yourbackseatkiller

Now is the time... to join the dAArkside..?

philelite

This is going to bankrupt Aimia!

I predict everyone is going to burn their points ASAP, Aimia will suffer, and there will be massive devaluations in points in the coming months / years.

fin 645

I assume it's no coincidence that AC's announcement was made on the same day Aimia's Annual Meeting is being held in Toronto. Rupert Duschene has retired after having been on "medical leave".

Aside from having AP miles to get rid of, accumulating more right now seems risky. For CC credits, I now have to decide the best options. And once the new AC program starts, it seems that everyone is supposed to start from scratch - strange strategy. There are going to have to be some incentives.

grandgourmand

Time to burn!!! A nice trip to Europe on LX's nice aircraft, or South America on Copa or Avianca, or exotic Asia on China Airlines would be awesome. Going to check on availability right post-haste!

alc

Are we sure AC IT is really better than AP?

I submit a question on the AC web site about this change:

https://www.aircanada.com/ca/en/aco/...questions.html

While I did get a confirmation on the web page that my message had been sent, I also immediately got the following email:

wonderful.

---- or did someone got fired already at Air Canada

heraclitus

At least there's 3 years so it won't be a bank run scenario where everyone attempts to cash out all at once.

So how will Aimia counter? Surely they must have something up their sleeve beyond just becoming an imitation of Air Miles.

The smallest state

They have a business model that works great as long as they have the exclusive long term deal with AC. They get cash for points but have to burn cash to buy flights. Now they have 3 more years of cash coming on board and ______ billion miles people have banked.

Expect a mad dash to the exit and people burning through miles.

You have to wonder about the following scenario's

1/ Aimia going bust before this transpires. Will AC "honor/honour" anything?
2/ Transition period.........Will there be a hard date or will there be a soft transition of say, 6 months where you can choose the new FF plan or Aeroplan?


These people who 'bank' miles for retirement really make me wonder. My dad does it with United and AA. I keep telling him to use them up. He looks at them like some people look at their life savings, save, save, save. All you need is enough for the next flight you want to take. USE 'EM.




Good luck to all on here. I hope nobody is stuck with superfluous aeroplan points where they can end up with either really high costs to book a flight or getting a magazine subscription. Despite my general antipathy to AC, I really hope they will do the 'right' thing.

Wpgjetse

I still see changes/movement on this.

robsaw

There may be a run if people think Aimia is going to go bankrupt prior to the transition date. The Air Miles fiasco on the points expiry doesn't play well into the PR angle for this nor does AC's lack of details and failure to answer many significant questions in their FAQ. Given it is AC, PR bungling is to be expected and the media will of course chew them up.

expert7700

Total BS.

AC knows it took blood, sweat, and tears to earn the miles. Mostly via 100+ flights a year on their airline.

They can't for a minute say that Aeroplan ran in a bubble. Aeroplan colluded with Air Canada in determining tiers, flight redemption price, and most importantly benefits like a 100% bonus for Super Elite. Earning rates are clearly advertised when making an airfare purchase on aircanada.ca/com. More miles is a compelling advertised benefit between tango/flex/PE/business. Aeroplan was just an accounting trick.

Step 1, Hide all liabilites from the books.
Step 2, Allow liability of "3rd party" to grow un-checked
Step 3 Watch 3rd party frantically try to stay in business by cutting call center hours and raising change fees.
Step 4 Pull the plug and start over with an empty balance sheet

To not transfer or not transfering 1:1 to the new program is an insult. The fact that they are OK with orphaning everyone's life-to-date miles savings is an insult. How is it even legal for miles earned on flights even ONE DAY BEFORE the change to not be useable on *A at all, or not be redeemable the very next day on AC's new structure.

Since it is going to be BAD, I for one am glad that AC didn't string us along for 3 years. Had they said transferable to new program there would be 3yrs worth of people living in denial... Believing that their hard earned miles would be just as valuable and redeemable for the exact same flights the day after the transition. Instead they gave us the bad news today. And all FTers have 3 full years to talk with our wallets and NOT BOOK ANY PAID AC FLIGHTS.

Of course it's also likely that AC's new structure will be laughable..... Who's ready to spend 190,000 miles on a nonstop from YYZ-SFO?

by not xfering the points, AC is hinting that 100k aeroplan points is nowhere near as valuable as 100k of their new AC points (which I'll refer to as IOU points). By saying AC doesn't want to touch the points from Aeroplan in the new program I think it means "trust us, you will be much, much, happier redeeming for aeroplan desks, wall clocks/etc from the closed aeroplan office buildings."

DaveObee

Negotiating behind closed doors has not worked out. Now they are negotiating in public. This ain't over. Don't panic.

24left

A few of us were discussing this in an email thread.

The big problem is AMEX Canada partnerships are underwhelming.

A few months ago, someone from the UK (IIRC) was asking here about transferring MRs to Aeroplan and it took a while for him to finally clarify where he lived and thus where his Amex card is from. I posted a list of the airline partners that the Amex U.S. and the Amex U.K. have and we here in Canada are at a serious disadvantage. Not only are there are limited number of airlines, but only Aeroplan and Avios are 1:1

So, while you are all trying to figure out how to burn your Aeroplan miles (assuming inventory doesn't just suddenly evaporate), I think many of us are also thinking about card partnerships.

For those who can churn, there are plenty of options, but for those who want just one or possibly 2 cards on which you can earn airline miles of value, the options are limited.

I'll assume that sometime after June 2020, Air Canada will have at least one or two card partners with the nw program, but the challenge now is for those sitting with a lot of MRs at Amex, will Amex sign with the new Air Canada program and so the MRs can transfer there and if so, will it be 1:1.

Since this is 3 years from now and none of us knows what Amex and AC plan to do, it's a major guessing game.

.

laidback71

A run will do nothing by help Aimia as people will find no flight options and will cash out for toasters instead. This will not bankrupt Aimia, they just won't be making the money they used to.

mapleg

Amia is not blameless in this. Nonsensical things like shutting down 24 hour support line for Aeroplan . Not much help when you are stuck 1/2 way around the world with a check in agent telling you that you don't have a valid ticket, despite the fact you have one in your hand.

Also, steering people to scamcharges.

Bartolo

In the days when CP was "disappearing", my Qantas reward (previously issued) became an issue. Qantas refused to deal with me or honour the tx which was in F. After significant negotiation, I got the points back. Stressful at the time.