jagmeets

While this may seem to be at odds with what I posted up-thread, I wholeheartedly agree with the points that IanFromHKG raises.

If its going to happen - I will probably use it anyway, but if it dilutes the value that the the MPC gives me, I'd be fuming mad.

midlevels

^

That's my feeling too. Probably mad enough that I might seriously consider jumping ship to AA and try to make Emerald instead of staying happy being a CX GO.

Too much travel

Let's face it - Marco Polo is, in the grand scheme of airline frequent flyer schemes, pretty crappy. There are no tier bonuses, and the burn rates are pretty poor compared with many other schemes.

The only reason I (and I am sure many other FTers) clock our miles to Marco Polo is because of the op-up priority above other OW flyers. If you're going to take this away from us - which functionally is what is going to happen with these cash upgrades (go look at the UA etc boards to understand the true implication of such a scheme) then you need to give us something in return. Otherwise, what's to stop us from just clocking to BAEC where we get more miles and better burn rates?

TMT

brithk

My view is that i would hate it...

I can see perfectly well as to why Cathay would want to do this, they get to sell unsold seats.

Mileage upgrade and redemption opportunities would be lessened greatly. This would hurt, particularly as a diamond I get to redeem a lot of miles (beyond what is available on the website).

The op up's would obviously also go down (a lot).

The very fact that CX are interested in our opinion leads me to believe they think this would be very controversial.

midlevels

Either that, or AgencyGuy, with the one solitary post, is taking us all for a ride

sxc

I don't know about whether CX expects this to be controversial but I can vouch for AgencyGuy being real.

IanFromHKG

I wholeheartedly agree. CX has probably the most difficult-to-meet requirements for top tier -120,000 miles pa with, as Tmt points out, no tier bonuses, and also pretty poor earn rates to boot (why do my business class seats get just 25% more miles when I spend over four times as much as economy?). No lifetime status. No guaranteed upgrades. If you take away the upgrade potential, there isn't much point being CX DM when you get virtually the same benefits being oneworld emerald. The more I think about it, if CX go down this road, I think I would switch. By now I could already have lifetime with BA, QF or AA. If I switch now, I might just still get it before I retire... Now THAT would be valuable...

ZenWorld

I think firstly, we have to understand that airlines are trying their very best to fill the plane to the max. And CX is known to be willing to sell Y seats or Y+ seats even when these cabins are full, and simply push oversold Ys and Y+s into J and F.

Now, they are thinking why should they just push people for free? Why not collect further revenue by "selling" the upgrades to willing payers? And with the budget tightening, there are a good number to mid-management that are only entitled to Y+ cabin, and these people may be willing to top up to J. So why not?

I know some DMs are protesting, but to be honest, I think the drop out rate from DMs are going to be very little, frankly because CX gets a good number of DMs from hub captives, and for those that love CX product, there are still few rivals for CX for them to jump to. (SQ? The only real rival to CX, and they NEVER upgrade you. Even their PPS hardly gets it.)

There are many people who felt that upgrades bidding should be only given to the CX elites. My idea would be: give AsiaMiles a good value in bidding. I.e. can bid in Cash or AsiaMiles or AsiaMiles & Cash, but the AsiaMiles gets good value for bidding. (Maybe say 1 AsiaMile is worth 5c during bidding process. It is an internal system that CX can decide on the value of miles) Now, who gets the most CX miles? Typically CX top tier elites! And I am sure now that AsiaMiles gets good value in bidding process, it makes the loyalty more worthwhile.

And if someone outbids by throwing more cash? Well, I am sure we will concede defeat that despite getting so much value with AsiaMiles bidding, we still lost.

This will also help CX in the sense that they will capture more miles revenue from credit cards (instead of outflow to rival programs), and people will want AsiaMiles better now, given they know it is precious commodity and extremely useful in bidding for upgrades. (hence, you bank your flying miles with CX instead of other programs)

More typical CX elite J customers can now look forward to F seats, Y+ gets to see J cabin (if miles are valued at 5c each, how much do you need to bid to beat these CX elites?), and CX gets more revenue as well, without really upsetting most of the CX elites. And I believe CX will be more happy to let econ seats go empty if they collect more revenue to push these people into higher cabins, than to let J & F seats go empty and collect less revenue, if the plane is not full.

And I think this will benefit both parties generally.

jsfrSE

^

garykung

Le me put it this way - each time a major airline (usually larger than CX) make a change, like bidding system, cash upgrade, etc. the change generates tons of heats. And seriously enough - airlines lose customers because of this change.

