Hearing that Annette Perez of CO was in attendance at the Freddies ceremony last night reminded me of a dialogue several years ago between her and one of my associates who was about 5,000 miles short of flying up to Platinum Elite at the end of the year, and wanted to see if CO could work out something whereby they'd grant her Platinum, and she'd fly a certain amount to qualify her commitment to CO. A challenge, in essence.

CO's (Annette's) flat response was, paraphrased, "We can't and we won't we do it because doing so wouldn't be fair to those who earned it and would compromise the integrity of the program."

HUH?!

And what the hell was CO doing in the same breath, outright comping to full Platinum others who didn't step foot on a blue-and-white plane all year??? Annette, my dear, my co-worker (and therefore I) invested ... equity by sitting in your 30" of coach because CO was our firm's preferred carrier at the time. And you told her WHAT you thought would be fair?!

I think there is an issue with CO's understanding of the word "integrity." While Gordo, et al., were busy being cocky-... big-wigs possibly hobnobbing with the likes of Kenneth Lay and his ilk at those Houston backyard BBQ's, did they pick up a few "New Economy" ideas on what running a business is about?

In deference to all of challenges to the validity of the Freddies and its voting process, I think we all can agree on one thing, and that is that whether or not the Freddies is the be-all/end-all of consumer sentiment, the present results do indicate that no matter how CO glosses over its mistakes in consumer relations by issuing obfuscatory explanations for patently customer-unfriendly policy revisions, dismissing legitimate concerns raised by its best customer on the basis that "others like it and say so, and therefore so will you," and talking about how far they've come from what apparently they're heading back toward, what still counts is treating your customers like the intelligent and empowered individuals that they are.

Seeing how CO has apparently lost sense of the concept of integrity in their dealings with us, it's no wonder that our loyalty toward CO has reciprocally gone out the door.

After all, AS is just not an option for most of the country, and no one in their right mind goes out of their way to fly WN.

Somehow, I just don't see how the humility implied with a statement like, "We'll work hard to earn your faith back" could ever be credibly reeived from Houston again. Once bitten, twice shy.

You have hit the nail on the head B or C.. Although I didn't discuss it with Annette last evening, I was experiencing the same feeling (I was gritting my teeth after the first 5 minutes of conversation, but I was a good girl).. Reading your post was like deja vu for me.. In 2000, Mr Fish was short of qualifying for Plat by about the same amount, and I had the SAME conversation with the SAME rep, with the SAME results.. Keep in mind that Mr Fish has been Gold/Plat with CO since 1995, all on full-Y, short hauls, at about $70K per year (this off year was due to a job change, and he resumed an even busier travel sched once settled into new job). OK, so he went on a mileage run, on Christmas day, and came within 600 miles of 75K. A few days later, the mileage posted and I called Annette to see if this would secure his status. She would NOT commit, so he was forced to take another run on New Year's Eve to edge him over the top.. Nice way to spend the holidays with your family, but CO Plat was important for someone who puts in 140K miles per year.. Only 2 weeks later, a friend was comped CO Plat based on one year as AA EXP.. It was at this point I started to lose faith in CO's integrity.. 5 years of hardcore, butt-in-seat high-cost miles meant nothing to them, and they have since shown that 2 more years of the same mean even less.. This year, the 3 Gold Fishes (grin), were all offered to move up to Plat for some ridiculous low # of flts, along with a few bonus offers.. Mr Fish, the hard core Plat, has received nothing for his loyalty.. I have very little faith left in CO at all.....

Robin

Well put... Integrity is sorely lacking at CO.

Ms. Perez excused herself from a pre-awards conversation after I mentioned that I would miss America West as a OnePass partner since I fly out of Tucson, a market served by two CO flights a day out of IAH.

I was disapointed that the CO representatives left right after the awards.

I did notice that a UA representitive had spent some time talking to a group of FlyerTalkers. they were still talking late in the evening when I left to go back to my hotel.

Hmmm........UA flies to almost all of the travel destinations from Tucson that I have accessed using the CO-HP partnership.