oenophilist

Just to repeat, there is no stated policy regarding lifetime miles expiring. There was never a stated policy of lifetime miles expiring that I saw. If you can point me to lifetime miles guidelines, please do so. I am not an amateur, I have had status on all three alliances, I have MM status on UA, I know that redeemable miles expire and know to keep activity to maintain them in an account, and I have done so over the past two decades when needed.

Nonetheless, thank you for your well wishes.

oenophilist

As some people have suggested, it is clear that there is no further use in discussing this issue anymore on this thread. There are two themes that have come out of the discussion. First, that it is "buyer beware" and therefore I am to blame for losing my lifetime miles credit on US Airways because I did not maintain account activity on my US Airways account. Second, that US and AA were inconsistent on this policy when they merged accounts, as US cancelled out all lifetime miles on accounts without activity and AA did not. And of course, any airline can change the program at any time without notice, which they do.

I think the important takeway from this is that AA can (and possibly will) wipe out your lifetime miles -- in addition to your redeemable miles -- with as little as 18 months of account inactivity. This is an extremely important detail. Is the policy different if you are a million miler? Possibly not. Which means that AA might wipe out your million miler status with as little as 18 months of account inactivity.

So while many are less-than-sympathetic for my situation, they should take heed that my experience exposes a major policy flaw with the AA million miler program.

LovePrunes

How about you just report back what the airline answers to close the loop. Maybe they'll tell you exactly how their "Program to date" mileage counter is reset for lack of activity. I concur with you though that there's not much more to be gained by lobbying this forum to agree with your point of view.

Please don't mistake disagreement with your opinion being "less than sympathetic" with your situation. Many have wished you good luck trying to get your old US mileage history to count, it's just that based on many years of experience with various issues, the majority here think it's unlikely to be granted by the airline. But really all that matters is what AA tells you, not anonymous posters in an internet forum say, so go talk to them and let us know how you make out.

weero

I am partially with you, even though I would not call a relatively clear case of thuggery a "flaw".

Why not write an angry letter to someone higher in the AA food chain? And only then resorting to the next step:

Is there are reason why you are reluctant to bring small claims court action against AA whilst you are still in France? I don't wallow in the expectation that this will greatly impact AA's IT or the likes but it will bring it to the attention of someone ranked higher than a bored and hostile CS agent.

And looking at the prediction power of our more active airline <redacted>, I reckon your chances are excellent.

JDiver

Honestly, I think you really need to look up the term "character assassination " and reconsider.

So I'll restate: you did not give US any business from their point of view when you flew their metal but credited all your flying to United Airlines. I personally believe it's dishonest to attempt to gain what is essentially double credit, not much different than if you were flying, say, BA and tried to get credit on BA and AA, or to claim you were wronged by failing to gain miles when you were flying an award on another airline. Some believe some, or all, of those are okay; I don't. That's what I opine.

As I implied previously, if I flew AA even hundreds of thousands of miles annually and credited all my flights to other programs (not even the required four paid AA or US segments per year), I'd have no status (or MM miles credited) on AA, my account would have lapsed as well as my miles. AA would believe I was loyal to the programs I'd credited the miles to, not to AA.

You credited your flying for an admitted period of ten years to United Airlines, yet expected to gain some kind of credit from US Airways to keep your account, or at least the lifetime miles reflected in your account (which for practical purposes went "dormant" at least, if not "dead") current. Without ever researching or contacting US to inquire until now, when you realize you are not getting something you did not earn. That's my opinion. You and others may disagree, that's perfectly fine. In the end, it's not a popularity poll, and opinions on FlyerTalk are meaningless in your quest to gain lifetime status on AA.

Your position reminds me of some of the upset expressed at the April 8, 2014 AAdvantage devaluations:

Airlines do what they want. Many here, including myself, had AA "never expiring" miles. That's what AA said, they never expired. They were tied to a number of awards and perquisites that also never expired, just like the miles.

AA and conditions (e.g. Concorde being obsoleted) little by little eroded those awards, conditions changed, and one fine day AA announced that, willy nilly, the "never expiring" miles would be converted (with a minuscule bonus) to everyday, expiring miles and the "never expiring" redemptions would cease existing.

