Award availability.

Here are a few for the list in no particular order:

1. Inconsistent information from one reservation agent to the next.
2. Inconsistent policy and regulations.
3. Release of seats for FF award travel, the revenue departments don't understand 331 days or customer service.
4. Using miles when and where I want to at non-inflated mileage requirements.
5. The continued inflation of all rewards across the industry (airline and hotel).
6. The loss of a customer oriented focus. The paradigm now is "customer service, what customer service?"

Happy Flying!

In a word - complexity.

The programs would cause me much less headache if there weren't so many complex rules. I like rules like these:

If you fly/stay, you earn miles. Always.
If there's an award seat/room, you can have it.
If you've got an upgrade certificate, you can use it if there's a seat for you.

In short, no fare/rate/class restrcitions. None of the "great offer" v-calss and above kind of restrictions.

1. The late fee for booking an award that AA and CO charge. Why do some airlines charge it ad others don't. You have already paid enough when you earned the miles and usually there's no need for a paper ticket because you're booking a few days before the trip and you have an e-ticket. Charge for the late booking of paper ticket awards. E-tickets do not cost anything extra since the customer prints them.

2. Devaluation of miles or points without informing the customer in advance or with enough time (Radisson Gold Points and Hilton Hhonors). Changes should be made for the following year and not for the current one. Give a reasonable time (Maybe a year) to use the miles / points at the same face value in which you earned them. Keep the old program for those miles/ points while the new program is in place for a certain time.

Award structures are now designed to be more complex and harder to understand. Award availability is available on flighs I would never take ie 6 o AM on Sunday morning. Miles earned are devalued and worth less every day much like the old Green Stamp Days. Miles are now profit center and can be earned everywhere It is in the airlines interest to de value them to increase e bottom line and reduce liability. No longer are these programs to reward the business traveler or loyality. The data is often sold to add revenue value. minimal return to the traveler.

Top three problems:

1. Devaluation of account balances. What British Airways did to North American members this year was criminal.

2. Standard award availability. Some airlines are better than others, but Continental absolutely takes the cake here -- to the point where OnePass is a borderline fraudulent program, advertising awards that are virtually nonexistent.

3. Plan complexity. Agents can't possibly master the rules. Sometimes that's to the customer's advantage, sometimes not, but it's always confusing.

Mileage credits from partners. Especially frustrated with a particular airline alliance that keeps telling me how wonderful and seemless travel to all corners of the globe is with them, but can't ever credit a partner's flights without me having to fax a letter and ticket stubs to them.

Miles are no longer a reward for the business traveler. Miles are now sold and are profit centers. Devalued miles benefits the seller as it reduces liability. Data from flyers is sold to add value. Awards to premium places are limited.

1. Inflation / devaluation.

2. Expedite fees. My miles were hard earned; I shouldn't have to pay to use them. AA is a bad offender here, obscenely charging inside 3 weeks, even on a web-booked e-ticket.

3. Expiry. Not a problem with many programs, but for me, this renders Southwest's otherwise generous programs nearly worthless. Other airlines are crooning over their fly 3 get 1 free promos, that for a limited time give you a cheap ticket for flying 3 expensive ones. But with online booking, WN has had fly 4 cheap, get 1 expensive free, on an ongoing basis. That's fantastic. But I usually fly 1 or 2 WN RT's a year. At that rate, I'll never earn anything.

I'd like to underscore these salient points because for me they are the crux of my frustration with FF programs.

Whilst it is necessary for airlines to tweak their programs on a regular basis, some employ knee-jerk reactions and change their rules and benefits more often then I change my underwear! Take UA as an example. In the last 12 months here are some of the changes:

• SWU restrictions based on fare class. Very little (if any) notice given about the changes. Due to the uproar by customers, fare class restrictions removed from domestic fares and D fare class on international fares.
• waivers and favors taken away
• 1K rooms closed
• No changes to *A travel flights once travel has commenced
• Extending qualification period by three months because customers were taking their business to AA
• Upgrading MP status based on current projections. That is, customers getting 1K benefits when they haven't flown 100,000 miles

I'd like to see some stability in the program and know that when I commit to fly 100,000 miles I can expect to enjoy the advertised rewards, not have them pulled from under me.

One problem that is on my wish list is the ability to upgrade on partner airlines using UA miles. Now that would be great!

------------------
Latitudes.

For my part, I travel not to go anywhere, but to go. I travel for travel�s sake. The great affair is to move; to feel the needs and hitches of our life more nearly; to come down off this feather-bed of civilisation, and find the globe granite underfoot and strewn with cutting flints.
Robert Louis Stevenson (1850�1894)

Ok I'll bite.

You left BBB of USAirways off your list. He started alot of the program devaulations last year

I'll just mention my two biggest peeves:

1. Award Redemption

2. Failure to recognize elite status and provide the advertised benefits (I get REALLY tired of arguing with hotel front desk personnel about what I am supposed to get).

Djlawman

1 Award availability

2 Difficulty in checking a range of dates online. I just can't spend hours typing in dates to find the combination of days with an available flight.

3 Availability of flights outside of hub cities.

From the home office in Chicago's Midway Airport....

The Top Ten Problems Members Have With Frequent Flyer Programs.

10. Not knowing if they will qualify for next year's top tier with only 99,823 YTD miles.

9. No miles accumulation on Air Force One.

8. No elite qualification accumulated for flights departing from airports east of the Mississippi River, south of the Ohio River if the departure time is within 20 minutes of high tide at at Cape Lookout, Oregon on the third Tuesday after a blue moon in the fiscal 2nd quarter of the airline you are flying on.

7. When you already feel like a LUSer, you are forced to do the HoKeY pokey and get further inSULTed in trying to see if you MaYBe get upgraded when you purchase your ticket.

6. Having to start valuing your miles as worth 2 Turkish Lira each instead of 2 cents each.

5. Telling the agent you would like to redeem an award for anytime between now and the year 2076 and they tell you, "Sorry....all sold out."

4. Hearing, �After flying 38,000 miles through 4 continents and 15 countries over the course of 12 days and out mileage running 11 other teams, you have been enhanced.�

3. You get the feeling that your 2004 Super-Duper-Triple-Diamond-Ultra-Platinum card will be printed on the back of a free Whopper coupon.

2. Waiting for the day that they start charging monthly account maintenance fees if your account balance falls below 1,000,000 miles.


AND THE NUMBER ONE PROBLEM MEMBERS HAVE WITH FREQUENT FLYER PROGRAMS

Five words � ROYAL PAIN IN THE A$$.


[This message has been edited by DLSIZE (edited 08-29-2003).]