PLeblond

Anyone care to add the preface to the comment? For context? Or is simply posting the part they take offence to repeatedly adequate for you?

"I should state for the record we value all our customers, indeed we know where our bread is buttered. That said, what I was trying to convey was the idea that the ostensible expectation of getting something for free (i.e. sitting in J but paying for Y) is not a sustainable business practice. Why is it wrong of us to compare ourselves to our Asian competitors? Many posters on here excoriate our J cabin compared to these guys, so why is it wrong to try and improve (and implement the access controls they already have) ? I've said this many times, but from what I'm hearing it would seem that we are expected to have the J quality of a Euro/Asian carrier with the access policies of an American one. That just doesn't work."

Paying for Y and getting J is a stupid business practice that makes frequent flyers believe they are entitled to things they did not pay for simply because they fly a lot. It was a mistake to start it in the first place and a very difficult thing to reverse.

Here is the meassage recent changes are trying to say: If you attain SE status for a low dollar amount and plan on flying J only through eUps, AC wants you to know that they no longer want you as an SE. They'll gladly accept you as an E50 or E75, but not as an SE. If you don't like that message...too bad. If your feelings are hurt...get over it.

Just don't reply that you have been 'loyal' all these years because everyone knows that if someone was offering a better alternative, you would have jumped ship a long time ago.

Why is this so hard for (supposedly) intelligent people to understand????

DaveObee

Admiral Ackbar's post after this one confirmed, once again, that Ben Lipsey's words were taken out of context, misrepresented, and so on.

Ben never said "our customers," he said "it," and that was a reference to moving people up to J, it was not a reference to the people themselves, no matter how some people have tried to twist his words to make him sound like pre-redemption Scrooge.

But this was pointed out more than a year ago, and for the most part fell on deaf ears. People believe what they want to believe, not matter how unfounded that belief might be.

Can we blame Ben for pulling away? It's impossible for one person to deal with an onslaught of social media nonsense, because it's one against dozens, and every time that one reacts, the words will be twisted again in multiple ways. It's impossible to win. (Unless you have been in that sort of position, I doubt you will understand, and we don't need your theories on what he should have done.)

The comments about what Big Ben did or did not do are also a waste of time. Sheer speculation. Unless you were in the room, had a good look at an email trail, or something similar, you don't know. Even assumptions based on a person's job title are counter-productive. How many people here have been in high-level positions in big corporations? Would Ben report only to himself?? Come on.

This board is weaker because the Bens are not here. The people who drove them away have, in my humble opinion, cheapened the FT experience.

Admiral Ackbar

Don't know why people are getting their panties in a bunch. I was merely challenging the assertion that the quote could not be found.

Overly sensitive FT crowd as usual...

DaveObee

You proved that it could not be found. "Exact wording" matters, only exact wording should be placed in quotes.

SparseFlyer

Thanks for bring this post back up ^ I thought it was forever lost

I still can't believe how this post caused an outrage on FT.

Nowhere in that post I can see Ben saying FFs or FT cheapens the J product. Like PLeblond says, it clearly refers to a practice of consistently upgrading pax to empty seats, and not to a group of people.

And you know what? It does cheapen the J cabin, regardless of how you want to frame it.



Careful with that, you will get attention from a subset of customers that believe that purchasing something entitles them to receive something else for free.

Because, well, you know, that's how life works. It's what I tell all the merchant I deal with. "Listen, I just purchased something from you at market value. Therefore, I will return here in a couple days to claim free products/services from you."


Side note edit: I do not mean that all "entitlement" is wrong, or that no one should/is allowed to complain. For example, flyers like yyznomad who (I would assume) spends in the 6 figure amounts with AC and flies their plane every week are absolutely 'entitled' to voice their opinions about how certain parts of the prodcut offering is "finger-in-bum-full-of-sneezes-licking good", or how certain AC IT features or AC rules are creating issues in receiving benefits/services that were allocated to him by AC (for example issues with upgrading a flight on lat flight pass).

However, you don't hear him saying "AC needs to give me moar free upgrades". You know why? Because normal people understand the fact of life of "paying for what you want", or "getting what you paid for".

Sorry for using you as an example Mr. Nomad.



Your mistake here is to assume we are intelligent.

I will say that, at this point, we will most likely never see BenL/BenS/AY in this forum (at least not under their official aliases).


