If you are waking up today and forgot to redeem your 2020 Delta Medallion Choice Benefits – don’t say we did not warn you (both on the blog and a bunch on Twitter as well). I locked in my SkyMiles choice and hope one day to be able to spend them at a reasonable award level (what – a man can dream – right?).
But as of today, those who were either Platinum or Diamond Medallion in 2020, have the “free” medallion year upon us as a gift from Delta and that means we now have access to the 2021 Choice Benefits (<-link to Delta.com landing page). Should you spend them right away? Yes and No. Take a look:
There are a number of choices you do NOT want to spend right away like Global or Regional upgrade certs as the 1-year expiration clock begins the day you pick them. You want to wait until you need them to redeem them (reps can issue your ticket and apply the certificates and then later load in the certificate numbers – and, yes, I have done this many, many times).
But there are two choices you should jump on if you can use them. They are Sky Club membership and gifting Medallion status.
Notice for both of these the expiration date is the end of January 31st of 2022. This means either you, or in case of gifted status to a friend, can enjoy them for one full year, and thus today is the day to get MAX benefit out of this Choice Benefit from Delta.
Now before I get slammed in the comments below – I understand very few are flying. I get that, for example, gifting status to someone who is not able to fly is all but pointless. If that is you – this post is not for you. 😉
However, there are a number of folks who ARE flying right now. There are many who either have got their first and or second shot and are now only weeks away from being as safe as possible to travel. If this is you or someone you can gift status to they can benefit now more than ever. Even Gold Medallion (or Silver Medallion in the case of the Platinum benefit option) status could yield some sweet upgrades with so few flying for the next few months.
From most reader reports, Skyclubs are not very crowed and if you don’t have access from either the non-Delta Amex personal or business Platinum card or the Delta Amex personal or business Reserve card Sky Club access could be a nice option.
I personally will simply sit on my 2021 choices as I hope for the chance to use them for Global Upgrades sometime later on this year when it is safe for me to fly again! – René
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I only show Diamond Choice Benefits and not the Platinum as had been the case in all prior years. I selected my 2020 benefits yesterday, Jan 31st, and was able to select both Platinum and Diamond benefits. I wonder if anyone is having a similar experience or if there was a requirement that I missed at some point.
@HGA – Interesting. I got mine but I qualified for Platinum last year via MQMs and the 25k Amex spend waver.
My Platinum benefits showed up for selection when I qualified (and are still there waiting for me to choose). I chose my 4 GUC yesterday. The new Diamond choices should be showing up any day now.
@Barry – They should be live now (as you can see from screen shots from post).
Yes, sorry about that. I must get better at reading the article and not just the e-mail!
I’m scheduled for my second moderna jab on the 18th
Of February…… so about a month from then I’ll be a
“Free bird!”
I am in countdown mode.
I did not open my 21 benes
Yet…. but did open the 2020’s thanks to all the appreciated reminders! Any notifications for good flights starting mid March would be GREATLY appreciated ! Stay healthy and safe!
@Rene
I ended up choosing the $200 delta certificate, as I can use that towards my monthly trip to TN for work and expense it as part of my ticket cost..
I couldn’t find anything I wanted at Tiffany’s
The upgrade vouchers aren’t worth it for me, as I fly fll to atl and atl to TN….
Like others, I see the Diamond choices for 2021 (due to rollover status), but not Platinum (which I didn’t qualify for last year).
Reading Delta’s page about status extensions, it doesn’t say whether you will get both Platinum and Diamond benefits if you didn’t earn them. I can see the argument both ways. Delta could say that if you were given Diamond for free simply by extending your status, you didn’t go through Platinum status to get it. Others could say that being Diamond includes being Platinum and therefore you should get both. I think we can see now how Delta decided to play it. I can’t really be objective here since I actually did earn Platinum.
Oh, I agree with seeing both sides and I’m grateful for the Diamond extensions (including the Diamond Choice Benefits. Just reporting that this seems to be the norm.
It’s an amazingly generous gesture. They could have just extended the status. These benefits if used to the full can be worth thousands of dollars.
I reached DM for 2021 on 1/26/2020 and had access to 2021 Choice Benefits the following day. I immediately burned the Platinum CB and one of three Diamond CBs. For anyone who may be wondering, those of us who earned our 2021 Choice Benefits in 2020 did not see them their magically reset today.
That’s odd!
It would have been nice but I am not surprised!
If you are like me and forgot to do this for 2020 since we were not traveling. I was able to message with a rep on the Delta website and they made an exception for my wife and I to still choose our 2020 Diamond benefits! They had to manually input our choices as the website only allowed the 2021 choices.
Doesn’t surprise me. Very nice though. Just curious, if you choose RUC or GUC, do they expire one year from today or from yesterday?
@Barry – It is day of redemption +364 days to redeem (and officially fly but if you can instantly clear them you can get up to another year – this comes with real issues when schedule changes happen etc).
@Rene, sorry for being ambiguous, my question was specifically regarding @Timothy’s situation where he chose the benefit a day late – if he use upgrades, did they give him a year from today to use them or a day from January 31st.
@ Barry, All the benefits posted today with expiration of 2/1/2022
Thanks @Timothy