bocastephen

John Rainey: Freddie Awards?? The nonsensical rantings of a bunch of over-entitled gasbags who think they own this airline!

spin88

IMHE they don't ask for, or record mileage numbers. They must record the compute ID number. I can recall voting one year, and getting distracted, and coming back to vote on the rest of the catigories and being told I had already voted. I did not try clearing my cash, etc.

But UAL's loss is all the more impressive for the 50,000 votes from MP from UA's boilerroom.

What I also find intersting is the very sharp fall from the 2014 results (which are in the link I posted in post 7). UAL used to be middle of the pack, and ahead of DL, no longer...

Bonehead

Thanks. By the way...the discontent is not limited to UA:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delta...e-failure.html

UA-NYC

Yeah, not surprising - but of course the difference is that DL never used to actually WIN these awards year after year

Kacee

Well if Marriott can win eight years in a row, there's still hope for DL.

Who, by the way, are the masters of pitching a benefit cut as an enhancement. Apparently their members are not falling it for it so far.

Bonehead

Let's see what happens when AA goes to a revenue-based earnings model. Then maybe it will be a clean sweep for WN!!!

spin88

I expect the DL folks are quite happy. They have said that SkyPesos was a problem for them, and have set out to improve it. I don't think they want a leading program (they focus on good service/product not the FF program) and they showed improvements across the board, and moved ahead of UAL in every category, which I assume is where they want to be. Here are the results, with the places they scored in each category:

Program of the year: this year: DL – 6th, UA – 8th ; 2014: DL 8th, UA – 6th.

Best redemption ability: this year: DL – 6th, UA – 7th ; 2014: DL -7th, UA – 6th.

Best Customer Service: this year: DL – 6th, UA 12th (next to last); 2014: DL- 8th, UA – 10th

Best Elite Program: this year: DL – 6th, UA 7th; 2014 UA 6th, DL – 7th.

Best Credit Card (most important award we all know ) : this year: DL – 8th, UA – 19th; 2014 DL – 11th, UA – 12th.

p.s. If delta were to actually win a Freddy (other than customer service) then I think they would spending too much $$$ on a reward program. I doubt that Anderson wants any Freddies (CS accepted) but he also does not want to have the FF program be a drag on attracting business. They have said the negative reputation of SkyPesos was an issue, and have gone about fixing it. Not by being the best, but by being better.

United OTOH needs the FF program to attract passengers given is massive under-performance operationally, and seriously sub-par hard and soft product. Destroying MP like Jeff did, has destroyed one of the major drivers of the business. Chase for one has to be P.O.ed.

CO_Nonrev_elite

What makes you think that they will take notice ?. They've been coming more or less last in everything for a long time now

nerdbirdsjc

True. Also, AAdvantage will come to more closely resemble SkyMiles and MileagePlus by this time next year -- as the passenger-facing portion of the AAUS integration completes, American will undoubtedly take steps to hoin the rest of the airline world in implementing a revenue-centric loyalty program.

nerdbirdsjc

Pretty much. And he would be right. The airline's biggest and best spenders now receive unprecedented value from MileagePlus, and those people don't have time to waste with Freddie surveys.

sbm12

Nope. It is basically a popularity contest. And the programs which solicit votes from their members (usually via emails) do better than those who don't.

Exleftseat

....and for that : "The CEO of United Airlines got a 39 percent increase in compensation last year, to more than $11.3 million, according to an Associated Press analysis."


Source : " http://skift.com/2015/04/27/united-airlines-ceo-smisek-received-a-hefty-pay-raise-in-2014/"

UA-NYC

We keep hearing that - just like it was a done deal they'd put fare class restrictions on SWUs, have four mileage status tiers, etc.

cerealmarketer

So of all the actual program related categories the most they slipped was 2 places, and none of those were leading to begin with.

To provide some facts on history...

From 1998-2009 MileagePlus didn't win a single Freddie.

http://freddieawards.com/1998-annual...e-awards-10th/

Alaska and Southwest came away with many. Way back when OnePass won some.

2010 and 2011 MP got best elite level (but never got it years prior...even though program was the same...for whatever reason the Freddie awards were administered differently for 2 years and called 'Frequent Traveler Awards')

Delta even picked up some categories along the way.

But these Freddie rankings are well...not much to read into other than tombstones for business travel magazine ads.

Not sure why they don't just take a sample of each program and ask for satisfaction. That time series would be useful.

But hey if they want to give us more, go for it.

transportbiz

Justifiably so, MP redemptions have dried up as fast as the dust bowl. I've been using SkyMiles for reward travel for the past 3-4 months, because nothing is showing up on MP and low and behold Delta has it.