# Am I just lucky with Delta?



## x3 skier (Jan 15, 2010)

I have accumulated over 4,000,000 Million Miles in my life and I can not remember a problem with Delta that has not been fixed to my satisfaction and with little action on my part. If fact, I cannot remember the last problem on a flight and I lately average 30000 miles a year with them. I also have had no problem getting the lowest mileage Business class tickets to Europe for the past 10 years.

OTOH, I cannot remember a problem free trip on Useless Air and I have over 1,000,000 miles with them but none since the merger with America Worst.

It seems that a week cannot go by without some legitimate complaint about Delta on these boards but I seldom read about problems or similar egregious behavior with other airlines except after the litany of wrongs about a Delta misdeed has started.

Maybe I am just lucky but I doubt it. My personal experience with the majors leads to my personal preferences in order is Delta, American,  a significant gap then United and last by a huge margin, Useless Air. Never used Southwest as they do not serve my needs nor my home airport. I only have flown Continental  a little but which I think would rank third in my list if I had more experience with them.

Just wondering.  Maybe I am lucky after all but I doubt it based on the rest of my life and times. 

Cheers


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## Jimster (Jan 15, 2010)

*Delta*

Congratulations on getting so many miles.  My first question would be how many of those miles did you have when Delta went to the notorious 3 tier system?  When that happened the value of all those hard earned miles depreciated substantially.  I know they "phased" it in, but all miles held when it happened were depreciated.  I would call this a problem.

Did you ever book a flight with miles on a partner airline and get charged?  If so, again Delta was the leader in yet another junk fee.

I suspect you don't pay luggage fees for checked bags, but those less fortunate than yourself can thank Delta for leading the way on that too.

OOOh did you ever pay a change fee or did your status negate that?  Again, thank Delta for the idea of the change fee.

If you ever wanted to use the toilet while on board, you can thank Ryan Air for not imposing that fee and Delta for not responding.  

Then there is the matter of booking flights using ff miles-perhaps your status insulated you there.


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## Aussiedog (Jan 15, 2010)

I have used multple million miles with Delta as well, and things generally went fairly smoothly until this last trip.  

I had to write letters to their headquarters twice to correct mileage problems but both times the issue was addressed to my satisfaction.  I also am not bothered by the many flight changes that come with a reservation made well in advance.  Especially in this economy, I expect equipment and time changes and when I had to refuse their changes because I was not comfortable with the connection times they always accomodated me at no extra charge for the changes.

But now, to have to pay ~350k miles for a first class round trip to Norway in late July?  Off the scale.   Once the rest of my miles are used up - American here I come.  They have moved from second to first place for me.

Ann


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## Aussiedog (Jan 15, 2010)

Jimster said:


> My first question would be how many of those miles did you have when Delta went to the notorious 3 tier system?  When that happened the value of all those hard earned miles depreciated substantially.  I know they "phased" it in, but all miles held when it happened were depreciated.  I would call this a problem.



I think this is what happened to me.  I used American miles for the past year and a half so this must be my first experience with the new system.

Ann


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## x3 skier (Jan 15, 2010)

*Some of my experiences*



Jimster said:


> Congratulations on getting so many miles.  My first question would be how many of those miles did you have when Delta went to the notorious 3 tier system?  When that happened the value of all those hard earned miles depreciated substantially.  I know they "phased" it in, but all miles held when it happened were depreciated.  I would call this a problem.
> 
> Did you ever book a flight with miles on a partner airline and get charged?  If so, again Delta was the leader in yet another junk fee.
> 
> ...



When the change came, I had about 100000 with DL and about 400000 left with AA plus less than 75000 on Useless Air and United. I was able to transfer some AMEX miles and get BIZ Class tix to London on DL this past Oct at the lowest mileage level and not at any level on AA or any of the others. AFAIK, status has nothing to do with FF booking at my lowly lowest tier position now. 

If Delta was the only one with baggage and change fees, etc. etc. etc. that is a legitimate complaint but if they all do (except SWA), who cares who started what since it is a fact of life with air travel today.   

