Changing your membership year
Oct 31, 2012, 6:46 am
#31
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Join Date: Mar 2006
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Does anyone think fixed membership years for everyone are a good idea (e.g. based on a calendar year)?
When I switched from KLM (calendar year) to bmi (membership years similar to BA) I found it odd to begin with but now I think each person having their individual membership year is better as long as households were given the one-off option to align their years.
Perhaps allowing a one-off reset of a membership year for everyone would be beneficial. A lot of people may sign up for BAEC and only later start showing any real interest in the scheme and at that point may realise they've got a membership year which doesn't really suit them.
When I switched from KLM (calendar year) to bmi (membership years similar to BA) I found it odd to begin with but now I think each person having their individual membership year is better as long as households were given the one-off option to align their years.
Perhaps allowing a one-off reset of a membership year for everyone would be beneficial. A lot of people may sign up for BAEC and only later start showing any real interest in the scheme and at that point may realise they've got a membership year which doesn't really suit them.
Oct 31, 2012, 7:02 am
#32
Join Date: Jan 2006
Programs: MUCCI
Posts: 5,706
Some schemes have it Dec 31st, others the end of Feb or March, but regardless of when it is (and people have different relgious holidays and different 'celebratory new years'), it can really affect people who do premium travel 'around that time'.
Some *membership* years they will have their premium travel trips (say F to carbiean, or Asia) from TWO years fall into a single membership year (because they flew a few days later one year, and a few days earlier the next) and yet they will have nothing in the other years.
I think personal years is far more desirable - providing members can (occasionally - if they are currently inconvenient) make a change to their year end date to make it fit their travel pattern and aviod yo-yoing due to it being badly timed.
Perhaps allowing a one-off reset of a membership year for everyone would be beneficial. A lot of people may sign up for BAEC and only later start showing any real interest in the scheme and at that point may realise they've got a membership year which doesn't really suit them.
I was about to say 'it could be limited to once every...' - however I return to the point, that if done correctly, nobody should be gaining an advantage. So why not allow it any time people want.
I however will continue to argue for rolling 'last 12 months' for blues, irrespecitive of HHA.
I think there should also be an end adjustment date feature to enable people to time it conveniently, possibly prorated or ending early. Without gaining an advantage.
You might say, why not just have the adjustment faciliity, why the rolling 12 months? Becasue people are not always able to know in advance.
It is bad relationship management to take a load of TP away from someone who is blue but has been very activie in the last 3 months of their year, etc. A year end they only had because they gave you business in the past.
Yet it doesn't happen to another member who is new. Rolling 'last 12 months' for blues solves all these problems.
Oct 31, 2012, 7:04 am
#33
Join Date: Jan 2000
Programs: Latinpass Million Miler. BA Gold.
Posts: 3,544
I have the same situation as srbenna, plus the the little BBAs also in April. But this difference can work both ways. This year we flew in mid-march. Mrs BBA had already requalified for Silver, so the TPs go to her new year. Had she had a date in April, these would have gone to waste. For me, the TPs helped me requalify for Gold. Had my date been in March, I would not have made Gold.
Oct 31, 2012, 7:14 am
#34
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) FFs like ourselves would actually use it?
Oct 31, 2012, 7:47 am
#35
Join Date: Jan 2006
Programs: MUCCI
Posts: 5,706
The ability to reset and begin your next year early would more be a feature for existing members, thereby allowing them to:
- get in sync with their partners.
