Cathay Pacific Asia Miles - Regarding CX and AMEX MPC Status Offer - Further Discussion

Well, I somehow feel I got the obligation to provide all those concerned in this forum an update regarding what's going on with Amex/CX deal on the MPC status.

My initial email to Ms Sim was:


1 June 2012

Dear Linda,

I refer to your email sent to me on 12 Oct 2011.

..........

As an American Platinum charge card holder myself, I participate in
forums that talks about American Express card offers and benefits. It comes to a surprise that
Canadian American Express apparently starts to offer their platinum card members
complimentary MPC Gold membership as a permanent benefit - this means those card holders
will not need to renew their MPC Gold status by flying enough miles/segments and will keep
that status permanently. This news is certainly conflict with what you have told me below as
I read your understanding of the offer as after the first year,
"they would then be expected to make up the mileage for renewal." So the
first question is, is this true?

...........

If the above is true, I must say this would further dilute the benefits and rights the current
members have, especially to those earn their status by actually flying enough miles/segments
(such as me) and not getting it for free through a third party.

...........

If there is anything that you think I have misunderstood, I will appreciate if you could clarify for me.

............

I trust all is fine with you.

Best regards,

XXX XXX
MPC Number XXX XXX XXXX


Today I got her reply - although she did not answer my question directly - she did not deny that
neither. Instead, she tried to obtain my understanding of CX's strategies in different markets.
I interpret it as a yes.


Dear Mr XXX,

Thank you for your email of 1st June 2012.

First of all, allow me to explain that our partnership with American
Express in offering elite tier memberships to selected Centurion
cardholders in Hong Kong indeed lasted just one year. However the
nature of our partnership agreement in other countries is different. I
am sure you will agree that we have different marketing strategies
placed in our different markets worldwide. Moreover, I cannot say at
this time what may happen to our complimentary elite tier memberships
offered overseas after this year.

Thank you for taking the time to write, Mr XXX. We look forward to
welcoming you on board another of our flights again soon.


Kind regards,

Linda Sim
Manager, The Marco Polo Club

So yep, I am afraid the allegation of Canadian Amex Plat offering MPC GO as permeant benefits is actually a valid one. Will MPC DM becomes a permanent benefit for Centurion card holders? I don't know. I won't get surprised if that's a yes too, although I didn't ask in the email.

Ladies and gentleman, welcome aboard on CX999 from Disappointing to Frustrating. My name is kamiao, your inflight service manager. To American Express Centurion and Platinum card holders, it's a pleasure to see you again....

Frustrating, disappointing, upsetting; especially for an airline that so many of us have been so loyal to for so long. This may be a wild idea, but I'll throw it out there: how about a collective email or petition? Surely with all the flying and miles and status that we have among us here that if we did something on a united front it would make more noise and hopefully justify a better response than... "Moreover, I cannot say at
this time what may happen to our complimentary elite tier memberships
offered overseas after this year."

Who's with me?

Frustrating, disappointing, upsetting; especially for an airline that so many of us have been so loyal to for so long. This may be a wild idea, but I'll throw it out there: how about a collective email or petition? Surely with all the flying and miles and status that we have among us here that if we did something on a united front it would make more noise and hopefully justify a better response than... "Moreover, I cannot say at
this time what may happen to our complimentary elite tier memberships
offered overseas after this year."

Who's with me?

I am afraid it might work better if each of us send her an complaint. :o

I am afraid it might work better if each of us send her an complaint. :o

I will be happy to pitch into any group efforts.

I will be happy to pitch into any group efforts.

Ditto to that.

Frustrating, disappointing, upsetting; especially for an airline that so many of us have been so loyal to for so long. This may be a wild idea, but I'll throw it out there: how about a collective email or petition? Surely with all the flying and miles and status that we have among us here that if we did something on a united front it would make more noise and hopefully justify a better response than... "Moreover, I cannot say at
this time what may happen to our complimentary elite tier memberships
offered overseas after this year."

Who's with me?

Count me in too. I'm more than happy to write in a complaint. From the way she responded, it sounds to me as though MPO could care less about losing their existing members (non-AMEX of course) in order to gain these new set of members. Anyway for sure I will be less loyal to CX now.

I just wonder why CX is not collaborating with HK Amex for the MPC elite benefits. Giving away MPC elite benefits to HK Amex premium cardmembers will help CX get more business IMHO. Provided I were a non-status, HK-base customer to start with, CX is giving me the MPC Gold status through my Amex Plat Charge Card, I would definitely forget about SQ or Korean or Asiana or NH or whatever and immediately jump ship to CX whout a thought. That way, CX is winning clients from the competing airlines.

Now, CX is giving away MPC elite benefits to Canadian Amex members? If I were a Canadian customer, this would not give me the incentive to fly more on CX simply because there are too few geographically convenient routes for a Canadian customer to take CX. Exactly like giving a comb to a bald man. Instead, I bet many of the Canadian Amex MPC elites will just take advantage of the OW status and fly more on AA or BA. Turns out this is a marketing program for AA or BA, funded by CX.