I do like the fact they roll over the "worthless" qualifying miles above those required for a tier qualification which used to expire and still do on other programs and the gift of 10000 qualifying miles they gave me last year (probably as the result of the universal whining over the changes on Flyer Talk and elsewhere). Nobody else has apparently felt the need to do something similar, probably rightly so.

All I offer is my experiences on mostly AA and DL and it has been good for over umpteen years now including the most recent past.

FF Programs and airline travel were good (and are still good to me) and if it  gets worse over time, it is a fact of life and I have learned to accept what I cannot change and not worry about it. FF Programs  were and still is "free" and I benefited from it and still do. If Airline travel gets a little more painful, that's life. As one of my old Biz school profs once told me, "Sunk costs are irrelevant even if you don't like it and makes you mad when things change. Just move on because you cannot do much about it except make lawyers richer by suing somebody." I guess the same is true for FF Programs and air travel today. 

There was an interesting Article in the Wall Street Journal a day or two ago about FF awards. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704675104575000961694950250.html One thing that caught my eye was that only 18% of award request Trans Atlantic where I spend almost all my miles were successful on United and a miserable 4% on Useless Air. Who cares what they cost if there aren't any to be had? 

My original question is why does it seem to me the preponderance of airline problem posts start about some horror story about Delta and then include the same things about other Airlines in the thread. I was just wondering why threads about some problem on another airline seem to appear to be much less frequently started when the same type of problems happen everywhere.  

Cheers


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## scrapngen (Jan 15, 2010)

*why post about Delta??*

I started the thread about their seating because I had never experienced such disregard for people on any other company or flight. I have had some bad experiences, but not quite like that. Having not flown much, if any, on Delta, I assumed it was due to their takeover of NWA.                                I do not fly enough to any one location to accumulate FF miles, so maybe OP gets treated a lot differently than the average flyer and that is what should happen to frequent customers, but everyone deserves a basic level of service that I did not experience there. Don't know why others post more about Delta. I'm not crazy about Frontier, either, if that matters


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## thheath (Jan 16, 2010)

Delta always treated me well; when I attained status with them they treated me like gold or should I say platinum...  

They are my favorite airline.


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## Carolinian (Jan 16, 2010)

thheath said:


> Delta always treated me well; when I attained status with them they treated me like gold or should I say platinum...
> 
> They are my favorite airline.



Try using your SkyMiles, or as some on FlyerTalk call them, SkyPiles.  They are the Zimbabwe dollars of the sky, severely devalued by DL's fortunately unique 3-tier system.

As to service, one of the problems at Delta is that they give their frontline personnel much less discretion to make adjustments to right wrongs or fix unexpected problems than other US-based airlines.  If your problem falls within an area that there is a corporate policy that allows a fix, you are lucky.  If not, the frontline people have no way to fix it.  A former CEO expressed this as being ''Simply Good Business'', a phrase that was used sarcastically on FlyerTalk frequently during his era and even after.  Delta execs have also referred to it as ''No waivers, no favors''.  I know that NW used to have what they called a ''Flat Tire Rule'' that gave their frontline employees wide discretion to make adjustments in appropriate circumstances.  Losing that was one of the many downgrades that NW passengers got when our airline was captured by DL.

There is also a major award travel problem on UA, StarNet blocking.  Many had suspected they did this, but finally a UA executive admitted it to a Washington Times travel writer.  StarNet is the system within the Star Alliance (or *A as many on FT call it) that allows airlines to book their ff members on other *A partners.  Theoretically, any ff member of a *A airline should be able to book any award availibility that is out there on StarNet, but UA arbitrarily denies much of it to its members.  What this means in practical terms is that it may not be that hard to find a UA award ticket to one of their European gateways, but if your destination requires a partner flight beyond the gateway, you probably will not find it.


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## x3 skier (Jan 16, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> What this means in practical terms is that it may not be that hard to find a UA award ticket to one of their European gateways, but if your destination requires a partner flight beyond the gateway, you probably will not find it.



