OK so there is a reason I haven't flown Delta in over 15 years

[lawren2 Malibu Beach Barbie & A Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close lawren2]

I always watch my flight fares after I book. Yapta makes that easier than ever to do. My flights to Ireland dropped $40 each. Same booking class/dates/flights.

I realize that some airlines don't credit your charge card but will give the difference towards future travel. Fine. We fly and Delta does caribbean and most places we would go in the continental US from the New York area.

Delta will not credit anything unless the fare difference is equal to the change fee, which in the case of international travel is $200.

This maybe is the last time Delta will ever see me on one of their planes.

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

Bummer! They sure do have a tough stance in the CSR, and that is unfortunate...willing to lose future business over that, really too bad.

[dougp26364 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dougp26364]

THen there's a couple of others you'll need to mark off your list along with Delta. I think most of the major airlines charge their change fee ($100 domestic for most) if you spot a decrease in airfare. Sort of makes you not want to book early but, then, if you don't, the price will probably just go up instead of down. I believe United and USAir follow this procedure (at least they have in the past) but I'm not certain about NWA, Contenital or AA.

[Pat H Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Pat H]

UA does not charge the change fee. AA does on Domestic but I'm not sure if they do on International.

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

THen there's a couple of others you'll need to mark off your list along with Delta. I think most of the major airlines charge their change fee ($100 domestic for most) if you spot a decrease in airfare. Sort of makes you not want to book early but, then, if you don't, the price will probably just go up instead of down. I believe United and USAir follow this procedure (at least they have in the past) but I'm not certain about NWA, Contenital or AA.

Northwest charges the change fee if the price comes down too . . . so you would need to see a $101 decrease to see any real credit back. I can't recall, however, if they give you credit back to your charge card or in a flying voucher.

Something else Delta does that sucks is that they don't have "stand by" any more. I was at the airport several hours early because me meeting was done early. I wanted to fly standby out earlier to get home earlier, but they said I couldn't. If I wanted to fly on the earlier flight (which was wide open) I would have to change my ticket and pay the appropriate change fee ($50 in this case). Fortunately, the ticket price for the earlier return flight was $42 less, so I made the change for a net cost of $8 . . . well worth it to avoid getting home after midnight.

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

My reason for leaving DL as my preferred carrier and comping my elite status over to NW was the gutting of their elite program. see Save SkyMiles! for the details. Of course, in two years, DL waved a white flag and restored the elite program to what it had been. By then, I had decided the grass was greener at NW.

I have watched the decline of DL's international service. For years, they had a great selection of newspapers aboard such as the International Herald Tribune. Financial Times, Daily Telegraph (UK flights), etc. and brought enough onboard for the whole plane. Now they only bring enough for business class and coach passengers are lucky to get a paper. For years, they had free booze in coach, but then cut that out so that you had to pay for it. Now, at least, they have reversed slightly and do give you one free alcoholic drink with dinner.

NW has the same problem with newspapers but at least is still the only US carrier with free booze in coach on international flights. Every European legacy carrier I have flown has had free booze trans-Atlantic and usually on intra-Europe flights, too.

One of the advantages of NW is that the percentage of domestic first class upgrades I have gotten has jumped substantially over what I got at DL.

The free booze issue has to hurt US carriers with European flyers. I remember the first DL flight I was on after this change in policy. I was coming back from Munich on a ticket I paid around $500 for. The German businessman sitting beside me had obviously bought a last minute, much more expensive ticket. When the flight attendant came around with the drink cart and asked what I wanted, I calmly said I normally got a German beer, but since they charged for that now, just give me a Coke. At that point the German asked incredulously if this were true that they wanted to charge him for a beer. When the flight attendant told him that it was, he became very irate, telling her he had paid $1500 for his ticket and didn't expect to have to pay for his beer, that Lufthansa would never do anything like that to him, and that he would never fly Delta again. He raised his voice enough that a lot of people on the plane must have heard him. His air rage, generated by DL's policy change, was such that he did not get any beverage, but just sat there and stewed. Every time the flight attendant came around, his conversation with them was in an angry tone. This would appear to be an example of airlines being penny wise but pound foolish, nickle and diming high fare customers and running them to rival airlines.