Check what unilateral actions AA took in April last year: oneworld Explorer awards gone, new award redemption tiers, international partner awards lost N. America gateway stopovers, some USDM awards were repriced; effective immediately, no advance notice.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...il-2014-a.html

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...solidated.html

Mr. Parker and his team implemented these fairly quickly after moving in to the Executive suites; it was a priority long before FFP or CRS/PSS merger. Perhaps you can write him and ask for his indulgence and clemency? Goodonya if you can achieve that. But be aware the April 8 2014 upset, complaints to USDOT, AA Twitter reps, AA itself, came to no avail. Who knows, maybe your complaint will be received differently? Certainly not if its contained to FT; the Parker contingent has very, very low regard for FlyerTalk and our ilk.

That's pretty much what I have to say.

sosafan

Based on one uncontradicted post, if you had done this, and been an active
US Airways flyer in the meantime, your previously flown miles (the ones you credited to AA, not the ones that you didn't) would have
counted in the new AA million miler program.

I don't think the OP or anybody else is trying to get double credit for anything. I had US Airways flights that I credited to the US Airways program. Later I had US Airways flights that I credited to the United
Mileage plus program when US was Star Alliance. As a result my US airways account went dormant. Apparently dormant AA miles are counted in the new "lifetime" program and dormant US miles are not.

I don't expect or even want my dormant US miles to be reinstated. I did hope they would be counted as lifetime miles in the new combined program.
They weren't. So the next great consolation for me is to come to flyertalk, to sympathize with the OP, someone in the same boat, and try to gently point out the inconsistency of those who argue that this is logical result of a "loyalty" program. It isn't. Nobody has risen to the challenge in post 81.

oenophilist

I can say the same thing for you.

There are three things wrong with this statement.

First, I am not attempting to get credit for miles flown on US but credited to UA. These are not and should not be credited toward my million mile status with US/AA. I am only after the miles that were flown on US and credited to US.

Second, my objection is with third parties on this board claiming that I did not fly US during the past ten years and therefore was disloyal. Simply put, I did fly US during these ten years. Therefore, the statement that I was disloyal was wrong.

Finally, there is a question of whether loyalty means a) crediting your miles to an airline, or b) flying an airline. I would argue that, at minimum, flying an airline is demonstrating more loyalty than crediting miles to an airline. THAT is why airlines are requiring a certain amount of miles to be flown on their metal in order to achieve status.


If AA had the choice between your flying BA and crediting your miles to BA versus flying AA and crediting your miles to BA, I'm rather certain they would prefer that you fly AA. If AA had the choice between your flying AA and crediting your miles to BA, versus flying BA and crediting your miles to AA, again I believe they would prefer that you fly AA. Do you disagree?


If you do not have any activity in your AA account for 18 months, do you expect to lose all of your lifetime miles? Not your redeemable miles, your "program miles to date". If nothing else, please answer this question.

bosman

With all due respect to JDiver, I have to say I agree with OP on these points.

oenophilist

Two reasons. 1. I don't think it will make any difference, if anything it will provoke a more negative reaction. 2. It is vastly easier for me to just stop doing business with AA.

At a macro level, airline loyalty is almost unnecessary anymore. The value of elite status diminishes every cycle. There are tons of choices that you can make based on quality of the experience and service. I'd rather spend 20% more and get top quality service than scrape and beg just to get an elite status that constantly gets devalued.

LovePrunes

None of us run a frequent flyer program of our own so best we can do is speculate why they merged the way the did.

1) AA was the governing/surviving mileage program. Looks like AA, from post 72/81, kept program to date miles on the AA accounts from zeroing out, even if the redeemable miles did zero out for lack of activity.

2) US had their own rules about what constituted lifetime flying mileage and what was necessary to keep their accounts open. Their rules were different than AA. AA as we all know used to count EVERYTHING from credit card bonus miles to dining bonuses etc. towards "Million Miler" which was an UNOFFICIAL and NOT DOCUMENTED program. So we have no written "policies" from how they used to do it, only what AA said once they made the Million Miler program official and cracked down on what counted for "Program Mileage to Date."

3) It appears that US accounts that were dormant from lack of activity (crediting US flights to US and not UA) had NO LIFETIME MILES. Who knows if this was reset by US years ago or only when the programs merged. What would really help your case is if you had been told before the programs merged that your "lifetime US mileage" is xxx,xxx miles. My understanding is US did not publish anyone's lifetime numbers and you had to get them to read it out over the phone or email it to you.

