gloyster

they don't care about petitions.. they care about money. bail on delta and fly AA, or Alaskan, just anyone but delta.... then they will care.

Lrtalk

When a customer stops receiving value for their dollar, they take the dollar somewhere else. Customers don't sign petitions - they walk. A petition simply says to the vendor "I don't like it but have no better option and am going to complain to try to get you to change your mind". If you don't think Delta sees through this, then it's time to think again. This is silly.

StayingHomeIsBetter

They do care about social media.

Find a way to ramp up public outrage and you may gain some traction.

But, a petition aimed at only protecting the DMs is not going to get that done (think in terms of the liberal media and their disparaging use of the term "One Percenter").

Get the public fired up about regular folks who have saved their miles for years for a once in a lifetime vacation, and now can't even figure out if it will still be feasible with another year's accumulation... that is how you effectively stimulate reservations about the character of the characters running an airline.

That said, I am supportive of doing something to push back. But, if someone tries to plan it here, it will never get off the ground. There will too many people who are pleased with their status quo, who will trample over threads with nay-saying posts about how any proposed action is doomed to fail.

indufan

And this is further why this won't gain any traction. They have their miles. In fact it is pretty apparent that the mileage chart is better. And then say 35% of the people like this better. I participated in the uproar 12 years ago and it mostly worked. I won't participate this time and it won't work anyway.

Beyond that, the general public has no clue of many of the inns and outs that are talked about here all day, every day. Even most upper level Medallions don't.

So, there are a few choices for people to make and I am NOT trying to judge what anyone should do. 1. Complain and try to get the stuff back to the way it was. 2. Move to the competition. 3. Deal with the new reality. 4. Quit being loyal to anyone and buy on price and schedule alone. 5. Find a line of work that doesn't involve frequent travel.

xliioper

Maybe. I'm not sure DL will care all that much about Mileage Run and Manufactured Spend DM's bailing to other airlines. And conversely, if these are the primary type of customers that AA and AS are picking up, how long do you think they will keep their programs intact?

StayingHomeIsBetter

I won't express disagreement with most of what you posted.

But, if your statement "They have their miles" refers to the hypothetical couple I proposed, I would submit that they have no way of knowing whether, or when, they might have their miles. VA Ave has cynically deprived them of that information by taking away the award charts.

Admittedly, the award charts only provided a "best case" target to shoot for. But, accepting what might be a high redemption value displayed on the award calendar for a particular period as the norm provides no useful info about what might be achievable with a bit more diligence and flexibility.

Taking down the award charts clearly did not provide any advantages to the consumer.

Would you assert that VA Ave was not seeking to gain an advantage by doing so?

HongKonger

Wiping their butts with this petition will be a nice change of pace from the $100 bills they usually use.

FlyingUnderTheRadar

This petition is sophomoric and worthless. The main whine is the loss of UG and FCM. Sorry WFCBFC, Delta is the business of making money.

The biggest gripe folks should have is the continuous changes Delta makes to the program. I have lost count in the past couple of years.

LaserSailor

It's not worthless, it provides hours on entertainment watching people thinking tweeting is important.

Want results, file a lawsuit like Lagan on UA. That gives even more entertainment plus free legal advice.

DL2SXM

Very well said ^

This petition is a waste of time.

Profchemnerd

I agree that this is what actually might get RA's attention. I couldn't help thinking, though, that if they switch to Spirit, then the CFOs will start getting petitions from their employees begging them to not make them fly Spirit!

Start_at_UIN

http://thegate.boardingarea.com/why-...will-not-work/

piper28

You're never going to get the mass public backing that you'd need for this, especially since the petition is targetted at diamond members. If anything, in the current political spectrum of things, that alone might cause things to go against it and have the "average" public write in to support Delta for socking it to the perceived elite.

Personally, I don't think there's even enough frequent flyers at any level for this to have any significant impact. You're not going to get the mass public behind it even without the diamond references because it just doesn't matter to them, because it really has no impact on them at all. Infrequent flyers just don't care about the frequent flyer programs, because they don't perceive that they'll ever get any benefit out of it anyways.

On top of that, I'd expect that all airlines are going to be pretty similar in their frequent flyer programs within a year or two. Expecting otherwise is probably naive.

(Personally, I'm all for FCM myself. Means I might actually fly first from time to time. Without it, I'd not likely be doing it.)

MSPeconomist

I find it ironic here that DM benefits seem to be relatively unchanged compared to the changes affecting other elites.

N830MH

Look! They care about petitions, but I don't care about the money. I just sign the petitions.