Originally Posted by
eternaltransit
As always, and I think airlines are pushing people to this mentality more and more, is for people to make their purchasing decisions based on price and schedule and convenient and product, not because of their loyalty program. The "loyalty" programs are no longer there to try and attract business and keep you there to go out of your way to use them, but instead are more like a rebate scheme if you hit certain revenue/spend levels. The paradigm shift of course is painful for people who have optimised their purchasing patterns around a program over immediate product.
It might be heresy for a community like Flyertalk, but I think people should ignore loyalty schemes and book for the offering instead and be happy that you get a rebate at the end of it. Airlines want a history of revenue and profit from you (and I can't blame them), instead of trying to lure people who promise some nebulous "future business" if they get pandered to.
Tbh Emirates Skywards is a pretty poor scheme but it works for me as I tend to fly with them most unless it's to SA in which case I tend to fly Etihad as I use the miles accumulated with Euro airline travel.
For me product quality and convenience comes first but with price hikes happening coupled with the fact I pay on a personal card then claim back makes it slightly harder for me to justify the increase in fares, if the company paid for it straight up then fine but as I need to pay first, maybe it's not quite as fine.
Also the whole part about airlines wanting revenue and profit rather than potential 'future business' based on a loyalty scheme, I fully understand where you and they're coming from but why would they risk current frequent flyers like that? I'll most likely fly Emirates when I need to rather than because it's the better option and in all fairness to Etihad, their product is a lot better and in some cases, it exceeds Emirates.