Are (some) Airline Loyalty Programs Rewarding the Wrong Behavior?
A few weeks ago, I attended a World Athletics conference where sustainability was a recurring theme, particularly for mass-participation events like marathons and half marathons.
Event organizers are doing some really thoughtful work to address the environmental impacts they can control: reducing waste, rethinking materials, improving transportation around events and more. But one of the biggest event sustainability factors (also one of the hardest to control) is how participants get there.
I fully admit to being part of that problem. I run more races around the country and across the world than I do in my home state, which means I fly. A lot. I believe deeply in travel and the connections and opportunities it creates, and I’m not going to pretend the answer is simply that everyone should stop flying.
But these conversations got me thinking about a broader topic around loyalty.
If we’re serious about sustainability, are the incentives we have built within leading travel loyalty programs (airlines in particular) encouraging the outcomes we say we want?
And that brought me back to something I’ve done more than once as a frequent flyer: taken an extra flight segment because my loyalty program rewarded me for doing it.
When loyalty works a little too well
United is the airline that comes immediately to mind for me because, particularly over the past couple years, I’ve flown United more than any other carrier.
MileagePlus Premier status can currently be earned in two ways. Both ultimately involve Premier Qualifying Points (PQP), which, in simplified terms, are largely a measure of how much qualifying money you’re spending with United and through eligible activity.
The first path combines that spend-based measure with Premier Qualifying Flights (PQF), which essentially are the number of individual qualifying flight segments you take.
The second path is based on PQP (spend) alone. Spend enough to reach the higher PQP threshold and it doesn’t matter whether you took 10 flights or 50 to get there.
(note that regardless of which path you use, you still need to fly at least four segments operated by United or United Express)
For many travelers, reaching status through the combination of spending and flight segments is the preferred path as it requires less spending than qualifying through PQP alone. That’s where the incentive gets interesting.
Imagine I need to get from A to C. Normally, I might book the nonstop flight: A → C.
But if it’s late in the year and I’m a few qualifying flights short of status, suddenly A → B → C becomes more attractive. I still get to the same place, but now I’ve earned two qualifying flights instead of one.
I will absolutely raise my hand admitting to having done this. I’ve chosen connecting itineraries when I could have flown nonstop, and I’ve also reached almost-year’s-ends where taking an inexpensive additional trip could help close a qualification gap.
From a loyalty perspective, the program is doing exactly what loyalty programs are designed to do: it is changing my behavior. But is it rewarding the behavior we actually want?
The industry is already moving away from segments
This isn’t meant to be a unique critique of United Airlines. Historically, airlines have used flight frequency, distance, spend and various combinations of the three to identify and reward their most valuable customers. Those systems continue to evolve, and United isn’t alone in still giving flight frequency a role.
Southwest, for example, allows members to qualify for A-List through either a specified number of qualifying one-way flights or a tier-qualifying-points threshold. Alaska/Hawaiian’s Atmos Rewards also recognizes flight activity, including an option beginning in 2027 that allows members to earn based on segments flown.
At the same time, several major U.S. carriers have moved away from requiring flight segments for elite status. Delta eliminated Medallion Qualification Miles and Segments beginning in 2024 and now bases qualification on Medallion Qualification Dollars. American bases AAdvantage status on Loyalty Points, while JetBlue’s Mosaic program uses “tiles” earned through qualifying travel and credit-card spending.
From a customer perspective, there’s a reasonable argument for both approaches. A spend-based system is straightforward and closely ties status to economic value, but it can also make elite status increasingly about the ability to spend more. Incorporating frequency can recognize the traveler who repeatedly chooses an airline without necessarily buying the most expensive tickets.
Ultimately, loyalty programs are designed to influence behavior (and they are very, very good at this). That’s precisely why it’s worth examining which behaviors they reward.
Sustainability makes the question more interesting
This tension becomes particularly noticeable because the airline industry itself has been increasingly vocal about reducing aviation’s environmental impact.
United has set a goal of reaching net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 without relying on voluntary traditional carbon offsets, alongside a 2035 target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions intensity by 50% from a 2019 baseline. Its strategy includes greater fuel efficiency, fleet renewal and expanding the availability and use of sustainable aviation fuel.
Delta has also articulated a net-zero 2050 aspiration, with a strategy focused on its fleet, how it operates aircraft and the fuel it uses.
American has similarly set a 2050 net-zero greenhouse gas goal, with fleet efficiency and lower-carbon fuels among the components of its strategy.
And at an industry level, IATA member airlines adopted a commitment in 2021 to achieve net-zero carbon emissions from their operations by 2050.
Loyalty-program design is obviously a small piece of an enormous sustainability challenge. Eliminating a PQF requirement isn’t going to decarbonize aviation. But incentives matter, particularly when they influence behavior at scale. This begs the question:
If an airline is investing in making flying more efficient and reducing its environmental impact, should its loyalty program simultaneously give a customer a reason to choose two flights when one would do?
What should we be rewarding instead?
As I stated in the beginning of this piece, I don’t think the answer is simply to tell people to fly less.
Aside from the fact that I truly believe travel is a force for good, discouraging people from flying also isn’t a particularly practical answer.
Air travel makes experiences and connections possible that would otherwise be inaccessible to many people. And plenty of air travel isn’t discretionary at all. People fly because of family needs, work and the realities of living in an increasingly connected world.
So yes, we can discourage unnecessary flying and encourage more sustainable routes of transportation. But just “fly less” on its own doesn’t seem like the answer.
I held off from writing this piece over the last two weeks as I (overly ambitiously as it turns out) was hoping to close with some visionary, ground-breaking, industry-changing recommendation for exactly what airline loyalty programs should do instead.
If that was your expectation coming into this, I’m going to disappoint you because I really don’t know what the cleanest answer is. I’d rather still surface the question for discussion than force a tidy solution where there isn’t one. I’d especially love to hear from people working in different corners of aviation, loyalty and sustainability who understand parts of this equation far better than I do.
For me, the conversation starts with two questions:
How can airline loyalty programs continue rewarding valuable customers without inadvertently encouraging unnecessary travel?
Spend is the easy answer, but relying too heavily on spend risks making loyalty status increasingly a reflection of purchasing power rather than loyalty itself. And this reinforces socioeconomic barriers in an industry where access is already far from equal. So what other, more creative pathways could recognize genuine loyalty without encouraging more flights simply for the sake of flying?
What other mechanisms could accomplish what flight-segment requirements are designed to do?
The benefits of encouraging frequency are fairly intuitive: rewarding repeat business, giving customers another reason to keep choosing the same airline and helping both predict and drive demand for what is ultimately perishable inventory (an empty airline seat can’t be sold once the plane takes off). The more interesting question to me is whether flight segments are the only, or best, mechanism for achieving those goals. Could loyalty programs create the same commercial and behavioral incentives without also creating a reason for customers to take flights they otherwise wouldn’t?
I don’t know exactly what the next version of airline loyalty should reward. But I think most would agree their loyalty programs are extraordinarily effective at changing behavior.