18% success seems kinda hard to me compared to AA @ 54% and Iberia, Lufthansa and British Airways even higher. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...694950250.html

Cheers


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## Carolinian (Jan 16, 2010)

x3 skier said:


> 18% success seems kinda hard to me compared to AA @ 54% and Iberia, Lufthansa and British Airways even higher. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...694950250.html
> 
> Cheers



Since the destinations sought by many ffers would not be just to the gateways but to some point beyond the gateway, the StarNet blocking would mean that all of those would count as being unsuccesful.  The 18% is overall, not just to gateways.  Also, Lufthansa is a *A partner, so if they had availibility, a UA ff member should in theory also have those seats availible on TATL legs too, EXCEPT, of course for StarNet blocking!

StarNet blocking undoubtedly is a major factor in UA's overall success rating being so low.

DL had one period where they blocked all AF partner flights on award bookings for a few months, which they tried to blame on AF.  That excuse did not wash, because all the usual AF partner flights were still availible during that period on both NW and CO.   Although that was some years ago and has not been repeated since, it shows that DL is not above doing the same thing that UA is doing on blocking partner availibility on award tickets.


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## Carolinian (Jan 16, 2010)

According to these statistics, it would indeed seem that you are quite lucky:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delta-skymiles/1036877-delta-ranked-no-1-2-a.html





x3 skier said:


> I have accumulated over 4,000,000 Million Miles in my life and I can not remember a problem with Delta that has not been fixed to my satisfaction and with little action on my part. If fact, I cannot remember the last problem on a flight and I lately average 30000 miles a year with them. I also have had no problem getting the lowest mileage Business class tickets to Europe for the past 10 years.
> 
> OTOH, I cannot remember a problem free trip on Useless Air and I have over 1,000,000 miles with them but none since the merger with America Worst.
> 
> ...


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## x3 skier (Jan 16, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> According to these statistics, it would indeed seem that you are quite lucky:
> 
> http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/delta-skymiles/1036877-delta-ranked-no-1-2-a.html



As the saying goes, I would rather be lucky than good.  

Cheers


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## camachinist (Jan 16, 2010)

My experiences with DL as a non-elite have been consistent. Other than a blizzard in ATL, for which they gave me a full refund after cancelling flights, the planes have always gotten me where I needed to go and generally on-time. The main reason I stick with UA is three-fold: One, they are the best carrier out of my local to where I want to go, both domestically and internationally. Two, their frequent flier program is one of the most aggressive in the business, as far as perks, promos and flexibility. Lastly, UA's system is a wonderful challenge to game. We've done some doozies over the years. I fly DL; I love playing with UA 

Congrats on the massive RDM accumulation. If you haven't done it already, get your 1MM on American (BIS and/or CC spend) and get your permanent elite status there. That's one area where UA is stingy: lifetime elite status. You gotta fly it, BIS, on their metal. 

Since I'm a 1K on UA, I'll try to status match this year on DL and try them out. I've seen some good international MR opportunities on DL/NW as of late. Only problem is the scant service out of our local. Hate driving. 

Safe travels


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## x3 skier (Jan 16, 2010)

camachinist said:


> Congrats on the massive RDM accumulation. If you haven't done it already, get your 1MM on American (BIS and/or CC spend) and get your permanent elite status there. That's one area where UA is stingy: lifetime elite status. You gotta fly it, BIS, on their metal.
> 
> Since I'm a 1K on UA, I'll try to status match this year on DL and try them out. I've seen some good international MR opportunities on DL/NW as of late. Only problem is the scant service out of our local. Hate driving.
> 
> Safe travels



Thanks for kind words.

Already got lifetime Gold on AA (1.5 MM and counting) and Useless Air gave me a couple of luggage tags for my 1MM+ with them and nothing else. Ways to go yet on Delta and probably will not make it ever. One of these days I will whine to them and see if they will match AA for lifetime status but those chances are slim and none and Slim just left town.  

DL and Useless Air have status matched me based on Platinum AA back in the day but since I usually make at least the lowest tier on DL every year and lifetime Gold on AA, I can't (and don't) complain, much. :whoopie:

Cheers


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## dive-in (Jan 16, 2010)

My flying experience with the airlines in order is,

American
Delta
Continental
US Airways
United Airlines
Northwest

The regional carrier Midway would be my #2 carrier but they went bankrupt after 9/11.  Got many AA and CO miles through them.

