Advertiser Disclosure: Eye of the Flyer, a division of Chatterbox Entertainment, Inc., is part of an affiliate sales network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites, such as CreditCards.com. Some or all of the card offers that appear on the website are from advertisers. Compensation may impact how and where card products appear on the site. This site does not include all card companies or all available card offers. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities. Some of the links on this page are affiliate or referral links. We may receive a commission or referral bonus for purchases or successful applications made during shopping sessions or signups initiated from clicking those links.
If you are a Delta flyer and think saving SkyMiles is a good idea, I bet you don’t sleep very well at night. You never know when things like massive no notice SkyMiles devaluations may hit once the Delta.dumb computers update. All those points you were saving for some mega trip – yeah – they now will cost you a ton more. Thanks Delta, loyalty rewarded yet again!
But just hours before this latest AXE JOB on loyalty we had another way Delta has come up with to fleece, maybe in one transaction, millions of hard earned SkyMiles:
Well maybe if you are overpaying for Delta tickets and you don’t care how much it costs you then sure, who cares what Delta does to SkyMiles. Now if you are the business owner, that is, you are paying for your tickets you may not agree with what Delta thinks. As soon as Delta went revenue based I was smart enough to realize flying is the WORST possible way EVER to earn SkyMiles. Period!
But it gets so much worse that all of the above. Delta now is bragging you can spend 2.5 Million SkyMiles at 1 cent each in value and buy the cheapest Delta PVT jet card they offer in a piece from Kelly Yamanouchi on AJC.com. There are so many quotes from Delta’s Karen Zachary, SkyMiles MD that make me want to throw up like:
“We’ve been trying to expand the usage of our miles,” said SkyMiles managing director Karen Zachary, including newer options like redeeming miles for a beer or champagne in a Sky Club. “We have people who really keep a lot of their miles to use for very unique experiences….”
Folks, if you thing it’s good value to redeem SkyMiles at 2 cents each for WAY over priced drinks in the Sky Clubs (that you already paid to enter btw) then I need you to email ASAP as I have some prime swamp land in Florida and we need to talk value (you will love it – it will be a “unique experience”)!
Other bits in the story quote Zachary as saying there are “Thousands” of SkyMiles members who have more that 2.5 Million SkyMiles in their accounts. Let me say this as nicely as I can:
YOU FOOLS!
When SkyMiles went revenue based a few years back I had well over 1 million SkyMiles. I have worked HARD to drop that number as low as I can as I only redeem at LEVEL 1 awards (if you don’t as well you need to talk to ADAM for help). I am down to about ¼ million and can sleep reasonably well at those levels, but I do not actively save SkyMiles. In fact, I have shown you how I will collect points going forward that are WAY better value that SkyMiles will ever be.
Remember you mass collectors of SkyMiles, not too long ago, Delta offered at a decent price round the world tickets in coach or business class. They had amazing “round the world” great reps that could book ANY tickets not just round the world ones and knew how to find you LEVEL 1 tickets with all partners. Now you have a version of SNAPP the reps use and they often tell you that you cannot do what you want even if all the legs you find are at LEVEL 1. Loyalty rewarded.
I am constantly shocked that an airline like Delta that does so much right operationally as well as some of the best front line people you will ever meet can have such utter disdain for the award program.
We all know SkyMiles died – did you miss the funeral? I didn’t! – René
Advertiser Disclosure: Eye of the Flyer, a division of Chatterbox Entertainment, Inc., is part of an affiliate sales network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites, such as CreditCards.com. Some or all of the card offers that appear on the website are from advertisers. Compensation may impact how and where card products appear on the site. This site does not include all card companies or all available card offers. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities. Some of the links on this page are affiliate or referral links. We may receive a commission or referral bonus for purchases or successful applications made during shopping sessions or signups initiated from clicking those links.
Responses are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.
Don’t you guys see that Delta is testing their customers to see how much will take for them to say enough and ditch them? They keep treating customers like crap and their flights are always full even when they charge astronomical prices for a seat. In their mind there is way more they can do to mess with customers before they get in a dangerous zone. They will keep doing this over and over again.
Agree with Santastico. Quite frankly it would not surprise me if Delta simply eliminated their FF program to gauge feedback. Their thinking, of course, “…if you don’t like it, tough go fly United or American. Our latest enhancement is really what our customers want…” or something like pathetic like that.
I ditched Delta when they removed their published award chart. I don’t trust Delta and with every overnight change without notice that Delta makes it puts a smile on my face each and every time because it reaffirms my belief they are shady and bogus.
Shameful. Wish they hire you to run the program or even advise.
I am about to board a Delta flight. As I have been hearing before every single flight with them this year the gate agent just announced:”…. this will be a completely full flight today…..”. I paid $1,000 to go from MSP to BOS. Thus, why should Delta care about customers and what they think about devaluation? People keep flying with them no matter what they do. BTW, I am a PM and my place on the list to upgrade to first class is 25 and it already checked full.
I credit all miles flown on DL to AS and buy status via biz/first if I want it. If I earn skypesos they are burned asap. Free agency is the only way to go with DL. Couldn’t be happier.
why is it always the business class that gets changed, and never adjust the amount of miles needed for economy?
Delta will not really feel the pain until their revenue from selling miles drops significantly. I don’t think it’s realistic to expect the flying patterns of the general public to change.
With AMEX dumb or desperate enough to sign a big contract recently, it’ll be a while before these changes will be felt by Delta, but I hope AMEX is smart next time and cancels their deal with them.
Delta will not really feel the pain until their revenue from selling miles drops significantly. I don’t think it’s realistic to expect the flying patterns of the general public to change.
With AMEX dumb or desperate enough to sign a big contract recently, it’ll be a while before these changes will be felt by Delta, but I hope AMEX is smart next time and cancels their deal with them.
I just cannot wait to see that the Global Upgrades I have filed to use on a long international flight become worthless after all these years of being loyal.
I believe in the old fashioned way of voting with your feet. If you are not being treated fairly by a business, WALK AWAY. When given a choice as to what airline to take, don’t take DL. I know that some are required for business reasons to take DL. There, you should talk to your travel person and inform them of the sky high DL prices and ask that they look around for a more valuable alternative. And, when doing personal travel , it’s Anybody But Delta.