Originally Posted by
WillBarrett_68
but they only make a single fixed contribution for the year regardless of how many times they visit the club or how long they consume seating space. People using cards are continually generating revenue for delta over and over, month after month.
I'm not sure why people get hung up on "membership" as being some exalted status that deserves unending adulation, it's a method to access the club and Delta has sent an extremely clear message that they don't see it as any more special than using a card.
When DL raises membership fees, those who use SCs less frequently are more likely to drop their memberships. The same would be true of people who get expensive credit cards primarily for SC access.
There could also be an issue of "revenge" SC use: people think they're paying a big fixed fee for access, so they make a point of using lounges more frequently, for longer periods, and consume more F&B while in the lounge.
Originally Posted by
GUWonder
Given this question remains unanswered:
“Is it no waivers and no favors on this for the US Congresspersons (Senators and Reps) wanting to use the SkyClub at DCA?”
I take it that my respectfully responding to non-answer responses to my question isn’t the issue as much as a profound dislike for the question about whether DL has a policy where some SkyClub users are less equal than other SkyClub users with regard to the 3 hour rule. Thus, it’s not amazing that there is all this tangential “what have you seen”, “how do you know” or “whom do you know” downstream banter, even as all of that is irrelevant to the question asked — a question for which there must be a factual answer no matter how much the question about the 3 hour rule is disliked.
Any airline not on a sanctions list, if interested.
AFAIK DCA still has a separate SC section for elected officials and other VIPs. A few other airports (IIRC LAX is one and JFK would also make sense) so one could ask the same question regarding celebrity early lounge access.
Originally Posted by
ijgordon
Lol, I'm inclined to agree - NOBODY needs to spend 3 hours in a lounge. Obviously there is some cost element of this (food consumption) as well as the crowding issue, so I don't have (much) sympathy for the OP (I mean could he have promised not to eat or drink anything until T-3h? I suppose
).
The problem with using boarding time is that AFAIK it only shows up on the boarding pass, and can vary by destination and aircraft type. If someone can't do OLCI then they won't know what the boarding time is before they plan their trip to the airport. 3h prior to
departure and therefore ~2h20m of max lounge time seems pretty reasonable.
DL has been advising everyone, including DMs with paid D1 tickets, to arrive four hours early at certain international airports. It would be very annoying for a D1 passenger to be denied access to an AF/KLM/VS lounge when the premium cabin passenger arrived on time and was able to get to the lounge in less than an hour for check in/baggage check, exit passport control, and airport security. In fact, I recently went from the airport door to the lounge in less than an hour when originating at AMS and CDG.
Originally Posted by
GUWonder
I have to disagree on this. Sometimes DL flyers have to drive rather substantial distances — in what may turn out to be rather inclement weather — to get to DL hub and focus city airports and deal with whatever is going on with traffic on the roads to the airports and whatever the situation is at the DL airport/terminal. And an airport-bound roadtrip which takes maybe 1-5 hours on a good day to a DL airport can sometimes take twice that or longer on a bad day and the variance can be extreme enough that it just makes sense to try to get there hours earlier than when the weather and traffic picture is all rosy. And when not able or willing to just ditch the car and get a quick replacement drive mid-journey, it sometimes becomes even more necessary at times to plan on being at the airport even way earlier than 3 or 4 hours before scheduled departure even if the weather and traffic picture looks good. Add on how finicky airlines can be with international check-in at times and their limited capacity for manual check-in, and there are good reasons why passengers entitled to lounge access may want to spend more than 3 hours in the lounges so as to try to get work done.
It can also be very reasonable to plan to arrive extremely early when there are strikes.
In terms of winter driving, I can recall a time when I left my hotel four hours early for what normally should be a one hour drive to the airport (on roads that I know reasonably well and that don't have major rush hour problems) and I still missed my flight from an outstation.
In addition to winter weather, road closures, construction, and detours can cause major delays. Recently I experienced an unanticipated detour for bridge repair work that caused my drive (fortunately on a raod trip so that I wasn't going to an airport) to be extended by more than an hour.
Originally Posted by
indufan
I am pretty sure it doesn't. I think it is a consistent 40 minutes.
RJs board later (30 minutes for CRJ-900s and it might be even less for CRJ-200s) and wide body international flights board earlier (60 minutes for at least most routes).
Originally Posted by
physicsdude
From my experience, this happens a lot at DTW, but the past few weeks, I've been in some queues at BOS and LGA where a lot of people in front of me wave their Amex card to get in. The thing is, you can often see the difference between those who have Amex cards and those who have status/membership/in a premium cabin. Those with Amex cards often have a group of people enter with them, waste space by spreading out their stuff on other empty seats nearby, and create a mess.
The thing is, DL thinks that their SkyClubs are on-par with the Al-Mourjan lounge at DOH, Polaris lounges, or Flagship lounges but they're frankly not and need a reality check. Problem is, even if all of the people with status/membership/in a premium cabin stop using Sky Clubs, they'll still be packed with all of the Amex guests.
Some of us can enter SCs by multiple methods. When I have a D1 ticket and an AmEx Plat charge card or DL reserve card, am I one or the undesirables? Is your answer different when I'm taking a flight in domestic FC?
Originally Posted by
jiburi
DEN also has AMEX Centurion Lounge also enforcing the 3 hour rules. My guess is they are enforcing the same rule for Centurion Lounge at Sky Club as you are using the same access method. Tho I could be wrong, AMEX could deny compensation to SC if swiped more than 3 hours.
Jiburi
IIRC Centurion cardholders are exempt from the three hour rule for AmEx Centurion lounges and they were also exempted from the no use on arrival restriction. Do DL SCs treat Centurion card access differently and allow originating passengers to enter early?
What about DL 360s? Does the three hour rule apply to them? In fact, when access upon arrival was prohibited, was this enforced for 360s?
Originally Posted by
WillBarrett_68
The three-hour rule in DL sky clubs is a Delta rule, not an amex rule. It applies to people entering on D1 tickets, with (annual) memberships, etc. It has nothing to do with the access method.
I'm not so sure about 360s, certain VIPs, and Centurion cardholders.