My bet is CX is firmed to make this change. What CX is looking for is the least painful way without any big losses (minor adjustments to make flyers less angry).

In FT, any so-called rumors or "seeking for opinions" is simply a way for airlines to see how people will react.

veechee

Has anyone had experience of this on other carriers?
- Not quote the same, but on PR, it is well known that you can upgrade from Y to J at check-in for a flat fee, and because of this, people I know that fly PR book Y and then upgrade at check-in. This is less net revenue for PR than if J had been sold originally, so J is devalued.
- Also similar with WS, Y+ fares are really expensive early on, but can be very reasonable at check-in. I know this, and I have overheard others say it as well when I have sat in Y+, so WS is losing revenue to people waiting to upgrade at the gate.
- CX's current system is the perfect contrast to these: pay for what you want at booking or you most likely will not get it.
Would such a proposition be of interest?
- I fly for business and my business requires me to fly Y fares, and I'm not prepared to spend my own money unless the price is extremely low, so no.
- I DO think the revenue model for CX may be net positive if you offer this for going from Y to Y+.
- I have a fairly high-frequency of op-ups from Y to Y+ on both long-haul and short-haul, and this system would probably reduce that, so this is net negative for me personally.
- Like others have said, I think you drastically devalue CX J if you allow bidding to that.
Should Marco Polo Club or Asia Miles members be differentiated from other passengers in the bidding process?
- Price discounts for MPC members based on status level. E.g., 20% off for SL, 25% off for GO and 35% off for DM (disclaimer: I borrowed the rates from what AC Aeroplan offers different status levels off off certain flight rewards).
- Option to use AM in place of cash, with same fare class rules as cash upgrade (i.e., V class fare can upgrade in the window using AM).
Does the proposed timing for the bidding work?
- Here's a question in response to that question: if I upgraded a segment 4+ days before departure on a ticket I booked with my TA, and now I need to move the date, what happens? Is it now a total debacle involving hours on the phone with CX reservations? I am guessing yes... If I were to do this, I would want to do it as close as possible to flying time: 72 hours or less before departure.
- CX allows check-in 48 hours before departure, why not tie the upgrade offers into the check-in system?

IF implementing this keeps CX from doing something really bad for us, such as a 4-3-4 configuration in Y on 777's (ala AC) then I am all for it. I realize CX has to compete against other carriers that are implementing all kinds of other revenue streams and continually shrinking passenger space.

Cathay Boy

For those that thinks there are minimal benefits aside from op-up between CX DM and OWE, nothing can be more wrong. As CX DM the CX staff treats you very very well. I can basically get J service in Y cabin aside from the J seat (subject to availability, but so far never been turned down once.) Once the ISM even brings me soup from F class, which was great. The inflight experience is just that much better.

Sure I've thought about going to AA with their easy miles and cheap redemption rates. But as frequent flier what am I giving up flying round trip 8-10 times a year between USA and China? Less comfortable seat, far inferior entertainment system, below average to average crew services, and definitely forget about getting any special treatment from the crew. Since what we do and should care about is actual FLYING EXPERIENCE and not trying to earn cheap coupons, I stick with CX.

CX GO vs. OWE? Maybe that's a true argument (again based on how CX treats CX GO onboard, definitely not as nice as DM) but CX DM vs. OWE? There's no comparison.

Too much travel

Is there a new Oneworld rule that one can only accumulate miles on the same airline that runs that frequent flyer programme?!

No-one is asking you to stop flying CX. We're just advocating that people stop racking up miles on Marco Polo if the op-up benefit is de facto taken away, as will be the case if /when CX moves to this system.

relangford

Do not forget about oneworld elites. If this were to be implemented, oneworld elites should also be allowed to bid before the masses. And, how would oneworld elites be handled? After CX elites? That wouldn't go well with an AA Executive Platinum (oneworld Emerald) if a lower status CX elite (oneworld Ruby or Sapphire) got to bid first. CX is already well known as being almost impossible to get award seats on, especially J and F. This proposal would make it go to impossible.

midlevels

Priority bidding on paid upgrades is not a published OW benefit. If an AA EXP felt badly about being put behind a CX GO or SL, I wouldn't have any sympathy. It's not like CX GO have any higher priority than AA Golds for upgrades on AA.

Finally, it's rightly so that award availability on CX is limited in F and J for AA elites. The amount of miles they need to spend to redeem flights is pathetically low compared to CX's own elites. So it's normal that CX would put it's elites ahead here.