redtailshark

I wonder who you could mean by that? It isn't me. After all, unlike some of the critics here, I've spoken my mind directly to more than one major airline CEO. Face to face... namely, Colin Marshall and Larry Kellner.

I know you wouldn't have reason to be aware of this, so if you meant me, then your error is forgivable.

As usual, speculating about the character of other FT members and what they would or would not do in the presence of Jeff seems needlessly personal. It would be fun to buy Jeff a beer and laugh at the utter outrage of the 635k SM demand, to ask him how and why it all went downhill, why he couldn't accomplish what he was involved in over at AA, with the EXP program, why DL as an entity is so utterly disconnected, why DL managers aren't compelled to redeem SM for their own travel and so on. It would be fascinating. Probably more interesting than asking UA's MP director how and why MP outperforms SM by such a gigantic margin.

Bad luck, somebody has to.

When you ask for evidence of what others have posted here on FT with respect to redemptions, then you might do the same thing you recommend....

5khours

Well some of us have communicated with Jeff in a very civil manner, and when the result is that you get a long response directly from Jeff that concludes "However, all in all, I hope our customers see that our overall program is significantly better than that at UA...." because...blah, blah, and "we don't charge for drinks at our lounges" it doesn't leave a lot of options for expressing your frustration and disappointment.

I don't think anyone is trying to be hostile, but it's very frustrating to watch DL pursue policies which are terrible for their customers and incredibly detrimental to their long run franchise.

itsaboutthejourney

Better, but sorry, even that is not acceptable. The same routing would have been 100K just 6 months ago on nwa.com. (Maybe maybe 150K if there was a holiday or something such as World Cup)

To the OP's intent: I can't believe you DL folk have put up with these crazy high awards and lack of avail all these years.

florin

The screenshot was posted as proof that it DL DID come up with that price in mileage. Maybe it was a one time fluke, maybe DL has since fixed it... but it should NEVER happen.


And 320k is ok?!?

Carolinian

Any of these milage quotes from DL are an outrage. When my miles were NW WP miles, I had little problem getting high season TATL tickets, always more deeply into Europe than just a gateway, for 50K in economy.

To paraphase Churchill's famous comments to Lady Astor, we have already established that DL prostitutes its ff program, now we are only haggling over the price.

Crazyhotelguy

I totally agree... When did 200K for J to Europe become acceptable??? And yet some are proud of this find...

PaulMSN

So did anyone find any C seats for 100K? No? Then I'm not buying.

It's funny that others berate OP for spending time posting this stuff, but the regular DL defenders are here in force, making multiple posts. Maybe it is these people who should just ignore these threads and get a life. How is his posting hurting them so much that they have to post here?

I'll never understand loyalists.

DiverDave

OK, you found an award that priced out at 635,000 miles.

Was that the lowest price offered? I imagine it was not, and that you have taken the highest price offered and have come running here to FT to share your exciting news.

That's like trying to book a revenue ticket on certain dates and the lowest fare is $200 and the highest fare is $800 and complaining about the $800 fare. Outrage. Outrage! OUTRAGE! OUTRAGE!!!!

How about a screen shot that shows all of the options you were offered on those dates. I'd be fascinated to see one that shows 635K miles as the best pricing available. That would be worth printing out and mailing to Virginia Avenue.

David

GrizShel

It took me today, a day later, about 15 seconds to reproduce the OP's experience.

I get a series of options ranging from 200k to 635k.

I assumed from the way it was presented that the OP in this case was giving an example of an absurdly high mileage requirement, not searching for the lowest mileage available. Still, there are many, many cases in my experience where even the lowest mileage tickets available on a route are absurdly high in my opinion (usually 1.5 to 3x greater than what I could get a year or two ago.)

This is the 200k route I see:

phl-jfk-fco delta 6086, 246
fco-jfk-phl delta 245, 6665

a4or3s

The screen shot he posted DOES show 635K as the lowest price available.

DiverDave

NO. The screen shot he posted is the selection screen for the return flights. I want to see the selection screen for the originating flights. See post quoted below.

Well done, thank you! :-:

I agree completely. That's what we can focus on, and it's not a case of picking 635K over 200K. It's focusing on how it should be 100K most of the time and that 200K as the default level on most dates is not acceptable.

And just for grins, I went to Continental and on 7/06 returning 7/16 the best J price was 177.5K miles. (DiverDave steps back and waits for the torrent of outrage.)

