2011 Air Canada Top Tier Program Speculation
 

If you think about it, this other thread about the 2010 Air Canada Top Tier program is just old, and seems to be running out of steam.

Plus too, what matters now is what Air Canada decides to do with its customers for 2011. Fact is folks, WE THE CUSTOMER are the ones who give them the right to fill their planes.

So let's own this topic before Air Canada puts their spin on it.

With that said, let's see:

• what do you expect to be maintained?
• what should not be chipped away at?
• what would be a positive boost?

Plus too, you can help to keep this post alive and at the top of the first page by posting to it

Two minutes in. Keep those thoughts coming!

I'd really like to see IKK remain but J capacity control issue fixed, i.e. decouple from R inventory. I personally would like to have a reasonable chance to use it for some specific NA flights at least.

Auto upgrades would be great, even if meals weren't provided for these; alternatively, give a few "standby upgrade" certs, usable only at the gate and after all others have cleared.

I personally have found that I could live with the current system. OTOH it's clear that there is a bunch of people for whom it's no good. Such as people with no relative satisfying the requirements.

Furthermore, I don't see why the choice between this year's and last years should be a mutually exclusive thing. So my suggestion would be that AC allow IKK *either* like this year (R inventory only) *or* like the year before, 30% penalty and the FF also in J in at least one leg.

At this point there are three things that would make feel like Air Canada really cares about top-tier flyers:

A) No fees for SE Aeroplan bookings/changes
B) 24/7 Aeroplan call centre for E/SE
C) Allow SE routing changes on Star Alliance reward tickets - with my super busy travel schedule I've been really stuck a few times. I had a supervisor do it once, so it's possible but seems they don't do it because it's a lot of work not because it's not possible :rolleyes:

I've started to embrace the joy of F flying and stopped booking AC flight rewards, so not too fussed about these, although it seems that the current blocking of rewards for SE is too much. While I'm happy to fly AC and upgrade to earn my status, when it comes to using miles I use them almost exclusively for short-haul (when NYC is $1,000 round-trip) or ultra-long-haul routes on the Asian carriers.

Mike

Wirelessly posted (iPhone: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)

1) Waive award fees for SE or return to full J IKK (would rather the former; not expecting both)

2) UA-like "One Call" phone center... revenue and award reservations, CS and lost luggage in one shot...

3) Some kind of confirmable upgrade from T+ fares.

These are the only things I miss about my old UA 1K status. Well, that and unlimited domestic upgrades, but I don't expect (or necessarily want) that on AC.

I don't think they could afford a 1K-like phone centre...there just aren't enough SEs to support that.

bite your tongue! I love it! Also I cant get used to Aerolotto at AC I love the SWU at UA where they can clear when I book.^

After all these years of SE, I'm giving it up this year they have cut too much from the program.

Electronic upgrades
 

Well, as you may have seen on the thread regarding upgrading Latitude fares after Feb 28, 2011, Andrew has indicated they are tentatively planning to introduce some sort of electronic upgrade system. Andrew also said that most of us would find this very positive (which makes sense since people have been harping about this for a while now).

As far as the never-ending IKK debate goes, as I am one who has no eligible family members according to AC rules, I vote for removal of the capacity control for the SE member at least. Perhaps then it is permissible to either capacity control or charge a 30% premium for the SE's family members. We have to find some middle ground where SE's get some benefit for being SE's yet AC can still be profitable and competitive.

deleted - wrong thread.

I suspect we won't see much change, but I would love some flexibility with change tickets that have 21 day advanced charges.

Example, YYZ-IAH, we finished a day early, I would have happily paid the change fee and fly home the previous day, instead because I was "inside" the 21 day window, it would have cost me $1000 to change my ticket.

Had the same issue YYG-YYZ and since we didn't have the advanced purchase, paid the fee and go home early.

SEs need that kind of flexibility trans border

and better T+ upgrade access (those M fares are just too expensive to justify)

[QUOTE=why fly;....

After all these years of SE, I'm giving it up this year they have cut too much from the program.[/QUOTE]

We will miss your SE presence:p


Buh bye la:D:D:D

Actually he said many people would be happy.

He said many people would be happy with this change as well :)

1) Canceling the ridicules fuel surcharge when using reward tickets without increasing the amount of points that you need to redeem free ticket.

Do let Air Canada tell you that the need to increase the amount of points to do it, because the fact is that we already are paying in average 20% more on the revenue tickets which award us the points we use to get the free tickets.

2) Complementary upgrade at the gate for Super Elite if their is a free space in J class which is not sold or claimed by Elite or Super Elite members. In other word instead of flying with empty seats give them to SE that doesn't have certificate starting from the one that paid the highest far for the ticket.

That thread is meant to include suggestions on all sorts of things, including service, bunch of stuff unrelated to top tier FF program.

OTOH, current thread includes or could include more than suggestions. For instance we now know that electronic certificates are coming.

Does it harm to keep things as they are, with both threads alive?