gcuk

As a July year end, I was hopeful they would re-assess extensions at least on a quarterly basis, based purely on them choosing the 25% TP target reduction. So by 8 December, the July’s had been impacted by reduced flying for 5 months, August by 4 months and September by 3 months, so the benefit of the 25% reduction had been lost to all those, and it would seem to me that it would be reasonable to extend those three TP end months by another year.
They could then continue to assess each quarter as the pandemic diminishes, not unlike the way they addressed the early concessions they made to the April-June year ends before the general extension.

ISTFlyer

IMO, yes.
If you're staying home to control the virus, that is your personal choice and if you prefer to fly during these days this is your personal choice. I appreciate everyone's own decision and I completely agree that everyone has a choice.
I am not 100% sure that the UK government advised staying at home during the past summer or even released something official about that until November lockdown. ( Assuming that you're UK based as you mentioned the quarantine ). If so, how could the UK travel companies could have sold vacation packages to Spain, Greece, Turkey, etc... during the summer.

Regardless of this, there are people who've flown during these hard days and it would be unfair to not give them something extra because they are morally guilty because they didn't stay at home. BA is an enterprise, which their main goal is to earn money and make profit so they should appreciate those who've flown and supported BA's bank account during these hard days.

By the way, BA also relies on some high revenue corporate contracts so they would also think about corporate travel if they are planning to make a decision in the future.

Sidenote: I could also not travel to many countries either because of border restrictions or quarantine/self-isolation issues at arrival. Though, where I live, there is no quarantine for international arriving pax and there is no official government guidance prohibiting travel

gcuk

BA stated that the last extension was for people unable to fly. There was no recognition for me as a July year end who had already achieved enough TP to renew my GGL/CCR cards. That was all ignored and I was ‘extended’ to July 2021, exactly the same as someone who had left BA and achieved zero TPs in the year.
Unfortunately ISTFlyer, loyalty counted for nothing then, so it would be a complete u-turn if they are to give any extra concession for having flown during lockdown.

ISTFlyer

That's sad but the reality.
At least you should have got additional GUF vouchers and your additional nomination rights.

KARFA

deleted

Tocsin

July reset for me, re-qualified for Gold in 2019-20, a total of (big, fat) zero TP for 2020-21 so far (several cancellations by BA), and nothing left booked before July 2021. I really do hope that BA look at the situation again before next July - not smiling

Shuttle

I think you are bang on ISTFlyer that BA was not the first mover on this current extension and are not going to make any further move any time soon.

I think to be 'fair', BA could at least give an extension for those of us that renewed in the second half of this year with enough accumulated points (i.e. we have got no benefit from the current extension). But then, my mother always reminded me that "life is not fair" :-)

Shuttle

BertieBadger

With impeccable timing, I received the new CEO's email message just a few minutes after you posted this, which contains the claim that:

I suspect that a number of people will consider that taking loyalty for granted is exactly what they have done here with their policies and responses to people such as yourself and others. It is to be hoped that these are not just idle words designed to placate but that they genuinely indicate a change of strategy.

alex67500

I quite disagree here, status has been extended for people who couldn't qualify from July onwards. The only people who could feel hard done by are people who missed renewal due to cancelled or not booked flights between March and June. Outside of this, nobody has lost anything, and that will be the case until at least 8th of July 2021. But this being a frequent flyer forum, anxiety runs high.

Granted, the email at the time was poorly worded now that we understand what it actually meant in BAEC management minds.But as mentioned by ISTFlyer, BA weren't front of the pack with extensions the first time around, and they will probably feel that the situation is fine as it is until some time in Q2 now. With that in mind, if it left you unsatisfied I'm sure you could take your business elsewhere. Personally, I don't have any business to take anywhere at the moment, so I'm staying put.

