CanuckFlyHigh

I am looking forward to attending this. See email below. Let me know if there is any feedback you would like to share. My focus will be:

GOLD Counter - when we have bags or need to make changes that can't be done online, we need a better system.
Companion Voucher Expiry - One year really should be extended.
Join an Alliance (although I am likely preaching to the choir on this one)
Multi-City booking - how long can this really be down?

New changes they have made that I love:

5% earn year-round
Dedicated Gold Phone number that I can do same day changes through


Hi XXX,

Thank you for joining the WestJet Rewards Gold Advisory Council. We appreciate the feedback that you provide via our monthly surveys and would love to meet with you in person.

As a valued Gold Advisory Council member, we invite you to join Marshall Wilmot, our Senior Vice President of Marketing & Digital for an informal dinner on XXX at XXX Restaurant.. This is an invitation only opportunity to share your feedback on our program directly with our senior leadership team.

YYCguy

Not sure if this is something that you can bring up or not, but why not make an inquiry about better Plus seating on the 737 (2x2 seating) and Q400 (bigger seats) fleets?

ricktoronto

Especially since they have fleeced the full fare paying Plus passengers, e.g. me with the ripoff pricing for fully refundable and still have the blocked middle seat nonsense.

mahasamatman

At least WS doesn't talk down to their customers like the European airlines do by calling it Business Class.

SKYEG

Didn't receive one as Gold. Please talk about better plus seating on domestic (2x2) and dedicated gold check in counters or something that will work better. Alliance and multi city booking are also two I really want.

Vaclav

On the subject of vouchers - seat and lounge:

Would it be possible to have a choice which ones to have, e.g. every member gets 10 (or whatever) voucher per year and can choose all of them to be for seat assignment, or lounge or a mix.

Facility to apply the seat assignment vouchers online.

Complimentary Plus vouchers - it would be nice if members were allow to apply them online during online check in or at T 12 or T 6 or something like that.

Sunny Day

Please bring up a big benefit of Gold - same day free flight change to earlier / later flight - cannot be done over the phone by Gold line agent because my tickets are bought from a corporate travel agency. Frustrating. I get the "oh, your ticket is from a TA, we can't touch it, you have to go the airport to do that" Well that negates me trying to take an earlier / later flight if I have to go do it at the airport in person. I want confirmation without having to go the airport.

Gold counter for check in would be great. Longer expiry for companion voucher than 1 year would be great. Make it doesn't expire as long as you remain Gold. Same for Seat selection and lounger voucher.

The dramatic increase in price difference from Econo to Flex is not sitting well with many.

Serve drinks/food to Plus section while plane is still on the ground waiting for rest of boarding. Often short flights don't even get drink service so why not fully use the time while waiting before the door closes.

WJ phone app should offer same day standby and same day change function during web check in.

keitherson

Get some information on the Dreamliner seat configurations for us, and what they plan on doing with the 767s. And their LCC plans.

They must also be planning some sort of lounge at YYC. No way would they launch long-haul business class with no lounges and try to join an alliance. Even Alaska has lounges.

Sunny Day

After log in, create an export to excel function of flight transaction history include WJ dollar, flight spend, booking class, dates - allow for personal tracking.

CanuckFlyHigh

All,

I attended this dinner on Tuesday night and it was a really excellent event. There were about 20-25 Gold members, 3 WS execs (Ed Sims - EVP, Commercial, Marshall Wilmot, SVP Marketing & Digital and the SVP in charge of corporate sales/third party brokers - forget his name), and an additional 4 or so WS staff.

We sat in a large square at Alloy and began by introducing ourselves, and then had a very open dialog round table for 2 hours while we ate and drank wine. There were all ages, professions, etc, but it was clear that everyone around that table travels a lot.

I wish I had notes to remember everything, but here are a few notable things I learned:

- The low cost carrier is a real thing. It is in the planning phases and is expected to be set up by end of year.

- Multi-City booking is coming soon.

- The new Dreamliner's will have lie-flat beds. They mentioned Asia, Australia, and Europe as places they all intend to travel to.

- They will use their partner lounges in airport (Swissport or Plaza Premium) as their lounges for business class passengers.

-It did not sound like they have any plans to join an alliance, however they kind of skirted around the question. They were really flaunting the fact that you can book Delta through WS rewards, and as of Monday, they added 35 more locations, and will continue to add more.

- They are really pushing to get a Gold counter. It is one of their most common complaints on surveys.

- There was a bunch of discussion about companion passes. They expire too soon, family members can't use them, etc etc. The WS Gold phone line can help you with this.

- The biggest thing I took away from this, is that the WS Gold line has LOTS of leverage. They can bend the rules for you and make exceptions. They gave examples of letting someone use two companion vouchers for a family of 4, extending expiry dates, and even more extreme examples that I will keep to myself so people don't try to take advantage of the service. But I was very impressed with how much they can do for you.

Other that that, there were tons of suggestions to the execs/westjet team, including everything that was mentioned in this thread. The staff took vigorous notes, and they commented that nearly every change they make is due to feedback they get in the surveys - so continue to fill them out!

Thanks to the WS team for the invite. Says a lot about an airline who cares this much about getting it right. The theme of the night is that they are shifting from a low cost carrier to a full service, premium airline. It wont happen overnight, but based on their new exec hires (New Zealand, Emirates, etc) it is clear this is their goal.

Let me know of any questions.

keitherson

Great notes, thanks for keeping us updated.

If they are flaunting Delta, I'd imagine they are joining Skyteam, though it may possibly be because Delta's revenue-based SkyPesos are more easily translatable to WestJet's $ system.

I'm hoping with their transformation to a full-service carriers comes things we normally expect: seat selection, upgrades, lounge access not limited by coupons and vouchers.

YYCguy

It's already being done on the 767 in Plus (pre departure champagne or OJ) as there's two aisles and the FA can maneuver around the guests boarding, but it isn't so feasible/practical on the 737 as there's only the one aisle and one boarding door.

Error 601

Any commentary on why they offer lounge access with Plus fares only at LGW?

keitherson

It's their only long-haul route? The longest one?

Error 601

So why not offer lounge access east-bound to LGW?

All I can come up with is the "Premium Gatwick" experience must be extremely inexpensive for them to offer.