Process Angioplasty - Delta Frequent Flyer Program

So in Scotland a couple of weeks ago, I was making small talk about our flights with a gentleman in the hotel lobby. He had used his Delta award miles - but oh, a painful trip! I was curious because he sounded like he should have been on my flight from Atlanta to Edinburgh and it was uneventful.

No, he flew Birmingham to Atlanta to New York LaGuardia, taxi to New York Kennedy to Paris to Edinburgh! Delta told him that was the only award itinerary available. The truth? The flight from Atlanta to Edinburgh was wide open - may be 25% full in both cabins.

From our conversation, sounded like he was one of Delta's best customers - at least 5 million life time miles (I am a mere mortal at 2.5 million).

Why does Delta mess around this way with its best customers? In recent years, as it struggles financially I believe it has been allocating fewer seats for awards (and its anxious customers want to use them up before it goes under). It hopes against hope it will sell those seats, and when it does not, it flies empty when it could have taken care of its loyal customers.

The last several years I have not been able to get free seats to Ireland for the family - even when I call when their schedule opens up 11 months in advance. Their usual suggestion - oh, use the double miles option which does not have any restrictions. Or they will offer connections via Paris or Rome, often with partner airlines (admittedly never as many changes as the poor gentleman above). As the kids get older, they may appreciate those stops, but at their ages now, the stopovers just add stress and chances baggage will not arrive.

I am surprised Delta has not written some code to put us on wait lists for the direct route and as those seats open up, move us over. On the other hand, I have redeemed free tickets to England at a week's notice. But I could have been one of their infrequent flyers and still got that. Appears random with little credit for being a truly frequent customer or one that plans early.

As it sells miles through affinity programs (it has credit card, real estate, hotspot, video rental, car rental - you name it - partners), the core airline customer seems to be forgotten in the award redemption process. And more fees have appeared. Every change to an award ticket sets you back $ 50. One year, changes in family plans ended up costing us $ 600 for 4 tickets - so much for free award tickets!

Delta finds itself in a downward spiral. At times like that you go back to bedrock customers. But if you do not respect the very currency you have issued to these customers, why do you expect them to sign up for more of that currency? Its loyal members want Delta to survive - but its got to be nicer to them and perform angioplasty to its award redemption process.

Comments

[Dennis Howlett]

It goes further than that Vinnie. If they're re-routing folk on award tickets, they're adding cost because of the increased fuel burn rate, multiple check in procedures and additional meals. Where's the sense in that?

[Roman Rytov]

It's bad but Delta is no excetption here. All American companies struggle with this approach and even Lufhansa is not really better. I wrote about problems of frequent flyer programs in the past here: http://roman-rytov.typepad.com/miles/2006/02/crm_flexibility.html

The good thing I see in the siuation is frequent flyers do choose companies to invest their miles primarily estimating how easy it is to redeme the miles later on. So Delta (or others) can simply change the policy, as Vinnie described, and get a fast advantage for easy money. If their plains are anyhow partially empty why not to let the customers to redem miles?

If Delta does it fast and loud enough it can draw flyers at least from all the aliance and sometimes even from direct competitors (LH, BA, UA). Nowadays to spread such a good news would cost also almost nothing - Delta started changing their customer service and crews' atitude (i noticed it too) and folks instantly started talking about that on the forums. I'm sure that the good news about letting me spend MY miles easier would spread even faster.

[vinnie mirchandani]

Roman, I hope they listen to you. I have got so tired of reasoning with them over the years that I have moved 90% of my domestic business away from them and mostly fly them overseas