OP Do you have such a number? I'm not asking if you were able to log in to your account, we know you could before. Did a US rep tell you you had a lifetime mileage balance, say the month or week before the miles were merged? I have a hunch if you had been quoted a number, it would have already been zeroed out BY US's mileage beancounters and that's why nothing transferred to AA to increase your "program mileage to date" counter.

Look at it from US's perspective. They can't produce free UA miles. If you flew a bunch on US and collected UA points, I'm sure US had to pay UA for them somehow. Maybe they traded, who knows, but bottom line is, you didn't participate in collecting US miles for those 10 years you were actually on US planes. Do I have that right? I think I understand what you've been trying to say, but can you see how that's more of a cost to US to give you UA points than to give you mileage credit they can dole out "for free"? I think that's why JDiver has said you weren't really loyal to US's program, since you were collecting UA miles.

5) I'm sure US appreciated you being a customer purchasing tickets and flying on US planes regardless of mileage credit, but to argue you were an active participant in their mileage program during those 10 years of US flying really isn't true. You probably have a higher "Program mileage to date" total in UA since that's where you credited them, but unfortunately those miles aren't becoming AA mileage history.

So at some point someone at US decides, this guy doesn't participate in our program, let's shut him down, (and lots like you who had no US mileage earning activity to keep your account from becoming dormant.)

I paid to resurrect one family member's dormant account, which was possible for a limited time at US after they closed/zeroed/made dormant your account. It was like $175 for restoring more than 100,000 miles. But after a certain date US would no longer allow that to happen.

I think your beef is with the defunct Dividend Miles Program, not the AAdvantage program. US's rules meant you had no history to transfer to AAdvantage. If Dividend Miles would have been the surviving program and AA miles got sucked into DM, then (as unfair as this might seem) AA program mileage to date might very likely have transferred to US, when the other way around it did not.

It's kind of like US having 4 elite levels and AA having 3. They had to combine two programs that didn't have the same policies/rules etc.

Nobody here is doing "character assassination." No one. Period. It's just not happening, but you're responding really defensively and I think reading anger and vitriol into counterarguments or different viewpoints, even if someone is writing something that's a little misunderstood from what you said (the no flying on US for 10 years which you and JDiver have talked about).

I'm sure AA wants to do their best to keep the million miler population as low as it can for obvious financial reasons.

I recommend you not waste anyone's time in court, it's their program and courts have ruled they can run it as they want and make changes whenever. That's life.

You asked me how is that anything more than semantics about calling it your mileage history "Program to date miles" vs "lifetime" miles. I think the biggest difference is there is no implication that your **PROGRAM TO DATE MILES** are to exist for a lifetime. Would you agree that's different? From post 72 and 81, the whole lifetime counter thing seems to operate differently between US and AA.

Seems like US set you up to be frustrated when your account went dormant and you lost your mileage history on an account with no miles in it, and no crediting US flying for 10 years There are rules for you to keep your account from going dormant at both US and AA, and you admit you didn't do certain things that would have kept that from happening to your account. I see no promise from AA that a lifetime mileage figure continue to be counted for a lifetime, especially with no crediting of flights to the program. If anything, it seems like they're saying if you aren't active in US's program (forget calling it loyalty if it makes you happier), then you lose your US program mileage to date when US made your account dormant.

I hope I've got your points addressed and that I've restated the things you were frustrated that people were getting wrong. Just because you didn't get what you want and I'm pointing out why I think that is, does not mean I'm assassinating your character. We're just 2 people who might have to agree to disagree.

Good luck and let us know what they tell you when you ask. Keep it short for them to read, and be careful of your tone if you want them to see it your way. Having a chip on your shoulder or coming across as itching for a verbal sparring match as it seems has been the undercurrent here on this post will not get you very far in the Exec Suite at AA.

oenophilist

There is a lot of misunderstanding in your post, so I will attempt to address each point individually.

Yes, agreed on both counts. US decided to zero-out any lifetime miles after a specified period of time (the only documented period of time is 18 months). AA did not. This is precisely what I am challenging. In both cases, there were no written policies detailing that "lifetime" or "program to date miles" would disappear.

While that is true, unfortunately it is not possible to go back in time and ask. And no, I do not have such a number.

Again, this is really irrelevant. I am not asking for any credit for miles that I credited to UA. The only point in mentioning UA was to challenge the assertion that I was "disloyal" to US over the past 10 years. I am not expecting US to recognize any of the miles that I flew over those years. My only expectation is that my lifetime miles are not zeroed out at some arbitrary date without notice.

