All airlines/FFP's change their qualification requirements - since 2009, UA has, AC has, DL has, BA has for 'Euro cheats', KL/AF has by slashing earning rates - and there are doubtless many more, and more still to come. You can never 'trust' any program not to require more the following year, so you just have to hope that you pick the most stable one. In that respect, I'd be much happier banking on A3 than any of the NA carriers.

I don't understand why you think this change is retroactive - it has not taken place in the past. A3 has honoured status achieved in 2012, 2013 or 2014 into 2015, and now is giving you as much notice as any other FFP has in recent times that from 2015 the requirements will change and you will need to earn miles annually to re-qualify.

If they ran status down, mine wouldn't expire until 2017 under the old rules because I have credited way more than 16k every year since 2012 when I joined (my current rolling year stands at 70k miles), although my card expires in 2015. That's why they need a cut-off date and a fresh start, otherwise there will be all sorts of people with later cut-off dates who have not credited, compared to those who qualified early and have kept crediting (for which it sounds like we may be rewarded with some roll-over in 2015). I qualified under the old rules, now I have to qualify under the new ones - that's life, and for me the changes are actually positive. Only those who tried to really milk the system have substantially lost out - so don't be surprised if there's not an enormous amount of sympathy for people in that position!