QtownDave

I have no way of knowing but based on there being so few lounges in just a few select cities I would bet that the majority of card holders have never been in one.

I’ve only been in the one of my home city.

Statman

Three data points based on what you wrote above.

1. My parents are both AUs on my Platinum because I want them to have emergency evacuation coverage and roadside service.

2. One of my best friends has a Business Platinum for his medical practice and his wife and kids are AUs because they just charge everything to one account.

3. Another good friend also has the Business Platinum and his wife is an AU so that she can have access to IAP.

The AUs in 1 and 2 rarely use the lounges and it is definitely not a driving factor for them. AU #3 usually doesn't use the Centurion lounge because her home airport doesn't have one and she flies J or F most of the time so she has lounge access already.

mia

As a matter of interest, are these all Platinum cards? Supplementary Business Platinum cards are expensive, but Gold are inexpensive and Green are free.

Statman

Yes, the AU's in #2 and #3 all have Platinum cards. I was with them in the Centurion Suite at the Staples Center last week and each of them used their own Platinum cards to get in due to different arrival times at the Staples Center.

GUWonder

RichardMannion

Steve M

How about $30 guest fee, with no free guests per year and no free AUs? This way, the only people that get to use the lounge are those paying the freight with an annual fee. I'm certain that would solve the crowding problem, reduce F&B costs, and allow for substantial growth in the membership base. It would also be the most fair.

Steve M

I wonder what the average number of visitors is per cardholder admittance, especially now with the "only 2 guests, even if they are immediate family" rule? I would bet money that it's well below 1.0, and possibly below 0.5. The reason this is important is that I think most people are assuming that the guesting policy is what's primarily responsible for crowding, but it may very well be arrivals and +3 hour pre-departure entries. Another thing about the +3 hour arrivals is that although they may have only an average amount of F&B consumption, their occupancy impact is far greater. For example, what's the average stay in the lounge? 60-75 minutes, I'd guess. Of the people that arrive more than 3 hours early, some of those are going to be very early. The average of those guests may be 4 hours or more, meaning each one of those might take up as much room as 4 regular guests. As others have said, Amex has been scanning BPs for awhile now, and has an almost-complete set of data, as opposed to us armchair quarterbacks.

RichardMannion

Steve M

I think you may have misunderstood: I didn't say "would cause" but "would allow for" substantial growth in cardholder base. Certainly, some people that regularly use the lounge with the same guest (say, a spouse) would get an AU for that spouse if they found value in the lounge. In some cases, it wouldn't even be the full AU fee, as some will already have a lower-tiered AU that they can upgrade.

My point was that with the lounges already at maximum capacity*, they can't substantially grow the Platinum cardholder base without creating a bad taste in everyone's mouth when people get turned away. This is especially true for what's probably their most lucrative customers: those that travel but a handful of times a year and justify the AF because of the lounge access, even if it doesn't make financial sense. I'm certain that Amex would like way more of those kinds of Platinums. If they were to implement a "no free guest" rule, they'd substantially increase the number of Platinum cardholders they could support with the current lounge configurations, with that growth coming in the form of new cardholders, not those cajoled to get an AU because of these hypothetical new rules. That is, it would allow them to grow the cardmember base due to general marketing of the card, not that the growth would be caused by the new rules.

*PS: I say "already at maximum capacity" because I think that's effectively where they are today. In some cases, people are having to wait in line at the entrance for people to leave, and this happens only if it's completely packed inside, creating an unpleasant experience even for many people that were already admitted. If they're having to implement other controls such as the changes to guest policy, no arrivals, and no +3 hour early entry, they're doing so to prevent the lounges from getting completely full. Even if that happens only, say, 1 hour a day, and the lounge is half-empty for other periods of the day, I still call that "at maximum capacity." It's not like they can grow the cardmember base under the condition that people spread out their travel more evenly throughout the day.

RichardMannion

Doppy

They should release the numbers to us so we can run our own calculations.

SP03

Most seating at the Centurion Lounge are designed for traveling with companions. Usually they are tables for 2. Would taking away a guest really improve capacity? Many of people tables are fairly small, so you would be sitting face to face on a small dining table, or side by side on the sofa sharing a coffee table. Earlier poster already mentioned that having to share a table is considered overcrowding.

Would Platinum cardmembers accept a $30 guest fee? I think you over estimate how many cardholders would be willing to pay for that. Many would simply choose to wait in the concourse esp as airports are getting nicer and there are alternative lounges. Now it's a free meal vs paying in the airport. But at $30 or $60 for a family, there will be plenty of comparable alternatives. Here at PHL, terminals are getting a big upgrade with much nicer seating and dining options. I would not pay $30 to bring in a guest.

Sure it would decrease utilization, by decreasing use by cardholders with guests, not number of guests per se. However, the consequence of that is each cardmember will have to decide if it makes sense to keep the card. What exactly does the Platinum card offer that's not available by another premium card? Not a lot. I would argue that the Centurion Lounge access is the only exclusive offering that you can't get anywhere else. You can get priority pass, 5x airfare, Hilton Gold, Amex Offers, Global Entry credits with other cards that either costs less or offer more.

So this would be a huge devaluation that would drive plenty of cardmembers away. The fact that Amex is willing to offer huge credits/rebates ($500 yearly if you count at face value) every year shows that AMEX is trying to boost acquisition at all costs. Do you really think Amex would touch that guest fee?

Visconti

This hadn't occurred to me, and could be a significant contributor to the overcrowding during peak times, since I'd assume an Airport's peak arrival and departure periods would share considerable overlap.

Visconti

When there had been excess capacity, I felt many of the recommendations on this thread were more a "solution looking for a problem." Now, it appears to me, with excess capacity narrowed, to reduce crowding Amex may increase space, accept some cardmember attrition, or combination thereof. Of course, especially with their closed loop system, Amex has all the data necessary to have a simple flowchart progression to follow, if, indeed, reigning in the overcrowding is important to them.

If the crowding doesn't improve, they can simply go up the follow chart according to their internal profitability score they have for each and every single cardmember, not unlike the one the computer spits out on whether a cardmember should be offered a retention. I speculate, it's on this flowchart where they've decided to (1) eliminate the immediate family (surely, they knew this would lead to widespread abuse, but it had been acceptable while excess capacity existed), (2) make permanent the 3 hour rule and for departure only.

So, in my view, if the crowding doesn't improve, we'll get a glimpse which category is next on their flowchart.