In some ways what American didn’t say about their devaluation is even more interesting than what they did say.
United made major changes to their award chart ten years ago … they made this bitter pill go down a bit easier by promising “saver awards available on every flight to every destination.”
When British Airways announced a huge devaluation at the beginning of the year which went into effect in April they softened it in a similar manner.
A Facebook friend writes, “Since [redeemable miles] are going to be harder to earn in the future with my flying patterns buying cheap tickets and American is going to start awarding miles based on ticket price rather than distance flown in about a year, does it make sense to load up on miles with the current purchase promo?
For the last couple of weeks the American Airlines website has intermittently been having problems with booking awards. Sometimes it will just error out, or it will be slow.
Also recently American’s call center agents haven’t been able to see Etihad award space correctly. Search for the awards correctly on the Etihad website, American generally does have access to the same saver (“Guest”) award space Etihad offers to its own members, call American agents and they will say they don’t see the space.
Here’s how to snag the award space even when American’s call center agents do not see it.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Marriott is buying Starwood and Starwood Preferred Guest members are nervous.
Marriott’s CEO spoke directly to members in a new video, and says “Devaluing points or member benefits is not the way to preserve and strengthen these programs.” With due respect to the Marriott’s distinguished CEO, I do not think he’s familiar with the Marriott Rewards program.
Two parables from frequent flyer history tell us a lot about the AAdvantage devaluation that was announced this week: that the fault for it lies with you (mass noun) and why American doesn’t take as much heat as programs that devalued earlier and thus gets away scot-free.
If you want to have the best change of an upgrade, you want to fly when there’s the least amount of competition for scarce upgrade seats.
However even routes, days, and times where upgrades are usually easier will see increased competition for 3 of the next 4 weeks. And January will be worse.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Changes in the travel industry are often a rorschach test for one’s own priors. Matthew Yglesias says “Marriott/Starwood merger is another case of the rich getting richer” but he gets it exactly backward.
I’m not going to make any points about income inequality in the United States or the world. But I am going to make a point about the particulars of how Marriott Rewards and Starwood Preferred Guest work, and about his take on American AAdvantage devaluations. Because they simply do not get him where he wants to go in making broader claims about society.
IHG Rewards Club – the loyalty program for Intercontinental, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn and related brands — is offering a 100% bonus on purchased points through November 30.
This means you can buy points at just $0.00575 apiece which is a lower price than what they’re worth.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