Who's with me?

Count me in too. This is a frequent flyer program and not a frequent AMEX cardholder program

You all realize that this is an extremely common marketing tactic in the industry, right? The few applicable countries that benefit from this, along with even fewer people that know about the benefit, and fewer yet that would take advantage of it, mean that the potential dilution of your benefits seems extremely small...from my perspective.

There are all sorts of credit cards that give status in programs, and their members rarely feel an impact from it and complain. A few examples off the top of my head:
-Hilton Surpass: Free gold level or diamond level, depending on spend
-Amex Platinum: Free SPG gold, free Hertz Gold, free National Executive
-Hyatt Card: Free platinum
-MANY airline cards give benefits equal to that of elite status, and/or provide elite qualifying points for spend

My point is that their are an endless amount of ways to earn status with rewards programs that don't require you to actually have your butt in the seat/bed/car etc.

So, I reiterate that I understand your concern, but is it fair to assume that the direct impact on you may be quite light, given how few people have access to, and take advantage of, the benefit? Or have you already seen a major impact because of it?

Either way, rest assured, you are far from alone in this concern. I doubt that emails from a couple dozen flyertalkers will change CX's stance in the matter, given the prevalence of the marketing technique in the industry.

PS. Not trying to offend or dissent with my comments, just trying to understand why there is such a high level of concern here, but not among members of other programs that are more likely to see an impact on them.

Do complain, and if it works, it'd definitely not because of the complain. Bean counters will do the math after this one year or the following ones in each market they open arms to.

I'm not saying the group effort won't work. I'm saying how practical this can be? I mean to write up a complaint itself is not hard, but how to collect each of our personal details (I.E. real name, membership number, signature possibly) and make enough noise is an indeed hard job.

Yes I see her response a bit annoying. She somehow seemed to get annoyed by my enquiry and comments too - the responses were more like "this is really not your business as its CX's strategy".

If any of you could come up with an easy and practical idea, please share.

Happy to join the group effort, but is her email address public knowledge (can't seem to find it)? <given name>_<family name>@cathaypacific.com?

Happy to join the group effort, but is her email address public knowledge (can't seem to find it)? <given name>_<family name>@cathaypacific.com?

I got her email through crd#mbr@cathaypacific.com which I believe CX Customer Relations will actually pass to her.

I am sure you will agree that we have different marketing strategies placed in our different markets worldwide. Moreover, I cannot say at this time what may happen to our complimentary elite tier memberships offered overseas after this year.[/I][/COLOR]

Mmmmmm...maybe Uzbekistan Amex Platinum cardholders get Lifetime MPC Gold...

Mmmmmm...maybe Uzbekistan Amex Platinum cardholders get Lifetime MPC Gold...

That's a good one - but Amex doesn't have any business in Uzbekistan. :D:D:D

For those who have expressed interest in a group effort, please click on to this thread: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/cathay-pacific-asia-miles/1361553-ft-cx-group-effort-devaluation-mpc-status.html

Thanks!
CX HK

Uh, guys, it's a company. The only way you can effectively discipline them is to fly with someone else. Unless you do that, all you're doing is adding into CX's cost/benefit calculation on this Amex program the five minutes it takes to read and file away a complaint letter from frequent flyers who are still flying CX at the end of the day.

Don't feel these giveaways have devalued the CX experience to the point where another option is now better? Exactly. I have to echo the poster above who suggests that for all the anger on FT about this, out in reality the impact on us has probably been minimal. (Looked at another way, does the extra revenue CX earns from this promotion provide money to do small service enhancements or to preserve services that might otherwise fall victim to cost-cutting? Maybe we're benefiting in ways we don't know!)

CX GO is still a very valuable elite tier. Yeah, these fake GOs might cut in line for op-ups. But do you realize how whiny it sounds to complain to CX about that? If anything, you might end up accidentally reminding them that some FFs now view the op-up as an entitlement, which is not something CX management wants to encourage. As for the other benefits we experience when we're not op-upped, I haven't noticed an appreciable difference in length of J check-in lines, crowding in lounges or other things as a result. Our seat guarantee is still intact and since it is a guarantee, the number of people CX chooses to make eligible for it is irrelevant to us. So how exactly are we impoverished by an Amex benefit in some markets?

I'm not saying CX is perfect by any means, although I do find them a lot better than many of their competitors. But I'd suggest everyone chill out and be realistic both about how CX is likely to view any complaints on this and also on what the real "damage" is.

Uh, guys, it's a company. The only way you can effectively discipline them is to fly with someone else. Unless you do that, all you're doing is adding into CX's cost/benefit calculation on this Amex program the five minutes it takes to read and file away a complaint letter from frequent flyers who are still flying CX at the end of the day.

