I just love quoting frequent flyer executives and in this case the quote comes from Mark Bergsrud, Continental’s Senior Vice-President regarding their recent elimination and reflection and restoration of the 500-mile minimum flight mileage bonus.
Now, ask yourself this. The members of OnePass complained about the loss of a few hundred miles on just a few flights in the Continental system (their average is over 1,000 miles per flight segment) and it was enough for a responsible marketing program to admit they might have done something without the right reasons and there’s enough evidence to support restoring the benefit.
Compare and contrast that with the marketing executives over at US Airways, whose members it seems messages are getting lost in the spam trap because there is no logical reason that Dividend Miles members could be any less concerned about there frequent flyer benefits unless of course there is no one at Dividend Miles listening any more. I just can’t believe that in addition to the 500-mile thing at US Airways which pales in comparison to the loss of the elite-level bonuses hasn’t elicited a single response.
But, I think I have discovered part of the problem. Here’s an interesting recent advertisement from US Airways citing the need for a new Director, Corporate Communications. Given the type of lame-brained announcement of how the loss of the elite-level benefit was portrayed in their press release of information related to it and responses form that same department, is it any wonder? Combine that with the sudden departure of their marketing guru (which I still and will have all the respect in the world and will consider this a mid-mile crisis for him) it looks like heads might have rolled but certainly the mile (buck) stops somewhere. Count me as totally disconnected of how OnePass members can get the attention of senior executives on this somewhat minor issue and Dividend Miles members can’t get a single followup to a really important change for this program.
I estimate that elite members of Dividend Milers are losing out on about 20,600,000 bonus miles daily that members of other programs are earning because they chose a richer program. That’s got to be hurting the mileage pocketbook but could it be that after these years of struggling just to stay aline, the fight is gone from Dividend Miles members? I certainly hope not.
