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Angry about AAdvantage devaluation / vent / what can I do? (April 2014, consolidated)

Old Apr 9, 2014, 11:05 am
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Angry about AAdvantage devaluation / vent / what can I do? (April 2014, consolidated)


Thread referred to: Devaluation, new tiers, oneworld Explorer award gone, etc. 8 April 2014

Without any prior notification, American Airlines announced on 8 April 2014 some significant AAdvantage program rescissions and devaluations, effective immediately:

  • oneworld Explorer awards can no longer be claimed; (pre-existing awards will be honored)

  • Stopovers at North American gateways for international partner award tickets were eliminated

  • AAnytime awards now reflect variable, demand-based pricing

  • US Dividend Miles North Asia premium awards have repriced

Important Information

AAnytime Awards: Effective April 8, 2014, for tickets issued for travel starting June 1, 2014, we have updated award levels. We will continue to honor any award tickets issued on / before April 7, 2014. For award bookings after April 8 for travel between April 8 and June 1, 2014, these award mileage levels will apply.

oneworld Explorer Awards are no longer available for award booking. We will continue to honor any award tickets issued on / before April 7, 2014.
This thread is specifically to vent and offer ways for readers to protest or complain.


Possibilities for action / communication:

Originally Posted by hillrider
Here's what you can do, as stated by the U.S. Supreme Court in its recent case (Source: http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions...2-462_p8k0.pdf page 13)

Congress has given the Department of Transportation (DOT) the general authority to prohibit and punish unfair and deceptive practices in air transportation and in the sale of air transportation, 49 U.S.C. 41712(a) , and Congress has specifically authorized the DOT to investigate complaints relating to frequent flyer programs. See FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, 408(6), 126 Stat. 87. Pursuant to these provisions, the DOT regularly entertains and acts on such complaints.
It is your duty to enter a complaint with the DOT at http://airconsumer.ost.dot.gov/CP_AirlineService.htm. You can even quote this passage from the U.S. Supreme Court.
Sample communication to USDOT here.

Originally Posted by ooshawn
Just wrote an unhappy letter to AA/USAir execs (all email addresses I could find), if you want to feel free to use/build off of the following:
douglas.parker<at>usairways.com,
sean.bentel<at>aa.com,
tom.horton<at>aa.com ?
Customer.Relations<at>aa.com,
ken.fischer<at>usairways.com,
robert.isom<at>usairways.com,
suzanne.rubin<at>aa.com
Corporate structure: http://www.aa.com/i18n/amrcorp/corporateInformation/facts/structure.jsp

Originally Posted by MyTravels
USPS:
<Executive Name>
P.O. Box 619616
DFW Airport, TX 75261-9616
Print Wikipost

Angry about AAdvantage devaluation / vent / what can I do? (April 2014, consolidated)

Old Apr 8, 2014, 6:53 pm
  #61  
 
Join Date: Jun 2013
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Originally Posted by Herb687
Maybe ol' Drinkin' Doug Parker will get yet another DUI and this problem will solve itself.
Still blown away that anyone with that little 1. self control 2. decision making prowess 3. responsibility would be supported as the CEO of the world's largest airline. That's not even the type of person I'd trust working an entry level job, let alone running a large company.

Originally Posted by eponymous_coward
I think you're fooling yourself if you think (insert random corporate C-level suit here) would have done much differently than the current CEO.

Again, look at that list of airlines I posted. Can you think of an example of an airline in the past 5 years serving a significant portion of North America that has NOT in some way devalued their frequent flyer program- changing award levels for the worse, eliminating elite benefits, slapping on fees, and the like?
Neither Delta nor United have become wildly profitable, even with all the money they're saving. AA has been making a profit. Rarely do those following the heard end up becoming market leaders.

AA has done well as of late by not making the mistake that everyone else has been making.
Pinned is offline  
Old Apr 8, 2014, 7:01 pm
  #62  
 
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Well, y'all kept showing up in the consolidated and pmUS fora going on about how you had a "premium" airline. Turns out Parker looked that up in the dictionary and found out it means "the customer gets charged more".

As the man who found the genie in the bottle says, be careful what you wish for, you just might get it.
ubernostrum is offline  
Old Apr 8, 2014, 7:06 pm
  #63  
 
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Originally Posted by eponymous_coward
QFT.

I think premium customers may do quite well when it's all said and done on AA. It's the "I want caviar and Krug from flying $99 MRs" crowd that's going to hate the Brave New World.
I buy my share of tickets in F, on US. Response to all this is "meh". Everybody knew mileage devaluation was coming. Don't know enough about Explorer to have an opinion, but what I read of it makes me lean towards believing the people who've been posting that it was just a bunch of loopholes getting abused.
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Old Apr 8, 2014, 7:45 pm
  #64  
 
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Originally Posted by jhartvu
Are Facebook and Twitter dirty words on FlyerTalk?
To me.
Dallas49er is offline  
Old Apr 8, 2014, 8:38 pm
  #65  
 
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Originally Posted by ubernostrum
I buy my share of tickets in F, on US. Response to all this is "meh". Everybody knew mileage devaluation was coming. Don't know enough about Explorer to have an opinion, but what I read of it makes me lean towards believing the people who've been posting that it was just a bunch of loopholes getting abused.
The changes today have minimal (North Asia business awards mileage increase) to no impact on me (pretty much else). I do have significant concern over what else might be lurking however.

