johndeere19

IMHO, the AA MM program as is is genius. On one hand, you have frequent fliers that jump up to lifetime status and stay loyal to the airline because of the benefits they get...on the other, you have people who rarely fly who can earn these thresholds, but rarely see benefits because they fly so infrequently (not really diluting the elite pool). The latter still works for them because they can sell miles in bulk to third parties like Citi and make a killing off of those deals today and award redemption flights in the future without a noticeable change in lower level elite benefits.

Personally, I rarely fly AA right now, but am attributing a whole bunch of spending to my Citi cards trying to get to the $10k thresholds with my eyes on my first 1MM milestone. I honestly can't remember the last time I flew AA (I tend to stick to *A right now), but reading through these threads and trips reports makes me want to shoot for 1MM (hopefully eventually 2MM) and try out a JFK-LAX trip in one of their premium classes and even some other shorter domestic flights on them.

I mean...ice cream sundaes...come on ^.

Side note: I can still remember a flight in Y on SAA where they put out snickers ice cream bars and that little gesture made all the difference...ice cream is the key!

altaskier

Amusing, disgusting, and oh-so-true all at once!

ptklob

for whats it worth I was talking to the gold desk the other day and asked the lady what she thought on this topic and she made it sound like the program was NOT in any jeapordy.

The question will be if cc points and others will continue to count...I hope so, by May I'll be Plat for life.

ESpen36

Just so you know, there is no "Gold Desk." You were speaking to a regular AAdvantage Reservations rep who any non-status member can contact by dialing 1-800-882-8880.

(Gold status gives you head-of-the-line priority, but not a separate group of agents. Only EXPs have an exclusive group of phone reps, a true "EXP Desk.")

Madison Guy

Each of us has our own hopes that certain types of earning currently in the PTD counter will be included in whatever AA MAY decide to use for LT programs, if they indeed keep them (and I suspect they will) and change them (I also expect, in time, they will.) With no idea what they will do, I'd expect PTD miles to still be just that, but perhaps a new, non-zeroing bucket for MM miles (similar to the elite buckets) to be created, with whatever counting to increment it that AA decides. Perhaps the "bar" to get LTG or LTP will be raised. Perhaps nothing. (But I sorta do expect something to change.) Anyway, in my personal case (not that nobody cares) I'd prefer only flight miles to count (including elite bonuses) - but that's my preference! YMMV

Since we are all speculating anyway...

Efrem

A minor correction: Platinum gets you head-of-the-line priority. Gold has to wait a bit longer, but still less than the general public (aka "self-loading cargo").

Also, when the EXP desk is relatively idle, its agents offload the main desk by taking calls from Platinum members.

EaglesOhThree

I think people are most obviously talking about the thead on here- http://www.travelingbetter.com/forum...ead.php?t=2996

JDiver

No, I know about that thread, and I think most folks are really speculating.

scubadu

Why do a small few on this forum always feel so deeply compelled to call this out anytime and anywhere a poster makes this reference? It almost smacks of "little man" syndrome or something.

Seriously, anyone that understands this difference knows exactly what a poster really means when then say "GLD/PLT Desk"

And for the record, pull out one of your old GLD/PLT cards and look at the back (I just did); the freakin' card says, and I quote, "AAdvantage Gold Service Desk" (emphasis mine). How do we propose that those who are not anal retentive about this stuff should know the difference (and frankly whether they really need to care)

Sorry, but I continue to be amazed at the minutiae that is obsessed about around here...

Regards

fishferbrains

^ I offer that some obsessive people may have more FT posts than BIS miles this year.

Perhaps FT could offer a Gold, Plat, ExPlat reward tier.

Pakse

Howdy,

FWIW - under my "View My Upgrades" tab it reads:

2 Million Miler Oct 1, 2010 2

And it shows I was indeed given 2 additional eVIPs

Nothing in the mail or email yet.

Keep the faith,

Pakse

shadesofgrey1x

This is not correct on many fronts. EXPs do not have an "exclusive desk". EXP Agents will take PLT calls when they are not busy. I had 1st hand experience with this over the last 2 years.

The rest of this business about there is no gold desk etc, obviously comes from persons who know nothing about how call centers operate. Very, very few call centers waste human resources by having an Agent sit idle for "exclusivity" purposes. I know of one call center where dial a prayer Agents also handled CS for porn purchases.

So give the dead horse a rest. Maybe there were exclusive "desks" at one point now it is just a call queue. In call center lingo "desk" usually just means what AA does with it (ie call handling priority). In that sense there are GLD, PLT, EXP "desks".

shadesofgrey1x

Oh, Oh you should have received "4" for 2MM not "2".

brp

I was thinking the same thing. I'm all for accuracy here-where it matters and has an actual impact (gotta correct if someone talks about using stickers on flights to LHR for example). The necessity to comment upon whether there is an actual desk for GLD or PLT members just escapes me. It matters not one whit for anything.

Sorry, but this is not really right. While the EXP agents may handle calls for the other tiers when not busy, there are exclusive agents for EXP, and this does correspond, metaphorically, to a desk. Because of the different cadre of agents and the capability/knowledge differences, this distinction does matter. So, an EXP will not (except under very unusual circumstances) get someone not from the EXP desk.

Cheers.

nkedel

Isn't that Coupon Connection?

(Used to be Omni, too.)