Delta 150% Partner Promotion Bonus to Be Honored, Sort of, Maybe

A week and a half ago, Delta introduced an amazing partner promotion, offering up to a 150% bonus on most partner activity. This presented some amazing opportunities. Too amazing, perhaps. Because Delta pulled the plug.

Turns out that Delta either was testing the idea, mocked it up, but offered it live by mistake. Or, depending on who you believe, only intended to offer it as a targeted promotion but didn’t include that in the terms and conditions and didn’t restrict who could sign up.

In any case, a disaster — because folks who signed up started transferring points into their Delta Skymiles accounts to take advantage of the offer. And Delta pulled the promo off their website. Personally, I transferred Diners Club points to my Delta account (to take advantage of the up to 35% bonus on Diners Club transfers currently in effect, on top of the 150% bonus). Those points posted quickly, so unlike folks who transferred Starwood points and then cancelled their transfers I was stuck.

Delta is now saying that they are going to honor the promotion for those who signed up before the offer was pulled. But they can’t tell anyone whether their accounts are properly registered or not. Delta promotions don’t offer confirmations of signup by email. And the promotion registration confirmation page doesn’t include account-specific information such that a member could prove with a screenshot or printout that they had actually signed up.

As a result, in theory I should get my miles. But I’m not going to be pursuing more opportunities under the promotion — too much risk, because there’s a good chance I could be fighting for the miles in the end even though I signed up for the promotion and Delta says they’ll honor it. Perhaps that’s what Delta wants.

So — if you signed up for the promotion, you should be good to go. But be prepared to fight. My take is, not worth activties just for the miles (like transferring miles between accounts for a fee), given the risks. But those with stronger constitutions than I have do have an incredibly lucrative opportunity in front of them.