I stronglyy disagree.
Regarding all the complaining about the EUA, since FC seats are not going out empty, it would seem to me that the EUA program is more fair than the old system.
I have been on 4 flights in the last month where first class seats went empty. On one of them my wife was not allowed a Gold Companion upgrade because she was flying on a reward ticket. This is technically within the rules, but has been done before. In any case, I see no great efforst of late to fill the First Class section.
As to whether F seats are not being released at the Platinum window, or in some cases until the day before the flight, does it really matter with the EUA (assuming that it enforces the heirarchy as published)? A Platinum will be ahead of Golds, Silvers, and other Platinums that purchase tickets later (except for Y fares) regardless of when inventory is released into F.
-snip-
I say this only after they have stopped doing manual upgrades on the phone. The reason I say this has already been mentioned: if F inventory is not available at your first EUA window, then you stood the chance of having your seat scooped by someone lower in the pecking order calling in for a manual upgrade.
So, what was essentially an issue of CO yield management not releasing upgrade seats in a reasonable manager has been turned into a war between silvers/golds and platinums for what is essentially not enough upgrades to go around. Platinums always thought it was those dam* silvers snatching their upgrades at the last minute, and now that this is impossible under EUA, and platinums have posted here that they were still "aced-out" of an upgrade at the last minute (when inventory showed "F" available that they were not allowed to get manually and no upgrade came) we have seen proof that all of this sliver /gold blaming was a lie.
I know that some have said that we really have no way of telling that the EUA is actually implementing the published heirarchy. This thoery implies that perhaps CO will make exceptions for certain undisclosed reasons, and put some people at the front of the line. I'd like to point out that this ability on CO's part is nothing new with the EUA: who's to say that with the old manual system, certain people who were granted special upgrade priority and were given upgrades when manually requested, even when there was no F inventory at the time? We'd have no way of knowing that this was going on then, just as we have no way of knowing that it's happening with the EUA.
We now have circumstances (unlike the one you describe) where there IS an F class seat available that should have been given to an elite in their window, it is not done by EUA, the elite calls in to get it (as the one-pass rules say they are entitled to do) the agent REFUSES to manually give them the upgrade that he or she confirms is available, and the elite does not get upgraded on the flight. We therfore do have a vastly different set of circumstances than before, where we can see the rules are being broken yet are powerless to do anything about it.
I think it comes down to how much we trust CO to be fair about the policies, and has nothing to do with the EUA. Personally, I see no reason to distrust them on this point.
Not to get personal, but how long have you been flying on CO? Were you there for Frank Lorenzo? Were you there for "Continental Lite" and the ensuing letter of aoplogy. Were you there for the first "October suprise" if not htis year's? How many international upgrade rewards have you had to redeposit into your account (at your espense) because you found out you were not allowed to use them only on the day of flight? No reason to distrust them?????? That's either blind loyalty or plain stupidity.
The problems I see (saw?) with the EUA were:
1. Premature implementation before customer notification
2. Early bugs in the system.
3. Initial published rules didn't explain the system in sufficient detail.
you left out:
1) They skewed the program again to the upper spenders, or the "elite, elite". This hurt the lower and mid elite and the economy traveler at all levels.
2) They did it IN THE MIDDLE / END OF THE YEAR AGAIN!!!. Hey, if this is announced in January, maybe I and others pick another company to fly on for the year. To be a person planning out my 25k or 50k milles of loyalty and expecting a specific level of service, to now find out that that service will be rare or non-existent unless I reach 75K, or expecting a level of service for 75K, and finding out that the equation is now more heavily influenced by $$ than the loyalty miles I've been working on all year is an insulting slap in the face. Fair companys (one's running a loyalty program) ought to know what changing the rules in the middle of the game does to loyalty.
3) As the endless commercials say, "...winning Inside Flyer's Freddie awards and J.D. Power's awards for best frequent flyer program three years in a row..." You have a system here that has struck the PERFECT balance to please all of it's customers - at all levels from twice a year flyer to Platinum elite. WHY CHANGE SOMETHING THAT EVERYONE LIKES AND THAT ISN'T BROKEN??????????
4) I've read these forums...So have some of the folks from Continental I suspect. Have we asked for this??? Even hinted at this??? I've never seen a word about it. I've seen (thanks Boomer) a pretty comprehensive annual list of what changes and improvements to One Pass that we, the elite, loyal flyers would like to see (more and better international upgrade possibilities, ability to use miles for President's club memberships, additional awards for Platinums over 100K, etc.). This stupid autoupgrade change then not only represents a slap in the face to all of the people who use the system and are not the top tier and highest payers, but it's also an additional slap in the face to all of the elite flyers who voiced what would represent good changes to them, and who have been completely ignored.
So then the remaining questions that have NEVER been answered by anyone at Continental are:
1)Why was the EUA imposed rather than announced?
2) Why have specific attempts to contact and inform elites of this change not been made? (I still have received no notice or e-mail.)
3)Why were the feelings of Elite flyers not actively solicited, but rather just assumed?
4)Why was a change made to One Pass immediately, when One Pass's own rules state CO has the right to make changes with 60 days notice?
5)Why was this system put into place without thinking out all of the ramifications (like people who don't want upgrades being forced to take them and not being able to sit next to their traveling companions on full flights)?
6)Why, after the debacle of a few years ago, did CO think it appropriate to fundamentally change the program in October AGAIN after people had already earned status levels for the following year? Why didn't CO announce this in January 2001 to take effect in January 2002?
7)Why is CO, despite the promises of the last October switch, distributing unsolicited, complimentary platinum elite status, placing potential new customers ahead of their loyal silver and gold elites?
Since all of these problems are now behind us, I'm very happy with the way it is now. Since the above problems seem very out of character for CO, I think this reflects poorly only on the individuals that were managing the EUA cutover, and not CO as a whole (assuming of course that this problem was recognized by CO upper brass and steps have been taken to keep it from happening again on another project).
So by that logic, the employees of Continental who thought of and implimented EUA were at fault, but the management was blameless? They were acting as renegades, on their own in an environment without any supervision or management responsibility? You really believe that? OK I guess. From now on, lets convict all of the soldiers for war crimes, but send christmas cards to the Generals and Dictators who are not at fault.
*****
Make no mistake about it, the EUA is a mistake - the latest slap in the face of an arrogant airline that has consiously decided at all management levels that being better that everyone else is good enough, and if everyone else stinks, then they feel they just need to stink less.
Every one of the stated goals of the EUA could have been accomplished in a way that was fair to all elites. It was not. It is a Yield Management mask, that has fooled (many of the) planinums into thinking a favor was done for them, and has outright screwed the golds and silvers. Many on these forums have said so. (At least the ones who don't have personal connections to Continental.) If we don't speak out as a group and say "no fair" in a loud voice with our Freddie and JD power votes
and wallets behind us, then Continental will continue it's downhil slide, fully confident in the fact (as Randy has stated) that it's loyal customers accept lousy changes like lemmings.
[This message has been edited by NJDavid (edited 12-25-2000).]