American Airlines upsets passengers with changes to its loyalty program
American Airlines has defended itself after passengers took to Twitter to complain about changes to its loyalty scheme.
Under the new system, due to come into force next year, passengers will earn award miles based on what they paid for their flight, rather than the distance flown.
This means the AAdvantage frequent flyer program will operate more like those of Delta, United, and Southwest.
Unveiling the changes, the airline said some award redemption levels will be reduced by as much as 40%, particularly to popular destinations in Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America.
But it admitted award redemption levels on other routes, such as some flights to Europe and Asia, will increase due to changes to market pricing and demand.
Since the changes were announced, some passengers have posted comments in Twitter saying they will be turning to other airlines.
Richard from Maldon tweeted: "34k this year. Same flights this year=8144. I was loyal because of AAdvantage but looks like you’re forcing me away :-(."
American Airlines responded: "We don’t want you to leave us, we’re certain there will be changes that will benefit you even more than now."
Cindy Elizabeth accused American on ‘catering to the elite rather than to its average customers’. "Not happy," she added.
American Airlines tweeted in response: "We don’t want you to be upset with us, our goal is to continue to have the best frequent flyer program."
Bloggers on travel website Travel Codex agreed that the only passengers who will benefit from the changes are those buying really expensive tickets.
"American seems to have gone ahead and copied most of Delta and United’s changes verbatim, once again proving that less is most definitely not more when it comes to competition in the marketplace," one said.
Shawn Coomer, MD of frequent flyer blog MilestoMemories, said the changes were ‘terrible news’ but not a surprise.
"The reason these changes hurt so much is because at the same time they are raising the redemption rates, they are decreasing earning rates for the vast majority of customers. This means that this new award chart is more expensive than it looks, because we haven’t fully adjusted our thought processes to earning at such a lower level. This will hurt more than it seems," he said in a blog.
"Basically, miles will become more scarce (at least for those who earn them through flying) and costs will increase. On the flip side many more people will be joining the elite ranks and sucking up upgrade space. This combination will significantly impact the American Airlines customer experience in my opinion. For those who don’t care about miles, then this won’t matter, but for those who are loyal to American because of AAdvantage, this is not a good thing."
Bev
Editor in chief Bev Fearis has been a travel journalist for 25 years. She started her career at Travel Weekly, where she became deputy news editor, before joining Business Traveller as deputy editor and launching the magazine’s website. She has also written travel features, news and expert comment for the Guardian, Observer, Times, Telegraph, Boundless and other consumer titles and was named one of the top 50 UK travel journalists by the Press Gazette.
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