My FF experience with the airlines in order is

American
Continental
Delta

Based on experience, what I read here, Flyer Talk, and various media outlets I try to avoid US, DL, and UA if at all possible.  

My bad experiences with DL began long before things really started to go bad.  They got me there an back but not on the days I wanted to go.  I was trying to book 331 days out.  That was 13 years ago.

When I was flying regularly on business I flew AA most often and got Gold Status for many years.  I still have a lot of miles with them and prefer them.  I've never had problems getting tickets with them for any of our trips.  

For our upcoming trip to Hawaii, I gave CO a shot burning many of my MR points.  The main reason I'm using them is they still allow for a stop-over.  Coming from the east coast it's nice to get to DFW, IAH, or LAX that first day.  To do that now with AA, it takes an extra 10K miles.  Granted, the new AA system gives you a lot of flexibility but I would have prefered the ability to have that stop-over. 

I will say I have been EXTREMELY happy with CO's customer service.  They changed flight times and made my connection in HNL too short to make.  They put me on an earlier flight that was not showing any FF seat availability.  I hear they have a good product and am looking forward to see if rumor equals reality.  Based on this experience I'll be looking at flying them again in the future.  Hopefully, the upcoming experience with CO is a positive one.


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## Jimster (Jan 16, 2010)

*airlines*

I am currently a 1K with UA but I have flown many others.  I have 1/4 million miles with AA for example.  Personally, I have nothing against AA and I would fly them without a problem.

As for UA I am pretty much with Carmachinists logic.  I fly out of ORD which is one of their hubs and up until recently have been fairly successful gaming the system.  Since they are going to Unlimited Domestic Upgrades in the second quarter of 2010 that may diminish the gaming a bit.  They also fly where I want to go.

AA is fine for Europe as is UA but when you fly to Asia, I think UA has a better product and more destinations than AA.  UA also  has economy plus which is a BIG advantage if you end up somewhere other than the front of the plane.  Economy plus catapults UA in my eyes past its competitors.

As for getting ff tickets, the only reason for UA's low 18% is the gateway issue and the starnet blocking.  I have had about 20 tickets with miles in the last 3 or 4 years and I have NEVER had difficulty in getting them with UA.  I would say the 18% figure is very deceptive.

I have also been successful with AA for many tickets in that same timeframe.  Generally, I give my daughter the DL miles I accumulate because she has no status with any airline and so she might as well be abused with their junk fees as with any other airline.  So what if she has to pay those fees-at least she got a free ticket.

I also agree that DL is probably the least friendly, least flexible airline among them all.  I am not talking about smiling employees, I am talking about unbending and unreasonable employees.  I will say though if you do not have status with UA and have to deal with the ICC, you will find them very unbending and unreasonable.  Delta's agents are like the ICC only you can understand them better as they are unreasonable.

I haven't flown CO as much but they seem ok-better South American options.  The one drawback is they have no economy plus and their seats are not as good as UA.  Perhaps CO and UA will formally merge but for now they have a cooperating partnership.

Finally, I think both UA and AA  have the best rewards available for the elite flyers.  This is particularly true now with Unlimited domestic upgrades and the retention of Confirmed Regional Upgrades and 6 SWU minimum for a 1k flyer.  The confirmed regional upgrades make it easy to sponsor a family member or friend to an upgrade.


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## Talent312 (Jan 16, 2010)

Jimster, your 1st paragraph was 18 lines long on my screen.
I got lost somewhere in the fifth. So, sure, whatever you said.


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## thheath (Jan 16, 2010)

One of the things I liked about Delta when I had status was that when I called customer service I spoke with an American that understood english, was knowledgeable and very helpful....novel idea huh?  

Try calling customer service with United.


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## camachinist (Jan 16, 2010)

> Try calling customer service with United.