Even though I am not a high fare customer, I go out of my way to try to fly European carriers where I get better service. Not only is there free booze, but they also generally provide enough newspapers for the whole plane. It is interesting what paying a little more for good service does. Most of these European legacy carriers were earning a profit while our skinflint airlines were mostly in bankruptcy!

[mishugana Member Find all posts View Profile Close mishugana]

My reason for leaving DL as my preferred carrier and comping my elite status over to NW was the gutting of their elite program. .

How do you do that?

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

How do you do that?

Many carriers will allow comping, although some will not. You have to document your elite status on another airline and request the new airline comp you equivalent status. My first choice actually had been to comp over to Air France, whose Frequence Plus elite program had a lot of advantages over any US program such as lower mid-level elite qualification levels (40K vs. 50K) and lounge access for mid-tier elites. However, they do not comp status, so NW was my second choice. That was probably fortunate since when Frequence Plus was merged with KLM's Flying Dutchman, the ''enhancements'' completely screwed up the program which emerged, called Flying Blue, substantially inferior to either of the previous ff programs.

[dougp26364 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close dougp26364]

UA does not charge the change fee. AA does on Domestic but I'm not sure if they do on International.

Then that's a change since the last time I tried this with UA. However, the last time was back in 1999 which was quite a while back.

[Icc5 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Icc5]

Delta could care less

I always watch my flight fares after I book. Yapta makes that easier than ever to do. My flights to Ireland dropped $40 each. Same booking class/dates/flights.

I realize that some airlines don't credit your charge card but will give the difference towards future travel. Fine. We fly and Delta does caribbean and most places we would go in the continental US from the New York area.

Delta will not credit anything unless the fare difference is equal to the change fee, which in the case of international travel is $200.

This maybe is the last time Delta will ever see me on one of their planes.

We just came back from a two week vacation that had us on 8 planes and Delta once. Had a bad experience with them and check-in in NY. Wrote to them suggesting they look at AA system in Boston which was fantastic. They replied telling me Delta liked there own system and hoped I'd fly again with them. To me this said to mind my own business and they don't care to look at anything that might improve their operation.
Bart

[lawren2 Malibu Beach Barbie & A Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close lawren2]

I agree that Delta could not care less. I stopped flying them when they stranded me in Tampa in the early 80s for 13 hours without so much as a dinner or drink chit.

I tried for months to find acceptable airfares and decided to bite the bullet on Delta as they are one of the few carriers that go non-stop NYC to SNN and were at least $200 less per ticket than Aer Lingus and Conti. AA was similarly priced but involved stops and twice as much time to get to the same spot.

The good news is the price I paid for the 3 tickets is still very reasonable even with the Ryan RT costs to London as compared to direct NYC to LON. Let's just say I have learned my lesson.

Steve your discription has me dreading the flight itself and I can only pray that we doze on our overnight redeye after consuming the one alcoholic beverage of course .

I tend to fly UA and AA and have not had issues with credits with either so I was pretty surprised at Delta's stance regarding lower fares.

[Pat H Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Pat H]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Pat H
UA does not charge the change fee. AA does on Domestic but I'm not sure if they do on International.

Then that's a change since the last time I tried this with UA. However, the last time was back in 1999 which was quite a while back.

Doug, note that I'm only talking about the change fee when the fare drops and you want a voucher for the difference not if you want to change flights.

[Arline Member Find all posts View Profile Close Arline]

We had to cancel a Delta flight due to a family emergency last November. We were told we would have one year to use the credits. When we tried to use them, after waiting a very long time for a phone rep, I was informed the credits had expired. I said that was impossible, and had to wait another long while for a supervisor. Bottom line--the year they use starts from the original booking date, not the travel date. I admit I was annoyed waiting so long on the phone, twice, and then getting negative responses from rude phone reps. With Delta's scenerio, our credits were only good for a couple of months, since we always book early! This incident was the last straw! I already had a sour feeling regarding long layovers during connecting flights. I'll return to preferred AA and Continental, TYVM.

[zdxlc9p6 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close zdxlc9p6]

he had paid $1500 for his ticket and didn't expect to have to pay for his beer, that Lufthansa would never do anything like that to him

I just booked a trip to Vienna this morning using Lufthansa. It's a $2200 coach ticket, and it really would grate me to have to pay $5 for a small wine or beer. Has anyone flown with them lately to verify if the gentleman's claim to free alcohol is valid?