Don't feel these giveaways have devalued the CX experience to the point where another option is now better? Exactly. I have to echo the poster above who suggests that for all the anger on FT about this, out in reality the impact on us has probably been minimal. (Looked at another way, does the extra revenue CX earns from this promotion provide money to do small service enhancements or to preserve services that might otherwise fall victim to cost-cutting? Maybe we're benefiting in ways we don't know!)

CX GO is still a very valuable elite tier. Yeah, these fake GOs might cut in line for op-ups. But do you realize how whiny it sounds to complain to CX about that? If anything, you might end up accidentally reminding them that some FFs now view the op-up as an entitlement, which is not something CX management wants to encourage. As for the other benefits we experience when we're not op-upped, I haven't noticed an appreciable difference in length of J check-in lines, crowding in lounges or other things as a result. Our seat guarantee is still intact and since it is a guarantee, the number of people CX chooses to make eligible for it is irrelevant to us. So how exactly are we impoverished by an Amex benefit in some markets?

I'm not saying CX is perfect by any means, although I do find them a lot better than many of their competitors. But I'd suggest everyone chill out and be realistic both about how CX is likely to view any complaints on this and also on what the real "damage" is.

Whether CX is going to change its behaviour on this matter? I don't know. I don't think they will to be perfectly honest. It's stupid to expect they will end a contract deal they had with a third party just because of some complaints.

But does it mean there is no value to raise a complaint about some concerns we have? I don’t agree.

By writing to them at least to make them be aware that a group of people have a lot of concerns on this type of initiatives. Today CX could offer GO to Amex Platinum and DM to Centurion, if there is no noise made to the management, they will presume everybody is happy and tomorrow such things can be offered to Visa Platinum or Master Gold, who knows?! Yes indeed the impact has been minimal to most of us. As a MPC member in Australia, you might wonder why I bother to write to Linda Sim complaining about some deals she has with the Canadian market? Seriously I haven't been to Canada myself yet! I won't likely to take a lot of flights between HKG and Canada in my life and the impact of this to me was pretty much nothing. But I still decided to write her something - cos I believe, if there is nothing to be done, the dilution of our benefits will go on and will go bigger. By making some noise, at least the management is acknowledging there are some negative impacts to its members and there is a potential cost associated with these type of deals - whether they want to ignore it and go ahead it's their business but without letting them know, they won't even know the existence.

It's fair to say the impact so far is small - but when CX offer this type of things to a much wider range of third parties and when the impact gets bigger, it would be too late for you to make any noise by then.

It's unreasonable try to control the uncontrollable - what CX will do is uncontrollable; what I can control is what my behaviours are - since I have the concern, to make me feel better, I went to complain. You may not agree or may not even see why people are upset about this or simply have the same concern but choose not to do anything – that’s your choice and I respect it - but be fair, at least I expect you leave those who choose otherwise alone and let them do what they want.

Just my two cents.

We take dozens of flights, generate tens of thousands of dollars in revenue (some business travelers generate hundreds of thousands), and are loyal customers of this company. Surely we should be able to reflect our views in an email, at the very least?

We take dozens of flights, generate tens of thousands of dollars in revenue (some business travelers generate hundreds of thousands)

Can you take the business elsewhere? Other airlines offering similar timing and product?

I agree with kamiao totally.

It is not what CX has done bother me. It is the dignity of being a frequent flyer.

What make FFPs attractive is not only the award travel but the actual care of the airlines in valuing your business.

Why CX has to greet elites on the plane? Why Evian? "It's a mixture of faux and homey - faumey." Even we know that such "good" gesture is reflected because of our business. It is fine. At the least - they do care. When such good gesture has been commoditizes (e.g. selling Evian onboard), the face value is the value people interpret as is. In this case - it is even worse - the "sale" of a status.

Personally, I don't mind my airlines selling some of my elite benefits to the general public, like lounge access, priority boarding, if it can help the airlines maintain in business without damaging the true elite. But it is way too far to "sell" the status.

To most of you, it is not a secret that AMEX top-tiered invitation only members are offered some complimentary elite status. Given that they are not too many invitation only members, who cares? But in this case - a card that is openly available for application is offering such an "amazing" deal. As rting said in another thread (not blaming rting), that status get me the free op-up right? Sure - that C$699 is definitely well-spent.

Is it fair to CX GO or SL who earn in a hard way? It is an answer that you can only answer to yourself. But my concern is - when one airlines is offering this, the other may follow (Remember the baggage fee in the U.S.?)

The dignity of frequent flyer - status is earned or matched. They are not for sale.

People. They destroy an airline. This is my 2 cent.

For those who have expressed interest in a group effort, please click on to this thread: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/cathay-pacific-asia-miles/1361553-ft-cx-group-effort-devaluation-mpc-status.html

Thanks!
CX HK

Yes, let's continue the discussion over there...

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/cathay-pacific-asia-miles/1361553-ft-cx-group-effort-devaluation-mpc-status.html

And close this thread.

Thanks

Guy Betsy
Cathay Pacific Asia Miles forum co-mod