.....and I increasingly seem to reach phone agents on the "DM line" who don't seem to be very good. Not only don't they know the rules but I keep being put on very long holds while they contact supervisors to do very simple things that should not require supervisor approval. SDC is only one example.

Seems like you may be calling in too frequently. Certainly something to worry about. Think about all the notes they must have on your record! I imagine a note per call (at least) or a note per agent that gets involved ... probably thousands of notes by now :D

A thousand notes for three million miles would be one note per three thousand miles on average, which would be less than one call or one agent per ticket on average. That doesn't sound bad, given all the stuff like search for upgrade space or request instrument-supported upgrades that we can't do on line.

I've had agent errors related to change waivers as well. Most recently, they wanted to charge me a $50 fee to take over a Delta Vacations ticket for SDC; the agent was going to waive the fee, but noted he was going to record it in my account as a one time waiver. I asked him why it costs money for Delta to take over a ticket from himself, and he backtracked quickly, noting he didn't realize that the ticket was a Delta Vacations ticket.

Just one small example, but I think a majority of posters here probably have at least one inaccurate note in their account because of an agent mistake.

If things keep trending this way, this is the type of change that isn't going to be a problem for corporate until it blows up in their face with unhappy staff (because their hands are tied) and unhappy customers. We all have many notes on our profiles. Is the airline really going to "fire" their customers?

edit: Thankfully so far, I've found that most frontline staff are as helpful (or unhelpful in some cases) as they've always been. I can't see this keeping up if they're constantly jumping through hoops to make things happen that they could have done themselves previously.

If it was actually automated it would be much simpler for agents to do or would even be simple to do online. But it must not be automated because I’ve had to argue with agents on this multiple times, particularly if confirmed in F with an RUC. Tried to SDC recently after being in confirmed F with RUC and an agent told me that OY space wasn’t available on the flights I wanted, despite open F seats for sale, and agent, claiming to be a supervisor when I asked for a supervisor, said policy had changed, and told me to switch to the flight I wanted in F would be a fare difference of $1100.

Thankfully a DM to Twitter got it resolved. But yes, if this agent is marking profiles on people that they’re asking for things they shouldn’t be, when I was asking for something that was within the rules and shouldn’t even require a waiver, that’s a potential problem down the road.

Last week I attempted to do a plain vanilla SDC thru the desktop website check-in process, non-stop to a later non-stop. V fare ticket with V9 on both later flights that day. Often the website can handle these straightforward SDCs correctly, yet dl.com showed $200 fee to change for each option. It was no hassle whatsoever to call in and SDC, but it does make me wonder if the agents system is prone to same errors as the website.

I too have had DM agents mention that I have used SDC "a lot". And, almost every time it is a battle to get it done. Being told that my fare class is not available. I fly all first class fares, so moot point. Me having to tell them to check their KM or ask a supervisor for help.

But hearing a lot of others are having these issues (I thought I'd just had a lot of uninformed agents) makes me wonder if DL will be limiting the number of times we can SDC. Or just get rid of it completely.

I think one per ticket is astronomical. I bet I don't make one per 50.

That’s my view as well. Whereas you are at ~2%, I am in the <5% range. My SDC requests have always been processed pretty quickly and without needing to ask for a supervisor or needing to HUCA.

Maybe there really is something to the “notes” being added to our records.

"This" in my post refers to the fact that a waiver was granted, not the SDC process itself.

SDC is a simple set of rules and ought to be fully automated because one either qualifies or not, but it does not seem to be quite that automated. That is sometimes a good thing. Once a function is automated, it becomes a lot harder for agents to simply issue a new BP at the gate, allowing a fee free change (whether that is SDC or not). That is true for many functions which could be, but are not, automated.

However, actual change fees are revenue and when revenue is "waived" someone has keyed that in and that is a metric which is easily automated. It also helps to inform the future of SDC (and other change) rules and fees.

FWIW I think the letter is real.

i think RM is rummaging through the couch trying to round up more revenue.

HUH? I'm talking about total calls to DL, specifically the DM line, for any reason, including requests to check for upgrade space (wanting to use GUCs etc.) and then a couple calls to check that the waitlist has been correctly done), often ticketing requests when I can't make delta.dumb put the segments I want together on a ticket or previously if I wanted coach in one direction and FC in the other, calls when T-24 is approaching and I haven't received the meal preselection email, calls about schedule changes, calls to correct missing miles, calls to remind DL to reissue my ticket when there are confirmed instrument-supported upgrades, calls to ask why I cannot do OLCI at T-24, etc. One phone attempt per three thousand miles doesn't seem like much to me given all the things we cannot do ourselves on line......and unlike some folks here, I don't use twitter, which surely should count the same as a phone call.....and BTW I really cannot recall a favor that I've either requested or received unless you count being rebooked over two tickets during the August meltdown that happened about five years ago where putting me on a nonstop freed up seats on two flights and avoided an additional day's delay in arrival at my foreign destination.

We're talking about a thousand calls (not my number, someone suggested it and I went with the math) during more than 25 years (including PMNW) of top tier elite status, including the time when one had to call after midnight for domestic upgrades and even a couple years before it was possible to purchase tickets on line.

That poster feels the need to post on every thread on every forum often times (pun intended) condescendingly.

If DL is really tracking and notating all calls, I'm curious as to how many I have asking if my Pet-In-Cabin notation is correct on all segments. I fly probably 6-8 roundtrips per year, mostly in F. Only one trip, usually in December, do I take my dog along for my mother to see. I have yet to not have a problem when checking in at the counter for the return segment, despite multiple confirmations everything is booked/ticketed/notated properly for the return. Other than the annual trip with the pet, the vast majority of my other itineraries are just fine. Well, I do book far in advance, so I am quite accustomed to weird schedule change issues.