However, I think it would be nice if we could get an anonymous AC presence like in other forums.


I'm sure they could get a few PR interns to take turns on the forum

bizorbetter

yes, as it relates to the thread title.Unlike your post lol.

too funny

bizorbetter

i think it's clear that ever since this thread became 'nasty' that there are a group of posters (and i'm not naming them) that will defend the company at any cost and no matter how bad they interact or treat their customers.

maybe they have reason too? But for me personally i will continue to call it as i see it .......for example AC has a great long haul J class and i have always given them credit for their lounges as well.

But when they drop the ball i will say so, regardless of the many kool-aid drinkers that have to rush to their defense

SparseFlyer

I don't see many kool-aid drinkers though. Nearly everyone I can think of that posts regularly on this board has both "praised" and "shamed" AC (both current, past, and banned members, all to varying degrees but still in both directions).


Personally, I find that many posters labelled as 'kool-aid drinkers' (as per the grapevine, no pun intended), are wrongfully accused.

Just like some that are labelled as "AC haters", but in reality really do appreciate the airline and just want to see the offering improve.


I think the issue is more that there is a small minority of extremes that post aggressively (figuratively and literally) and break down the discussions.


We can definitely tell that not many here have never explored much the topics offered by humanities courses, which could've upped their understand of social behaviour and how to sucessfully and constructively interact in groups.

J. Leslie

Nailed it ^

PLeblond

Having been accused as being an apologist, a kool-aide drinker, an AC lover et. al. I can tell you that most of that probably stems from my disdain for the attitudes of a not insignificant sub-section of Flyertalk itself. I often find myself arguing against entitlement,
nit picking and piling on rather than defending the airline in question.

In most cases as such, as in this one, I am an 'entitled whining FT hater' more than an airline apologist. But I can understand the confusion.

I'll try to be more clear in the future.

superangrypenguin

I read your post a few times, and I believe it really boils down to this.

I disagree with you. I liked the honesty and the transparency. The second one introduces someone with PR training, then another FTer will go, "cut the crap!". You had mentioned in your post about the desire to have someone not mess with you (e.g. the "spin"), my opinion is that there wasn't much spin. When Ben saw a spade, he called it a spade, whether or not we liked it.

On one hand you want someone to call a spade a spade, but then (quoted), you want someone who has PR training whose job is to spin things?

I'm confused. Help me understand?

skybluesea

I'm sure Adam.Smith will agree that in Economics, no such thing as "free lunch" - consequently, if I understand your paraphrase, AC is getting INSUFFICIENT return from the bargain previously struck, and now wishes to change the bargain, which they can unilaterally do, per the AE agreement. But under NO circumstances has any traveller been getting anything for FREE - the FF bargain involved the trade-off of AE benefits, diminishing as they may be.

Please remember all those corporate travelers who don't get to travel J anymore because company policy no longer allows it - this is often because the very same corporations have negotiated corporate rates with airlines, so the benefit accrues back to the Company for the volume discount represented by FF benefit, rather than them landing on the traveller directly, or in partial form with Tango fares, etc.

I have seen FT whining that travelers should get FF benefits because they do the hard work of butts in seats - WRONG, this is part of the negotiation with your employer on your compensation. If your firm decides they wish to keep the volume discount AC offers for FF, you may need a lesson in salary negotiations 101.

My clients are always willing to buy my tickets, and some do not give me the option - but I prefer to buy myself, as long as the fare is the same for my client, because then I get all the flexibility that comes from making this choice. BUT, in return I only get reimbursed with my invoice, often months later, so I accrue interest costs for this choice, which my clients avoid. But the freedom to choose has way more benefits, although if interest rates skyrocket, then I might think again.

I also disagree with your bit about carrier alternatives - have posted on this before, but suffice to say we have insufficient air travel choice in Canada than desirable because of public policy reasons, but that's a debate for elsewhere.

SparseFlyer

The poster? Or the 18th century philosopher?

YEG_SE4Life

Admiral Ackbar,

It is as I thought. You can't find the exact wording. The wording i'm looking for started with 'our customers'. I still challenge anyone to show me that. Otherwise, it is nothing more than a spin on what was actually said, placed in quotation marks to deceive anyone who hadn't read, or doesn't remember, the original post.

bizorbetter

if your best defense is that the wording was not verbatim that says a lot.

Everyone here knows what was said