BertieBadger

Many people have not had their status extended, indeed I have been told explicitly by BA that mine was not and would not be. But perhaps you misread my point, or more likely I did not express myself clearly - it is not about whether people have "lost", but rather whether there are members whose loyalty was taken for granted, and it seems to me that many will feel exactly that way. The presumption from BA appears to be that because many people re-qualified early, they were spending at a rate that they would continue to do so and retain their status organically. Meanwhile others who had been busy shovelling money into the coffers of BA's competitors would be gifted a free year. Everyone is of course entitled to their own conclusion on whether this demonstrates BA taking loyalty for granted, but I would not be surprised to find that many do.

(Yes, "loyalty" is arguably a misused word for what is ultimately a transactional relationship, however it is one that BA are very fond of so it seems fair to use it in the same manner they do)

A generous appraisal to be sure! Based on some of the comments on this thread, some people found it downright disingenuous, rather than merely clumsily worded. And if it is simply a poor choice of words, why not send out another email saying what they actually meant? To my knowledge they never did. But again this is not about whether people feel hard done by, or whether they "lost out" but whether BA's policies are consistent with their statement that they do not take members' loyalty for granted.

alex67500

I've read this a few times now, but I'm not sure what part of your loyalty has been taken for granted. From where I stand nobody has gone down a level due to lack of available flights and destinations since July this year, and we don't know what will happen after that. I still think the move they made was to make sure nobody lost status, and that the email was very poorly worded. I will quote again, but "Don't attribute to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence" (the original quote is stupidity, but would be too harsh here).
I sometimes wonder why BA don't involve a team of FT beta testers for their emails and policy changes. It would save them so much time... I know we're a special, vocal and anxious bunch, and we have the most contorted cases usually, but we're probably still a very small minority.

BertieBadger

I'll try to clarify. If they will forgive me for using them as an example, some time ago ThatT1Feeling shared an impressive pic that showed a decade or more of Gold, GGL and CCR membership. On BA's own terms that demonstrates significant loyalty. And yet as far as I know, BA have given them no meaningful [1] support. The current assumption seems to be that they and other GGLs in their situation will have no difficulty amassing the 2250 TPs they need before mid-2021. I think that many will perceive that as BA taking those member's future business - their loyalty if you will - for granted.

Yes, of course BA might adapt their policy in the future and we might see further extensions (I personally don't think we will, but I have no particular insight) but I only evaluate their words on what is known, not what might be.

(As an aside and FWIW, I have a number of times indicated in this thread that I do tend to the view of (very) clumsy wording, although if it is simply incompetence why not correct it at the earliest opportunity, it seems that would have saved more than a few queries to the customer services team. And again, for clarity, I am not discussing whether people are happy with BA's policies here, they have been discussed at length, and of course everyone should make their own decisions based upon them.)

[1] I acknowledge the reduced target of 75%, but as many people have pointed out, cancellations and reduced schedules quickly wiped out that 25% reduction - and much more - for many.

alex67500

I think this is where the anxiety I mention comes in, we don't know what might be. On the other side, a lot of BAEC staff must be on furlough, anxious with other topics. Not to take a page out of the whiny little violin book, but we might not have a BAEC or a BA to extend any status past July.

(I still don't think anybody's been wronged or taken for granted (yet), but we've both said our bit, so we can settle this over a beer or glass of bubbly if/when we can meet again! )

BertieBadger

I was thinking how I could better explain this. For me, the fact that any individual member is not losing something isn't enough. I feel it is analogous to being told by ACME Utility Ltd that "No Mr Badger, since you've been our customer for 5 years, you can't have the lower price that we charge others for the same service. But to prove we're not taking your custom for granted, we won't raise your existing price". I wouldn't personally be convinced by that

It would be a pleasure

PS - Although I cropped out your words about BA & BAEC staff, I do appreciate these remain very tough times for them, and I hope I've repeated that often enough in this thread, but more than happy to do so again. My next BA flight isn't until Spring 2021 at the moment, but I am looking forward to it.

HighwayToHEL

My replacement GGL cards arrived today. Maybe I should frame them, along with my unused CCR card. As an August refugee I'll not be requalifying