- proactivly (if they do know in advance) draw the same benefits from a surge of flying that a NEW blue member was. Indeed, you could have a Silver member and a blue member on date X, and after a surge of identical flying, the Silver member would still be silver, but the Blue would be Gold, just due to an unfortunate year end timing.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:00 am
#36
Join Date: Mar 2005
Posts: 380
It also affects those wishing to switch their business to BA. I have been a Star Alliance Gold member for the past ten to twelve years. Now that BA has acquired bmi, and virtually all of my travel is either to the U.K. or, when I am there for long periods, within the U.K. or to Europe, I'd like to make the switch. The problem is I opened a BAEC account last June, not realizing the implications, in order to transfer bmi miles. (I wasn't gold with bmi as they pulled out of my market many years ago.) I understand that BA doesn't status match, and I'd be willing to start from the ground up. I had planned to switch my travel at the at the start of the new year. By my calculation, I will have 530 tier points by June through a combination of WT+ and CW/CE travel, so just shy of silver, and then the year will reset. I'm just not sure I want to be bronze for what could be a very long time. Without the flexibility, I am rethinking my plan to switch to BA at this time.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:12 am
#37
Join Date: Apr 2011
Posts: 3,513
At the risk of being lynched... I'm not sure I buy this rolling 12 month argument or the once off reset. I can see how it would make life easier for blues in particular. But in setting the rules the way they are BA has presumably done a forecast of people rising through the tiers. If they moved to a rolling year, in order to keep the promotions at the level they want they would just increase the number of status points needed to move up. So it would not really help anyone.
Put another way, people have roughly a year from when they sign up to get to, say, silver. If they fail to do so presumably they are not flying enough for BA to see them as worthy promotion prospects. I really cannot see a commercially attractive argument against this. I don't buy that people will dump BA in droves. And those few that do are relatively small customers to BA.
To me, so long as the rules are clear at the start, and don't change half way through, I don't see an issue. And Nicky's note up thread seems quite correct - the rules are the rules, we all knew them, and to ask for extensions beyond the two weeks (not accusing anyone in the thread of doing that) is frankly trying it on.
Put another way, people have roughly a year from when they sign up to get to, say, silver. If they fail to do so presumably they are not flying enough for BA to see them as worthy promotion prospects. I really cannot see a commercially attractive argument against this. I don't buy that people will dump BA in droves. And those few that do are relatively small customers to BA.
To me, so long as the rules are clear at the start, and don't change half way through, I don't see an issue. And Nicky's note up thread seems quite correct - the rules are the rules, we all knew them, and to ask for extensions beyond the two weeks (not accusing anyone in the thread of doing that) is frankly trying it on.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:12 am
#38
Join Date: Oct 2003
Location: London
Posts: 3,500
The fixed period must save BA some money (due to lower number of status card holders) but is at least partially offset by people like you and me taking their business elsewhere.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:14 am
#39
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Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: London
Programs: Mucci. Nothing else matters.
Posts: 38,644
It would be bonkers to restrict the abilty to adjust a membership year to just people in a HHA in the first place.
...
Even if people are a 'genuine' household, BA should NOT (while allowing them to sync their year ends by a mechanism of adjustment) be giving any member of that HHA any advantage to attain or retain status.
And, if the mechanism does not give any advantage, why not open it to all in the first place?
...
Even if people are a 'genuine' household, BA should NOT (while allowing them to sync their year ends by a mechanism of adjustment) be giving any member of that HHA any advantage to attain or retain status.
And, if the mechanism does not give any advantage, why not open it to all in the first place?
I hope that helps to explain my posts above. I do have views about the wider issues as well.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:17 am
#40
Join Date: Aug 2012
Posts: 2,676
The issue I have with restarting the year early is the unfair nature of it - those who are aware will do it.
Take myself. I'm, right now, flying out in the USA with 8 week away from my year reset. I've obtained Silver, there's no way I'll get Gold in the time remaining. So, if the feature was available, I'd have made a judgement call about 1 month ago to reset early to get the points into the next year rather than lose them next week.
However, the person I'm travelling with, he is in the same situation but he just wouldn't pay enough attention to do this.
Of course, there are plenty of these scenarios in real life, but the likely outcome is that when I eventually explained the situation to him after the fact, he'd ring BA and try to persuade them to retrospectively do what he should have done. He'll then get told no and have a 'bad' experience.
So I don't have a problem with the fixed end date - sure the reset would be nice - but it's not vital.
For me - the syncing up of the HHA is a far bigger problem. My wife and son have very different reset dates and that makes timing when considering points very difficult. BA could make this more unattractive by saying that the only way to deal with it is to end their years early for one year. E.g. if my wife's ends in April and mine in November - the adjustment would be to end her year in November this year or to only give me 6 months in my next year.
