United Quietly Enacts “Surprise & Delight” Upgrade Program
Jeff Edwards September 29, 2015
United will surprise high-value frequent flyers by confirming free upgrades when booking travel on more routes, including flights with United Global First Class service.
United Airlines may be starting to make good on promises to put the “friendly” back in the “Friendly Skies,” and it looks like the legacy carrier intends to bring its new passenger-first focus to its most valuable customers first, without the usual fanfare.
Aviation industry blogger Brian Summers was the first to report details of a new top secret “surprise and delight” upgrade policy that will bring unexpected upgrades, confirmed weeks in advance, to United’s high-value flyers.
The unannounced new program will offer more upgrades to elite flyers and will confirm those upgrades earlier, in some cases, at the time of booking. The new policy also promises to create a greater number of unexpected upgrades for the airline’s most loyal customers, including opportunities for bumps to United Global First Class on select international flights.
With the dust beginning to settle after years of mega-airline-mergers, U.S. carriers may once again be ready to place an emphasis on earning the loyalty of their most profitable customers. In July, Delta Air Lines unveiled a surprise and delight program of its own giving select elite flyers the opportunity to upgrade not to a premium class cabin, but to a private plane on select trips from the airline’s east coast hubs. Delta has plans to expand the program to include destinations throughout the system.
In a letter to employees, soon after being named the new United Airlines CEO, Oscar Munoz signaled that more changes are on the way for the airline and this time changes will include more than just cost-saving measures. In the internal memo obtained by Bloomberg, Munoz responded to a flight attendant who tearfully told the incoming CEO that she is “tired of having to tell people I’m sorry.”
“We’ve heard that you want to be empowered to do good work with effective tools,” Munoz wrote. “We will give you the right tools to deliver the service and reliability I know we are capable of.” So far, it seems Munoz is making moves to make good on his promise, at least for the airlines’ most elite flyers.
[Photo: United Airlines]
beansb... you are so right. Most of the high value customers are business travelers who do not pay for their flights out of their own pockets. I have been a gold, platinum, or 1k for all of the last 11 years and only 3 of my United flights in those years have been for business (and if you add silver, it includes the last 18 years). The rest have been my own personal leisure travel for which I paid from my own income. I think that kind of patronage shows much more loyalty to United than the business person flying on someone else's dime. And I am not one of those who gets the flights with the most miles for the least amount of money just to earn elite status. I easily exceed by a large amount the new spend requirement for the for the particular elite status earned. For each international vacation I took in the past 9 years, I purchased a business class ticket with my own money. I am not an independently wealthy person, but travel is my passion.
Is this Brian Williams reporting?
Yes! My favorite United story: at ORD, the customer service desk refused to even attempt to help me insisting I talk to the gate agent instead even when I pointed out that the gate is in plain sight and there's no gate agent to talk to.
Let's be honest though. They are targeting this at their highest value customers - Global Services. Who get upgrades pretty much all the time anyway. If United actually wants to bring back the friendly skies they should look down from the $250k yearly spend to those who only spend $10-25k with the airline yearly. Sure glad they are helping the 1% though. I'm sure they need it.
A key change is to get a fresh young crew with a great attitude for service!!!