Again, I am not arguing that I was an active participant in Dividend Miles. The only reason that I bring up the fact that I flew US and credited is because others attacked me for "not flying US" over 10 years and then expecting some reward.
Again (I feel like I have to use this word a lot on this thread), you are confusing redeemable miles with lifetime miles. US had a program where you could pay to resurrect your redeemable miles. I highly doubt that you paid $175 to restore 100,000 lifetime miles only. I am not attempting to restore my redeemable miles. I am only trying to recognize the lifetime miles that I flew and credited to US.
This is corporate doublespeak. They combined programs, under the name of AA. US and AA are the same company now. The fact that AA is the surviving program is irrelevant (although I'm sure that isn't the way the employees view it).

There absolutely has been character assassination. Period. My character has been attacked repeatedly, from practically the first page of this thread. This has included a) my knowledge of how frequent flyer programs work; b) my loyalty or lack thereof; c) my motivations, etc. While several posters have addressed the merits of my claims, and in some cases challenged them, it has been the character attacks that I have had to defend, repeatedly.

Million miler is there for a reason, to reward repeat customers. I wasn't going to make million miler by the combined miles, but the combined miles might have put me at a threshold that would make me fly more AA in order to achieve million miler. Now, that isn't going to happen. This isn't good customer service.

As I mentioned to others, I have no plans to, for the reasons already stated. I only get involved in lawsuits that I think I can win.



I don't agree that is different. "Program to date miles" implies miles flown up to that moment on the airline, e.g. lifetime miles. I have never seen an indication that "Program to date miles" would somehow reset to zero.

Quote:

Originally Posted by LovePrunes

Seems like US set you up to be frustrated when your account went dormant and you lost your mileage history on an account with no miles in it, and no crediting US flying for 10 years

I disagree with this. There are rules for your account to be considered "inactive" and you lose your redeemable miles. I fully agree with this. There are no rules, nor were there ever stated rules, that your account would go "dormant" and therefore lose your entire history with the airline. I fully accept responsibility for allowing my account to go inactive and therefore losing the redeemable miles in my account.


The question is: is there a promise from AA that your account will not go dormant and you will not lose your "program to date miles"? Like US, there is no stated policy with regard to these lifetime miles. Theoretically, every customer's "program to date miles" are reset to zero every 18 months. However they are not. If it were the case, I predict there would be quite a large group of customers that would be alienated and angry.

You have not made an attack on my character in this post. It is one of the more reasoned posts on this thread.

Just to reiterate, I'm not really in the mood to spar with AA on this, or "beg" them to reconsider. I'm the one that buys the tickets and spends the money. I have a lot of choices. If they want my business in the future, and if they want the business for all the people that I buy tickets for, they can come to me.

I rarely complain to airlines or about airline experiences. I've written one formal letter to an airline in my life, 15 years ago. Normally I just roll with the punches. This case is a bit different in that 13 years of flying was invalidated with a keystroke. It is far easier to just stop flying AA.

LINDEGR

That is 100% wrong IMHO. The FF mileage going to UA is meaningless to US. US pays a miniscule amount to UA for those miles. Buying and flying on US metal is what helps the bottom line of US. It is ludicrous to say that OP "did not give US any business."

In fact your Best Buy Amazon analogy (although you stated it backwards) proves the point - from whom the consumer buys the product is what matters to the business.

HMO

You don't want to litigate, you just want to complain. We got it ^

LovePrunes

Seriously? All this energy from you to make your case and then nothing? You're just going to drop it?

I think you'd have zero chance of convincing them to give you million miler credit for US miles history that zeroed out, but I'm just surprised you are giving up. Don't you believe in your own arguments enough to write AA, after all ? Wow. Seems like the thread can be closed in this case.

This veers off into DYKWIA. No airline is coming to you (or me or anyone else.)

oenophilist

It wasn't really my intent to veer into DYKWIA, and in fact I am not much to AA based on recent spend. I just don't understand the attitude of begging to a business for something when the customer is the source of their revenues and livelihood. That is usually indicative of a monopoly or oligopoly, which are bad for consumers. Many people are in that situation in the airline industry due to industry consolidation and geographic location. I'm in a location that makes it super easy to simply avoid AA.