here. Here's a summarized chart: The elite benefits I’ve personally found to be most valuable are:

• Unlimited complimentary upgrades (when available, upgrade from coach to first class on domestic flights). Higher status leads to better chance of upgrades.
• Waived same-day confirmed fees and waived same-day standby fees (switch to different flight on same day as ticketed flight). Requires Gold or higher.  Info about getting value from same day changes can be found here: Leveraging Delta’s Same Day Flight Changes.
• Complementary Preferred seat selection (choose exit row seats with lots of legroom)
• Complementary Comfort+ Seats (more leg room, free drinks, better snacks).
• Regional upgrade certificates. Puts you to the front of the line for regional upgrades. This is great to use for flights where upgrades are most important to you. For example, I use these for flights of about 3 hours or longer. This is a choice benefit for Platinum and Diamond status.  Upgrade certificates can be applied to both paid and award tickets.
• Global upgrade certificates. Use these to upgrade from coach to business class on any international flight when upgrade space is available. Delta will no longer confirm an upgrade in advance from cheap economy to Delta One business class. Instead, Delta will immediately upgrade you to Premium Economy and then put you on the upgrade list to business class 24 hours before your flight. This is a choice benefit for Diamond status only.  Upgrade certificates can be applied to both paid and award tickets.
• Free award changes and cancellations. This used to be huge, but now all awards originating in North America are free to change or cancel.  Requires Platinum or higher for free changes on awards originating outside of North America.

New Medallion Elite Requirements

Delta SkyMiles will increase the thresholds for Diamond, Platinum and Gold members in January of 2020. There are no changes to the qualifications.

Medallion Tier	Current Threshold for 2023 Status	Qualification Threshold for 2024 Status
Silver Medallion	$3,000	No Change
Gold Medallion	$6,000	$8,000
Platinum Medallion	$9,000	$12,000
Diamond Medallion	$15,000	$20,000

Beginning in 2023, for the 2024 elite year and beyond, Gold will require $8K MQDs; Platinum will require $12K MQDs; and Diamond will require $20K MQDs

• MQMs: Medallion Qualifying Miles can be roughly thought of as the actual miles flown. It’s important to understand that these are different from redeemable miles which can be used to book award flights. MQMs are only used for earning elite status.
• MQMs are earned on both paid flights with Delta or Delta partners where the flight is credited to your Delta account, and award flights booked through (and flying) Delta.
• MQSs: Medallion Qualifying Segments are the number of segments flown. Unless you fly a very large number of short flights, you are unlikely to earn elite status through MQSs.
• MQDs: Medallion Qualifying Dollars are the sum total of your base-fare spend (e.g. doesn't include taxes) on Delta-marketed flights.

In general, to reach each elite tier, Delta SkyMiles members must earn the stated number of MQMs or MQSs and spend the targeted amount of MQDs. In other words, its not enough to just fly far or often, you also need to spend a lot of money with Delta.

• Award Tickets: Flights booked with Delta SkyMiles for Delta's own flights earn MQMs, MQSs, and MQDs.  Award tickets earn MQDs at a rate of 1 MQD per 100 SkyMiles redeemed (e.g. 1 cent per SkyMile).
• Partner Flights: Paid flights booked on Delta partners earn MQMs, MQSs, and MQDs as long as the member's Delta SkyMiles number is attached to the ticket.  MQDs are calculated as a percentage of miles flown rather than the amount paid.  Details, by partner, can be found here.
• Rollovers: Most airlines require that you fully re-earn status every calendar year. Delta is mostly that way too, but with one exception: as long as you earn Silver status or higher, any MQMs not used to reach status are rolled over to the next year. For example, if you earn 70,000 MQMs and meet Gold MQD requirements, you’ll earn Gold status (at 50,000 MQMs), and 20,000 MQMs will be rolled over to the next year to give you a jump start towards re-qualifying.
• MQD Waiver: There’s an easy exception to the MQD requirement for Platinum status and below: Simply spend $25,000 or more with Delta branded credit cards and the MQD requirement goes away.  This feature requires having a Delta Platinum or Delta Reserve card, but the spend can be on other cards (such as Delta Blue or Delta Gold) or mixed across Delta cards.  Delta Platinum and Delta Reserve credit cards offer bonus MQMs for high spend, so it is possible to tackle both requirements (MQMs and MQDs) through spend without setting foot on a plane. Unfortunately, Delta requires $250,000 in credit card spend (across all Delta cards you have) to get a MQD waiver for top tier Diamond status.

New Choice Benefits

Platinum and Diamond elites have the option of choosing one Choice Benefit each year.

• Diamond and Platinum Medallion Members with the Delta SkyMiles® Reserve American Express Card, Delta SkyMiles® Platinum American Express Card, Delta SkyMiles® Reserve Business American Express Card or Delta SkyMiles® Platinum Business American Express Card can choose a statement credit for their Card: $500 for Diamond; $200 for Platinum. Terms and conditions apply and will be provided when the American Express Statement Credit becomes available.
• Diamond will receive two Gold Medallion Gift Statuses per selection (vs. one today); Platinum will receive two Silver Medallion Gift Statuses per selection (vs. one today)
• A Delta Vacations Experience (flight and hotel): $500 for Diamond; $400 for Platinum
• An MQD “head start” for the next Medallion year: $1,000 MQD boost for Diamond; $500 MQD boost for Platinum
• Delta Travel Credit Voucher value will be increased to $250
• A $250 sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) contribution to help in our collective goal toward decarbonizing aviation

There is an option to get $500 back for Diamond elites with Delta Platinum or Reserve cards.

Global upgrade certificates lost a lot of their value when Delta changed the rules on how they can be used.

Early next year, upgrade certificates will be part of the check-out process on Delta.com.

Early next year, Medallion Members with Global and Regional Upgrade Certificates will be able to request upgrades with their certificates themselves during check-out on Delta.com—a highly anticipated enhancement to upgrade certificate usability coming in 2023. Delta continues to invest in the SkyMiles Program, listening to member suggestions and evolving the experience to exceed member expectations and enable more seamless travel.

I hope that Delta will incorporate the upgrade request into the check out process.

Bottom Line

It will be more difficult to get Gold and higher elite status through flying in the years to come.

The ability to request upgrade certificates online will be huge if they do it right.

Enhancements to Choice Benefits make it possible to gift elite status to two people.