Take myself. I'm, right now, flying out in the USA with 8 week away from my year reset. I've obtained Silver, there's no way I'll get Gold in the time remaining. So, if the feature was available, I'd have made a judgement call about 1 month ago to reset early to get the points into the next year rather than lose them next week.
However, the person I'm travelling with, he is in the same situation but he just wouldn't pay enough attention to do this.
Of course, there are plenty of these scenarios in real life, but the likely outcome is that when I eventually explained the situation to him after the fact, he'd ring BA and try to persuade them to retrospectively do what he should have done. He'll then get told no and have a 'bad' experience.
So I don't have a problem with the fixed end date - sure the reset would be nice - but it's not vital.
For me - the syncing up of the HHA is a far bigger problem. My wife and son have very different reset dates and that makes timing when considering points very difficult. BA could make this more unattractive by saying that the only way to deal with it is to end their years early for one year. E.g. if my wife's ends in April and mine in November - the adjustment would be to end her year in November this year or to only give me 6 months in my next year.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:37 am
#41
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If, when I started as a FF, I had not discovered FT, not gained the knowledge necessary but instead had got within spitting distance of the first rung of status, I would have been greatly annoyed if I'd realised that I could have done it with a little more forward planning. And I probably would have been annoyed enough not to put the effort in for the next year. I may even have chanced it with another airline (FlyBe, in my case).
While Bronze, Silver and Golds are the ones BA need to look after, Blues are the ones they need to entice.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:45 am
#42
Join Date: Jan 2006
Programs: MUCCI
Posts: 5,706
Put another way, people have roughly a year from when they sign up to get to, say, silver. If they fail to do so presumably they are not flying enough for BA to see them as worthy promotion prospects. I really cannot see a commercially attractive argument against this.
However, plenty of people will have joined BAEC years ago to credit the odd flight to BA etc. They therefore have a membership year end date.
As a result, when a situation that occurs happens and they do a lot of heavy flying on BA, they have the TP they are now earning reset half way through the process.
I've seen this happen! (A couple of times). Two people both with year end dates set a long time ago start flying, both fly the same flights, one ends up with status, and well on the way to renewing it. The other does not.
Another time it was someone with existing low level flying and someone who was a new signup. The new signup got status first, from the same flying. The other did not.
I've also seen situations where someone has flown 180% of what the other person has, yet they do not have status, and the person who flew significantly less has it - again due to bad timing of an old membership year.
(And I can tell you in this situation the person who had status was a LOT less valuable!)
To me, so long as the rules are clear at the start, and don't change half way through, I don't see an issue.
Now you might say people should study the scheme and plan.
But that is not what BA should be thinking about, they should be thinking about rewarding and looking after the more valuable customer.
And as I've said, I've personally seen people fly less get better reward (Status) than people who fly a lot more, due to very bad year ends.
And the person who did not get status was unquestionably already more valuable to BA.
Are the rules clear? How many people worry about their And Nicky's note up thread seems quite correct - the rules are the rules, we all knew them, and to ask for extensions beyond the two weeks (not accusing anyone in the thread of doing that) is frankly trying it on.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:51 am
#43
Join Date: Jan 2006
Programs: MUCCI
Posts: 5,706
And, if blue had a last 12 months, it would only be status members who would need to make use of it.
Additionally, now that they have started to be rewarded/valued, there does need to be terms applied to that,ie duration.
It could, be the case that people could choose to retrospectivly fire a reset at a given time. Again, the member would have nothing that a new signup would not have benefitted from. And I think existing members should not be disadvantaged compared with new signups.
Oct 31, 2012, 8:56 am
#44
Join Date: Jan 2006
Programs: MUCCI
Posts: 5,706
With regard to HHA, I would point out that there are plenty of people that do live or certainly fly together as a real world geniune household, but at not part of a HHA. Various reasons for this.
They may similarly be disadvantaged by having different year end dates that are now permanelty stuck where they are following the November2011 (announced)/ March2012 (implemented) changes.