David

kb1992

+1

The default 200K level is a rip-off because most other carriers offer low mileage awards on many dates.

zsmith2

From CO.com....2 stops going over to CDG (PHL-MAN-BRU-CDG!) otherwise there is no availabilty! I'd rather pay a little extra to get only one stop!

Taxes/Fees
U.S. Security Service Fee $5.00
U.K. Passenger Service Charge $19.80
Belgium Embarkation Tax $20.50
MJ $0.90
Italy Council City Tax $5.80
Italy Security Bag Charge $2.60
Italy Security Charge $2.30
Italy Embarkation Tax $9.70
U.S. Customs User Fee $5.50
U.S. Immigration User Fee $7.00
U.S. APHIS User Fee $5.00

Certain taxes/fees list above are included in the originally quoted price.

1 Reward 177,500 Miles
Additional Taxes/Fees $84.10
Total Price 177,500 Miles and $84.10

Purchase this reservation without redeeming miles.

Flight Details:
Depart:
8:40 p.m.
Wed., Jul. 7, 2010
Philadelphia, PA (PHL) Arrive:
8:45 a.m. +1 Day
Thu., Jul. 8, 2010
Manchester, England (MAN) Flight Time:
7 hr 5 mn Flight: US734
Aircraft: Airbus A330-300
Fare Class: Business (I)
Meal: Dinner
No Special Meal Offered.

Change Planes. Connect time in Manchester, England (MAN) is 1 hour 50 minutes.
Depart:
10:35 a.m.
Thu., Jul. 8, 2010
Manchester, England (MAN) Arrive:
12:55 p.m.
Thu., Jul. 8, 2010
Brussels, Belgium (BRU) Flight Time:
1 hr 20 mn Flight: SN2174
Aircraft: Avro RJ85
Fare Class: Business (I)
Meal: Snack
No Special Meal Offered.
Change Planes. Connect time in Brussels, Belgium (BRU) is 50 minutes.
Depart:
1:45 p.m.
Thu., Jul. 8, 2010
Brussels, Belgium (BRU) Arrive:
3:55 p.m.
Thu., Jul. 8, 2010
Rome, Italy (FCO) Flight Time:
2 hr 10 mn

Travel Time:
13 hr 15 mn Flight: SN3181
Aircraft: Boeing 737-300
Fare Class: Business (I)
Meal: Snack
No Special Meal Offered.


US Airways flight 734 operated by US Airways.
Brussels Airlines flight 2174 operated by Brussels Airlines.
Brussels Airlines flight 3181 operated by Brussels Airlines.




Depart:
9:50 a.m.
Fri., Jul. 16, 2010
Rome, Italy (FCO) Arrive:
1:30 p.m.
Fri., Jul. 16, 2010
New York/Newark, NJ (EWR - Liberty) Flight Time:
9 hr 40 mn Flight: CO41
Aircraft: Boeing 767-400ER
Fare Class: BusinessFirst (ZN)
Meal: Lunch

Change Planes. Connect time in New York/Newark, NJ (EWR - Liberty) is 2 hours 40 minutes.
Depart:
4:10 p.m.
Fri., Jul. 16, 2010
New York/Newark, NJ (EWR - Liberty) Arrive:
5:23 p.m.
Fri., Jul. 16, 2010
Philadelphia, PA (PHL) Flight Time:
1 hr 13 mn

Travel Time:
13 hr 33 mn Flight: CO8803
Aircraft: Bombardier Q200
Fare Class: Economy (KN)
Meal:

zsmith2

From UA.com

Passenger 1 210,000 miles 129.90 USD 210,000 miles + 129.90 USD

Ticket total: 210,000 miles + 129.90 USD
6:00 AM PHL - 7:11 AM ORD United 337
C210
View seats
connecting to
6:02 PM ORD - 9:25 AM CDG United 942
C210
View seats
Arrives next day
Flight details

11:20 AM CDG - 1:35 PM ORD United 943
C210
View seats
connecting to
4:00 PM ORD - 7:13 PM PHL United 7398
C210
View seats
Operated byUNITED EXPRESS/ GOJET AIRLINES

zsmith2

From USAir.com:

350,000 mi

754 6:20 PM PHL 7:55 AM CDG (0) 7h 35m
755 11:40 AM CDG 2:04 PM PHL (0) 8h 24m