Confused on AirTran to Southwest Elite Benefits
 

I have been an A+ Elite member with AirTran since 04/12/2003. I have more than 800 lifetime credits and have flown 31 segments in the last 12 months (8 months actually). The only reason the last 12 months segments are not higher is because I boycotted SW in Sept - December of 2013, based on them NOT providing me with a reciprocal status with SW.

Now I am reading that SW is giving their A-List members A+ Elite status on AirTran flights!! I really do not want to go back to Delta but I may have no choice since I will not fly SW as one of their cattle. I deserve pre-boarding without having to pay extra and any other perks that are given to their highest class of reward traveler.

Has anyone heard of any changes coming to accommodate A+ Elite members over to SW?

Thanks: confused::confused:

Southwest has for some time given Airtran Elite members A-List status on Southwest. Whether that will make you happy only you can decide.

You can read the FAQ here to get a lot of information.

There was an e-mail that went out last week to A+ members that the program is ending November 1st. If you have A+ status that expires after that date, Southwest will grant you status in the Rapid Rewards program for 2015. Now, what that status gives you as perks I'm not familiar with but you can try going to rewardsfarther.com or southwest.com

Generally, I agree with you - I'm not a big Southwest fan - I like to know where I'll be sitting before I board a plane. And their fares are not what they used to be, so there is not much of an advantage over the other carriers. I do have status with other airlines, so checked baggage fees do not concern me and I always have access to extra legroom seats, so the flying experience can be decent. But Southwest does have its loyal followers. You just have to decide if Southwest is the airline for you because AirTran will disappear in 6 months and that's not changing.

F these guys on Southwest. I tried to get a status match. They wont give me one. My current status expires last week of October and I am 5 or 6 credits short of renewing it into Oct of 2015. They said since my expiration of my current year is final week of October, they wont give me a status match since it is before Nov 1. I asked, why not give me a status match until my current expiration at least . No dice. I will just have to wait until I rack up enough credits to push my expiration a year later so that I will cross that Nov threshold. But with no more AirTran flights to my frequent destination(replaced by WN which will not help me with getting those credits on AirTran), that might take a month or two longer than I expected. Which means I can't ask them until August or September. Why can';t these morons grant me reciprocal status until my current A+ Elite expires?
Oh , and add insult to injur,y, I foolishly didn't check the expiration on the 2000 bonus credits for enrolling. So I didn't get that either. But I didn't really have much to argue since I didn't read the fine print.

Oh and the AirTran A+ Rewards line closes at 6pm. So I will have to call them tomorrow to see if I have better luck with them.

I read somewhere on this forum that WN A listers were no longer getting automatic upgrades on AirTran. Well, if they wont give AirTran elites unconditional reciprocal status on WN, why should they for WN A List on AirTran.

Another thing: Rapid Rewards line customer service according to the reps is not for actual customer relations. All they can do is go by a script. I have to call a separate line for that.
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Is there a chance for me to get Delta to give me a status match(I know Silver sucks, but hey , what else can I hope for).

Keep plugging - at some point you're likely to get a supervisor with the juice to waive the mandate. One assumes maintaining elite rolls is their goal.

I called twice. THe first rep was polite but very indifferent. The second rep was friendlier but told me that there was nothing anyone in rapid rewards could do to help me in my case and that customer service was the only option to find someone to help me. She told me it would be pointless to expect anyone at the Rapid Rewards line to be able to make any discretionary change.

When I told them what incentive do I have to fly WN right now if they don't give me an immediate status match, she told me I could spend extra on a Business Select fare!!!!!!!

Elite renewal was always a rolling number... once you hit 12 credits in the last twelve months you were good for another year past that date. Fly another RT and it got bumped further out. Surely the easiest Status renewal in the business.

So you since you are 5-6 credits short you've flown only 6 or 7 flights in the last year.. DL is IMO not going to be impressed. They at best will offer you a challenge and it will be a pretty huge challenge considering your travel.

I know you're frustrated, it sux that your Elite status expires so close to the deadline. But why did you wait so long to get a match? I'm pretty sure if you had asked in January you would have had A-list this year. But that would not have affected whether you would get it next year.

As for renewing your status. You are only 3 round trips away from extending and you still have 4 months to make those trips and qualify.

With the recent sale you might have scheduled those trips for less than $300. You still could fly them, although now it will now be more expensive.

