Originally Posted by
3Cforme
Please point to the major U.S. frequent flyer plan that makes such a promise. It doesn't exist, IMHO. Typical language for nearly 20 years has made it very clear that:
- points/miles are the property of the carrier, not the individual
- terms can be changed unilaterally by the carrier
- plans can be terminated on fairly short (six months) notice
The OP has a point even if there may be less certainty to the valuations as presented. (Sales at $0.01 per mile? I recall something on the order of half that for DL and AA but won't go digging through annual reports to confirm.)
Carriers have lots of data about breakage and with tens of millions of participants in major plans, the plans are demographically diversified - not a big fraction of those tens of millions will redeem so obsessively as the deep FlyerTalk crowd. Carriers really won't want to cede control: they want a safety valve (changing earning rates, changing redemption rates, changing fees, imposing time restrictions) to make sure $1000 worth of points never displaces a real $5000 international business ticket.
I've pushed the family into cash-back cards for better value. (Selfishly, too. It's easier for me to handle their ticket buying that way, instead of digging, digging for Saver redemptions on legacy carriers.)
I was being mildly sarcastic, but I do believe that if they took the devaluations too far, some court somewhere might rule for the passengers in a class action suit. The marketing and advertising certainly promises free trips and US Airways pilots and flight attendants openly hawk the credit card sign up bonuses during the flight (saying things like "that is enough miles for a free trip"). If they cancelled the programs and made the miles truly worthless, while the airline itself was profitable, lots of class action attorneys would pop up, figuring they would get a settlement without going to court on the precise program terms and conditions. A devaluation is the same - just an injury to the mile holders who acquired the miles while the redemption rate was X - instead of a death to the program. The airlines have to determine how badly they can injure without having adverse consequences (either legal or business consequences) to themselves.