Whither frequent flyer programs?

[Carolinian Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close Carolinian]

Airline mergers and ff program consolidations are the real danger point for major devaluation of ff programs, and three key ff programs are headed that way in the short term. If the programs emerge from that relatively intact, then they are probably on solid ground at least for the medium term, but those of us who use these programs need to be wary until we are past that hurdle.

Two mergers or consolidations that have been disasters for ff members are DL and NW, and before that AF and KLM. Air France and KLM had good ff programs, Frequence Plus and Flying Dutchman, but when AF acquired KLM and merged the programs, the result, Flying Blue, was a pale ghost of its predecessors. It has since been further gutted. NW had a great ff program and DL a decent one, until DL arranged a takeover of NW. After the takeover, DL started gutting both programs even before they were formally merged with things like its three tier award chart and its massive foreign origin surcharge.

The next ''integration'' we have to hold our breath on is AA and BA, which have recently formed a joint venture, approved by government authoriites. They have announced an ''integration'' of their ff programs beginning next month but not the details. Those will be crucial. AA's AAdvantage is much more customer friendly that BA's program. There are three possibilities - 1) the integration could only involve being able to earn or burn miles across both systems, 2) overall policies could be streamlined close to the AA model, or 3) overall policies could be streamlined close to the BA model. Either of the first two options would be a win for AA ff'ers, but the third alternative would be a huge loss that could massively devalue the program. BA for example allows earning of only 25% of the actual milage on many of its coach fares, while AA awards full miles on all published fares. BA socks members with a fuel surcharge that can go into the hundreds of dollars on award redemtions while AA does not. AA allows one way redemptions for half the milage while BA does not. BA's award chart does not include the reduced 40K awards trans-Atlantic in shoulder and off season that AA does. BA zones Europe for TATL award seats, which AA does not, making the redemption levels for some zones higher than those at AA even in high season. What form this ''integration'' takes will be a very key thing to watch.

The other one out there is UA's merger with CO. Here the differences are much less in existing programs, but that does not stop the merged airline from using program merger to gut it as happened with DL/NW and AF/KLM. Given the moves last year to align award charts, maybe not too much damage will be done, but there are still a number of issues that are being watched. One is whether the merged program will follow UA's policy of *Net blocking or CO's policy of making anything on *Net availible for award redemption. *Net is the system under which members of the Star Alliance share award seats among themselves. *Net blocking impacts those who need to use partner carriers for at least one leg to reach their ultimate destination.

AA should tip its hand in a few weeks, while it will take longer to hear what UA is going to do.

The real irony would be if US ended up with the best surviving ff program. Hopefully that will not happen.

[stevelb Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close stevelb]

You are correct in all that you have stated. Although we don't yet know what will happen with UA/CO, as a big holder of CO miles I am dreading this takeover. The CO ff program is far superior to and more liberal than UA's in many ways;especially availability. Just as an example, right now from ORD to Hawaii CO shows far more options and the better flights than UA even though almost all flights are on UA flights. CO shows UA flight availabilty where UA will not allow their own ff's to book.

[camachinist Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close camachinist]

Since UA services my local best, and is the *only* airline which services my alternate, UA and *A are probably with me to stay for as long as I fly. That said, I'm watching the changes with the CO merger carefully.

Personally, as a 1K, I still get a ton of benefits and flying UA is relatively reasonable and comfortable. With the merger and dropping to 1P next year, I expect many changes. Since all the majors are similarly priced from my local, for myself, it's about convenience and benefits. AA is really the only other player with any reach into where I travel to and even they lag far behind UA/CO *A for international travel.

Hopefully, I'll get to try out CO in the near future and see how that works out. From the few tickets I've booked for others there, it's not nearly as fun nor as easy to game as UA is. I'd miss the 'slot machine' aura of playing with UA, for sure.

As I tend to fly long-haul on cheap revenue tickets and use resultant RDM's on selected expensive short-haul, *Net blocking doesn't really affect me but it surely does affect a wide cross-section of MP members. I hope CO's influence changes that. We'll see

[SteveChapin Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close SteveChapin]

As of two weeks ago, the CO policy was still in force; I flew on OnePass miles to Denver. One of the legs was on USAir, the other three were on UA.

[bnoble Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close bnoble]

As a DTW denizen, I'm a Delta captive. Except for a handful of leisure routes, the only convenient flights are on DL. I'm a low-tier "elite" with them, and the few perks that come with that improve the prospect of flying from nearly unendurable to not entirely horrible.

That said, I don't think I would have described NW's WorldPerks as "great"---it was marginally better than DL's, as DL more actively sells status, where NW it was mostly earned. But, marginally better, not vastly superior.

I long ago stopped focusing on earning points for non-flight activity, and have directed my ancillary spending to other, more flexible reward programs instead. Honestly, none of them are hugely great deals, and the amount of time it seems I would have to spend to figure out how to increase my yield is probably more proftiably spent on billable work.

[Dori Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Dori]

SW's new Rapid Rewards 2.0 program has devalued the whole concept, in my opinion. In the past, a flight meant 1 credit, regardless of the duration. Now that they have switched to a point system, points are accumlated based on mileage. Short flights receive fewer points. As an infrequent flyer (usually twice a year), it will take me much longer to earn a free flight.

Dori