Finally making A-List by flying takes 25 flights, one round trip a month plus one extra. In 2014 if you fly Southwest enough so that the total of your flights on Airtran and Southwest equal 25 during 2014, you will qualify for A-List in 2015.

It doesn't seem likely to me that you will be able to maintain A-List after 2015, unless you fly Southwest a good bit more. You could do it by purchasing BS tickets, but you seem disinclined to do so. I don't blame you I always buy the cheapest ticket I can, with Southwest's no change fee, there seems little reason to purchase more expensive tickets. With a low number of flights you can purchase early boarding or gate upgrades cheaper than making additional unnecessary trips to qualify for A-List.

Actually I have flown 26 times in 2013 itself on AirTran. I took 3 international trips - one on Delta, one on British Airways. I remember requalifying pretty early last year and dont know why I still have 6 credits left. And thanks to phasing out some AirTran flights this year, I have flown only 4 times since January of this year. But my heavy travel is upcoming. And that includes international. I wonder if I can make a case of presenting my british airways miles and my AirTran flights to Delta and make the case that I can bundle both to Delta. Or have them give me a status challenge and I can make an international trip on that challenge.

[UPDATE]: I called A+ Rewards line. The lady was very nice and it took her a long time to get someone from Rapid Rewards to talk to her , but she held on patiently. And she took care of it and got me a "tier status" match as she called it. She said that was the key word to use. So I am good until Oct 26. I am sure I can get those 6 flights pretty easily with some trips to Philly , Boston to kick it into next year.

We shall see how my first WN trip goes in a couple of weeks.

The counter restarts on your renewal date. If your status expires in October of this year your clock for renewal started in October of last year. It's the number of flights since last October that matter.

Pretty clear saneman understands that. Elite renewal date is only days shy of the Nov status bump window and AirTran stopped serving his usual destinations.

Just remember. If you're considering a status match with DL, it's a once-in-a-lifetime match. Use it wisely.

Wasn't clear to me he understood how it worked from the comment I quoted since he appeared to think there should be some kind of carry forward for any trips after qualifying. But a little redundancy never hurts and the explanation may help someone else. ;)

I have to say that the way Southwest is handling the termination of the A+ Rewards program is generally better than I expected. It is inevitable that some people fall between the cracks, unfortunately saneman appears to be one. :(

I will admit I forgot about the non carrying over of extra credits to qualifying for the following year. I don't know how I forgot about that. So RS is correct. Doesn't hurt to overexplain it sometimes.

I do disagree Southwest is handling it well considering it took an AirTran rep to take the trouble to do this. Why couldn't the Southwest people suggest the tier status match to me? I talked to two of them last night.

And I will keep in mind the delta status match to be handled carefully. I will go for it only if I think I can get gold at least with enough bunched together travel during the challenge.

Airtran Customer Service has always been more on top of the status match that the Southwest people. Southwest Customer Service seems to view the Airtran integration as an unimportant nuisance. I would never talk to Southwest about anything having to do with Airtran.

I don't think Southwest has handled this integration well. I just think that given how they have handled other aspects of the integration, integrating the FF programs has been better communicated and more generous than I expected.

Knowing Airtran was going to cease operations by the end of the year I moved all of my booking to Southwest anticipating A+ rewards ending. I expected the program to just end and existing Credits to be moved to RR Credits with a single top off, as was done for RR1.0. I expected that my current Southwest status would simply remain and I would either re-qualify under their rules or not. I did not expect a status extension nor a conversion of Credits to Points.

It turns out from a Frequent Flyer Program point of view I would have been better off continuing to book on Airtran. I would have gotten 1200 points for each of my flights (usually less than $100) and would have re-qualified for Elite in less than half the flights required for A-List. In fact I would have already re-qualified. In that case I would have lost a couple of months of status (February 2015 vs December 2015). In any event I will qualify for A-List on Southwest this year.

In the end it didn't matter to me since my anniversary date is in February. I re-qualified last year so I should get a status match. My Elite status does not expire until February 2015, so I will have all of 2015 to qualify for A-List in 2016.

My wife who has booked a lot of flights on Airtran this year will re-qualify for Airtran Elite by the end of the month. She should get A-List Preferred when her flight totals are combined. Combining flights for determining status is also not something I expected.