Oct 31, 2012, 9:06 am
#45
Join Date: Sep 2012
Location: Balham - Gateway to The South
Programs: BA Bronze
Posts: 2,020
Nicci, could I just make a suggestion which I have posted before:
Blue members having 'badly timed' year ends.
And keep in mind they might have been relativly inactive for years and have now become active BAEC members.
They have joined BAEC, and lets say they have a 8th August year end.
They fly BA occasionally, but because they only fly occasionally.
Now some future year in June they start flying heavily. They get to 280 TP in 3 months by 8th August, and they are reset. (Because that is when they joined BAEC years ago).
Now in the next 3 months they get another 280 TP.
Despite doing 560 TP in less than 6 months, they arn't even Bronze yet. Despite it possibly all being BA.
Yet another member, who had never been flying BA before, who joined up and flew the same flights, would be Bronze and just 40 TP away from Silver.
I've seen this happen with colleagues and acquaintances.
The solution I advocate:
It is very bad (in terms of new relationship management) to take away a load of TP from people who happend to have given you a flight or two in years gone by. Just when they start to accumulate.
I think Blue members, should be considered on a rolling 'Last 12 Months' basis.
As soon as they have reached 300 TP, they should then acquire a year end.
There is a question as to what this year end date should be, now that you do not automatically begin a new year upon promotion. Under the spirt of this set of rules, it would be 12 months from the earliest of thouse TP contributing to the 300. I.e. if someone started flying again on 21st June with some TP towards that 300, and they reach it November, their year end should be 8th June.
You could make a very simple and clear website graphic to show this:
e.g.:
Blue members having 'badly timed' year ends.
And keep in mind they might have been relativly inactive for years and have now become active BAEC members.
They have joined BAEC, and lets say they have a 8th August year end.
They fly BA occasionally, but because they only fly occasionally.
Now some future year in June they start flying heavily. They get to 280 TP in 3 months by 8th August, and they are reset. (Because that is when they joined BAEC years ago).
Now in the next 3 months they get another 280 TP.
Despite doing 560 TP in less than 6 months, they arn't even Bronze yet. Despite it possibly all being BA.
Yet another member, who had never been flying BA before, who joined up and flew the same flights, would be Bronze and just 40 TP away from Silver.
I've seen this happen with colleagues and acquaintances.
The solution I advocate:
It is very bad (in terms of new relationship management) to take away a load of TP from people who happend to have given you a flight or two in years gone by. Just when they start to accumulate.
I think Blue members, should be considered on a rolling 'Last 12 Months' basis.
As soon as they have reached 300 TP, they should then acquire a year end.
There is a question as to what this year end date should be, now that you do not automatically begin a new year upon promotion. Under the spirt of this set of rules, it would be 12 months from the earliest of thouse TP contributing to the 300. I.e. if someone started flying again on 21st June with some TP towards that 300, and they reach it November, their year end should be 8th June.
You could make a very simple and clear website graphic to show this:
e.g.:
Code:
------------------------------------------------------------- | | | | | | | | | | | | | | 0| 0| 10| 0| 20| 0| 10| 80| 0 | 50| 80| 40| ------------------------------------------------------------- |Nov |Dec |Jan |Feb |Mar |Apr |May |Jun |Jul |Aug |Sep |Oct | |2011|2011|2012|2012|2012|2012|2012|2012|2012|2012|2012|2012| -------------------------------------------------------------
, however nearly all my TP earnings were in the last 3 months.I would love a rolling year to start me off !
Two years running I've nearly got to bronze. Bronze in itself doesn't give much more status than Blue apart from being able to select seats 7 days out (please correct me if I'm wrong).
In the next 8 weeks I'll earn 140 TP's - which if a rolling year was in place would have given me Bronze - BAEC could offer it without much extra cost, especially if it was only for your first 'promotion'. After all the perks are few and this would encourage more 'lower status' members to fly more for silver,
Would also be nice (might be impractical though) to be able to access past years miles/TP's/redemptions