canadiancow

Eliminating the third party to the deal could open up various possibilities (not all of which are good for you), but I wouldn't expect anything to change in the short-term.

trek604

So if AC rebrand the new 2020 loyalty plan "Aeroplan+" their IT changes would be cosmetic only on the front end and business as usual on the backend (i.e. the people would still retain their AE numbers).

canadiancow

At this point, I fully expect people to retain their numbers, but I wouldn't expect much to be the same on the backend.

mapleg

Oh no, don't say that. The backend is horrendous.

Transpacificflyer

Perhaps AC will adopt the Delta SkyMiles approach to booking; One portal,;the AC purchase point where customers will be given the option of purchasing with $; Miles/Points or a combination. This is the most likely change and one which would eliminate the cost/burden of maintaining 2 booking portals. Easier to have one trained group of personnel and one system to maintain.
And of course at some point a devaluation of points, again. I can book J-RT YYZ-BKK/HKG/SIN with China Eastern @ 160,000 and sometimes 300,000 with DL. I expect we will see similar; 175,000 with Air China, or 250,000 with Air Canada.

I don't know what will happen, and I am at the point where I don't really much care. I am just waiting on West Jet to get it's act together and to offer TPACs,

AC MMSE

On the surface it appears like AC bullied their way through this. AC likely just kept Aeroplan from going into another carrier's hands. The Porter air thing was kind of a joke, I think they bumped up the bid for bigger reasons. One can only speculate.

Hopefully AC sees this as an opportunity to bring the loyalty program up to the standards they seem to be setting with the updates in services and routes to attract/retain frequent flyers. If this happens they just gained a large number of reasonably loyal customers' attention before Westjet (and perhaps others) start targeting their core customers with better perks. As a card carrying business traveler I hope for the best here. The old program was gutted and hope they use the energy they saved trying to replicate Aeroplan on incentives for FFs to stick with them.

yyznomad

Oh wo/man... that would be pretty awesome!

Smiley90

I'd rather fly Westjet than Rouge TPAC so I'm all for that.

jimmac

Can anyone on here with a legal background (not the speculating wannabe lawyers) offer guidance on the solidity of the Amex contract with Aeroplan? I presume the presence of Visa in this consortium is going to shut out Amex. But Amex has a contract with Aeroplan until June 30, 2020. Will Aeroplan under consortium ownership have to honour that contract? Will I, therefore, have until June 30, 2020, to make MR point transfers to Aeroplan? Or does the consortium have the ability to boot Amex as soon as they assume formal ownership?

Stranger

Contract should stay in place. So I would think Aeroplan Amex should be OK, as long as AC does not introduce (temporarily) two types of Miles, say Altitude miles and AE miles. And maybe, after most people convert, devalue the latter. But is amex contractually obliged to transfer miles from non-Aeroplan cards? And if at one point there are two classes, would one want to transfer?

28isGreat

The contract would survive, all other things being equal, but it's entirely possible that the contract includes unilateral termination provisions in the event of a substantial change such as this. I have no idea if this is the case, but it could be. Even the real lawyers would have to see the contract to give an answer without speculation

Happy

No no. Fly EVA in the front.

Stranger

If going to TPE, sure. If it's the same number of connections as alternatives, why not. But adding a connection is not necessarily desireable.

cyralax

24left

Yup, mine just arrived. No mention anywhere of any discount.