As to loopholes, as an example I suspect widespread blogger attention to "Two Award Tickets for the Price of One" on awards involving international gateways is probably unhelpful for the long term availability of such benefits as we're seeing.
phlwookie is offline  
Old Apr 8, 2014, 8:44 pm
  #66  
 
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Posts: 2,086
Originally Posted by Herb687
I don't think the generic airline CEO would do things all that differently in the long-run. I do think that a good exec team would give some amount of notice prior to implementing major devaluations.
To me, this is the big issue. DL and UA have done some major devaluations, and DL has done some of them with virtually no notice. But none of them were done day of like this. They at least gave a couple days notice and usually a couple weeks-months. I'm honestly not sure why AA felt so compelled to make these changes so quickly. Is the revenue from a couple weeks-months more of bookings at higher rates so great? It certainly isn't a customer-friendly move.
aa4ever is offline  
Old Apr 8, 2014, 8:49 pm
  #67  
 
Join Date: Oct 2009
Posts: 382
Originally Posted by ubernostrum
I buy my share of tickets in F, on US. Response to all this is "meh". Everybody knew mileage devaluation was coming. Don't know enough about Explorer to have an opinion, but what I read of it makes me lean towards believing the people who've been posting that it was just a bunch of loopholes getting abused.
Certain destinations were only available using an Explorer award.

I think people are more concerned with the stealth of the announcement (not one nanosecond of advance warning) rather than the actual cancellation of the award itself.

UA posted their redemption/fee changes months in advance of them going into effect.
povertyjetset is offline  
Old Apr 8, 2014, 9:52 pm
  #68  
 
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Originally Posted by povertyjetset
Certain destinations were only available using an Explorer award.
Off topic, but -- why?
dtremit is offline  
Old Apr 9, 2014, 12:22 am
  #69  
 
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Originally Posted by povertyjetset
I think people are more concerned with the stealth of the announcement (not one nanosecond of advance warning) rather than the actual cancellation of the award itself.
Agreed. That's the thing that's leaving a horrible taste in my mouth about this whole deal. And then the email they sent out announcing changes doesn't bother to even mention that there were other changes besides the ones they mentioned in mail. To call it deceptive would be too kind.
OverThereTooMuch is offline  
Old Apr 9, 2014, 1:51 am
  #70  
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Originally Posted by Pinned
Neither Delta nor United have become wildly profitable, even with all the money they're saving. AA has been making a profit. Rarely do those following the heard end up becoming market leaders.
Pretty difficult to become wildly profitable overnight in a business that has spent 90 years destroying capital (recall Warren Buffet's quote: "If a farsighted capitalist had been present at Kitty Hawk, he would have done his successors a huge favor by shooting Orville down").

That being said, DAL gives stockholders dividends, so they are returning profits directly to stockholders, as do ALK and LUV. AAL, not so much at the moment.
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Old Apr 9, 2014, 2:07 am
  #71  
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Why do I expect Parker wants AS to be eaten up by one of the Big 3 cartel brethren or run into the ground by the Big 3 cartel brethren? I suspect he and his industry kin want an even more concentrated market because they know industry commoditization has made their financial fortunes dependent upon the ability of a cartel to exercise market discipline and collude against consumers.
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Old Apr 9, 2014, 2:46 am
  #72  
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Moderator Note

OK, we get that some members are angry. Fair enough. This consolidated thread has been merged together from a couple of venting threads, and we can all vent here. Others that may pop up will end up here too. Having one place for this will avoid the front page being overrun by "Parker is the next Lorenzo" and "Get on social media and complain" type threads. There are still a lot of people actually flying, and we want the forum to remain relevant to them.

Members are expected to leave politics out of this discussion. Tangential references to the popularity of controversial politicians have been removed.

Keep things civil please. If further redactions or deletions are needed, they will be done.

~Moderator
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Old Apr 9, 2014, 3:12 am
  #73  
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Originally Posted by flyerhog
This is one of the pitfalls of social media. There's only so much you can say within 200 characters or less. Do something more concrete like writing a letter or cancelling your AA cards.
Or writing in to US Congress or DOT about regulation of these programs and an amendment to modernize the Airline Deregulation Act? Unfortunately, I expect that to be useless at this point too.

This is a reduced competition environment, so the impact of doing anything individually is probably marginal at best. I'll just shop around more and be less likely to make purchase decisions based on the "loyalty" program -- actually that's sort of hard for me to do, as I've never been an airline or alliance captive and fly enough and play the game ok enough to level the playing field for myself. It will be harder going forward, but I expected that to happen following the government favors and waivers granted the industry's big players -- which is why I was critical of various DOJ ATD actions/inactions related to the industry in the last several years. At this point too, shopping around and being promiscuous in the approach to business relationships in the market makes sense for me. YMMV.

Last edited by GUWonder; Apr 9, 2014 at 3:24 am
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Old Apr 9, 2014, 6:32 am
  #74  
 
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As was to be expected

Quite a few years ago I had accumulated a fair number of miles on US Airways.
Didn't fly them for some time but was assured the miles never expired. Went to use them and found they had expired, WITHOUT NOTICE ("Our policy changed")

Thanks Doug

So nothing new here.

But this simply reinforces my view that it is time to burn miles, and not accumulate more: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/trave...l-out-ffp.html
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Old Apr 9, 2014, 9:46 am
  #75  
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Here's what you can do, as stated by the U.S. Supreme Court in its recent case (Source: http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions...2-462_p8k0.pdf page 13)

Congress has given the Department of Transportation (DOT) the general authority to prohibit and punish unfair and deceptive practices in air transportation and in the sale of air transportation, 49 U.S.C. 41712(a) , and Congress has specifically authorized the DOT to investigate complaints relating to frequent flyer programs. See FAA Modernization and Reform Act of 2012, 408(6), 126 Stat. 87. Pursuant to these provisions, the DOT regularly entertains and acts on such complaints.
It is your duty to enter a complaint with the DOT at http://airconsumer.ost.dot.gov/CP_AirlineService.htm. You can even quote this passage from the U.S. Supreme Court.
hillrider is offline  

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