Business travel
Gulliver
Loyalty programmes
Delta improves its loyalty scheme
Feb 16th 2011, 17:18 by A.B.
SOME good news from Delta Air Lines, which has announced that its SkyMiles loyalty points will no longer expire. Previously, they would disappear into the ether two years after the "last qualifying mileage activity". Now, with effect from the start of this year, they become ageless.
Jeff Robertson of Delta commented: "We know how much customers value their miles, so eliminating mileage expiration is a major win for them." I suspect it's not actually a "major win" for customers who value their miles. Those customers' mileage accounts would not have been inactive for 24 months in the first place. It's the irregular flyers who forget they are members of the scheme and can't remember their log-in details who stand to benefit. It's a nice bonus for them and a wise move from Delta—the first of its kind from a legacy carrier.
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This helps Delta pull in those occasional flyers that already have miles. It is a little like golden handcuffs - If Delta expires my miles it removes a reason to prefer them over any other carrier given similar prices.
I bet all of the air cattlecar carriers in the US miss the days when business travelers were able to pick and choose their own flights, and often spend $50 or more in order to stick with one airline company to accumulate their miles. Those days are mostly gone.
I'm convinced that on signing up to Lufthansa's Miles & More programme (back in the days as a student when I had the time to read terms before signing on the dotted line) it read that miles had no expiry date. Either I misunderstood or it changed since then. Who flies Lufthansa anyway?
Lufthansa's Miles & More scheme, like Delta's was previously, trashes your miles after several quarters of "inactivity". The latest end-around to protect your miles involves signing up for the Lufthansa Miles & More Mastercard. Another options: Subscribe to Financial Times. What is most frustrating with any "frequent flyer" plan is the multiple roadblocks one encounters when attempting to use those miles, such as black-out periods or not having the right type (upgradable) ticket. Glad to see Delta's announcement; they were one of the last U.S. major carriers to invoke miles expiration, as I recall (I am also a SkyMiles member).
Sadly what Delta calls it's "Medallion Qualification Miles" (MQM) expire all too quickly.
Delta's miles may never expire but the ridiculous redemption rates the airline imposes as good as make them worthless. It's 240,000 miles for a business class ticket from Asia to the United States. Asian airlines are much fairer in this respect. Also, Delta does not even have the good sense to post an awards chart for travel ex-Asia on its website. I have to keep calling its hotline for information which I should be able to obtain online. Once I use up my existing miles (earned with Northwest pre-merger), it's goodbye to Skymiles for me.
Oyamadai wrote "Sadly what Delta calls it's "Medallion Qualification Miles" (MQM) expire all too quickly."
In reality, unless a SkyMiles member is an infrequent traveler (no elite status at all--not silver, gold, platinum, or diamond), any MQMs earned beyond the highest qualifying level carry-over to the following year to aid Medallion qualification in that next year. This year, for example, I had almost 50,000 MQMs carry over beyond my Diamond qualification from last year.