Originally Posted by
John Thacker
I certainly don't think it will benefit me, but neither am I surprised that they would change a policy that they thought was being "gamed."
I'm highly confused. If the current system has been "a completely unsustainable model for so many years," why are you so surprised that it's changing? If something can't go on forever, it will stop.
Thanks for your comments John; we're actually in agreement here, my message is about not being surprised anymore after so many changes for the worse and the news about new or rising fees all the time. For some time now it's all been about increasing or creating new fees, providing less FF benefits, devaluing FF miles; nothing surprises me anymore.
And BTW I don't think this policy change had anything to do with people gaming the standby system; you can still do it, it's just not free anymore but it may still be worth it in certain cases.
Originally Posted by
John Thacker
United, or any other company, doesn't adopt policies on the basis of being "nice" or "mean." They're always out to maximize profits.
Agreed but a company can choose to maximize profits by either getting more customers (transactions) or by increasing the revenue per transaction. United is definitely not changing the policy in an attempt to get more customers and is trying to increase revenue by creating such a complex pricing and fee structure that it's literally becoming a bait-and-switch type of business. And a side effect is that its image is getting hurt, even among its own frequent flyers, and a lot of FFs like me are choosing not to fly as much anymore because of all the hassle with security, baggage, rude employees, so while the revenue may be up short term, United is bound to lose even more customers in the long run. But of course Wall St doesn't care about anything long term, they'll just keep increasing fees or creating new ones and flying fewer (packed) planes until they're no longer competitive or no one wants to fly with them anymore. That's what's unsustainable about this model in my opinion, you don't make a business more successful by pis***** off your customers.