Usually I get Dearborn or Honolulu when I call UA. GM's, 3P's and 2P's will usually get Bangalore or Manila, though, if you call late at night, you can get Honolulu. Also, international agents (say 'international' or 'no' to the domestic question to HAL) usually speak and understand English well and are competent. I have found DL's phone CSR's for a non-elite to be more consistent than UA.


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## Jimster (Jan 16, 2010)

*UA*

As I said above, with UA you generally get the ICC (Indian call center), unless you are 1P or above.  That is a definite negative for those without status.  Since they are scripted often times, talking to the ICC is like talking to a wall-entirely inflexible.  When talking with Delta, I get the same inflexibility but at least I can understand them.  Now that I have status, this negative has all but disappeared.


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## Carolinian (Jan 17, 2010)

thheath said:


> One of the things I liked about Delta when I had status was that when I called customer service I spoke with an American that understood english, was knowledgeable and very helpful....novel idea huh?
> 
> Try calling customer service with United.



From your references to ''when I had status'' your experience with Delta seems mostly to be from the past.  I would agree that in times past Delta was a good airline.  All of that started changing when Rob Borden showed up.  Customers battled his changes through the www.saveskymiles.com campaign, and eventually got Borden fired and his changes reversed.  Then they brought in Jeff Robertson (of Jeff Bob as some call him on Flyer Talk) who made a different set of changes that were far worse than Borden's from a consumer standpoint.  Borden degraded DL's ff system from an earning standpoint, while Jeff Bob degraded it from a rewards standpoint.

I have bailed out of Delta's elite program twice now.  The first was during the Save Sky Miles era.  I did not want to stay with Delta under Borden's changes and so had to make a decision on where to go.  I went with NW, and because I found that program to be so much better than DL even during DL's good period, I stayed with NW even after Borden was fired.  Then DL took over NW, and they captured my NW miles and devalued them to SkyPiles so now I have bailed out to CO.  Curiously they have notified me that I will be a SkyPiles Medallion for 2010.  Apparently that is based on my NW flights in 2009 even though I put all of the miles from those on my CO One Pass account.  They must really be having a lot of customer flight from NW flyers if they are handing out free status.  I did not credit a single mile to NW last year because of the pending DL takeover.


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## Poobah (Jan 19, 2010)

*Delta's Problems*

I believe many of Delta's problems stem from the way it is organized: Stovepipes. This is a corporate model that has proven unsuccessful because it inhibits lateral communication, delegation of authority, and timely decision making.  

Stovepipes are probably the reason we are seeing Delta operations  deteriorate. Stovepipes, particularly at corporate levels are filled with (figuratively) with Barco loungers, Lazy Boys, Comfy Afgans which allow the members of a stovepipe to snuggle down when they come to work. They know full well that the insulation that surrounds the stovepipe will protect them from any discomforts of reality. 

A corporation the size of Delta will never survive with the ineffiencies inherent in stovepipes. Delta needs to rid itself of the stovepipes and then flatten the organizational structure. Hopefully the top management levels will recognize this before it is too late.

It is really too bad that Delta bought NWA. Had it been the otherway around a better managed, more cost effective airline would have been the result.

JMHO

Cheers,

Paul


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## Carolinian (Jan 20, 2010)

Poobah said:


> It is really too bad that Delta bought NWA. Had it been the otherway around a better managed, more cost effective airline would have been the result.
> 
> JMHO
> 
> ...



. . . and MUCH more customer friendly!

NW was sitting on the biggest pile of cash of any of the US airlines, and that is what DL was mainly after.


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## Judy (Jan 20, 2010)

*United came through for me, but not Delta*



x3 skier said:


> I have accumulated over 4,000,000 Million Miles in my life and I can not remember a problem with Delta that has not been fixed to my satisfaction and with little action on my part. ...........
> 
> Maybe I am just lucky but I doubt it.


From my perspective, I'd say you were lucky.  Either that or earning all of those miles got you titanium level frequent flier status that gets you special treatment.  I have a ton of Delta miles, but most of them are from buying rather than flying and from the transfer of my Northwest miles.  One reason I have so many is that they're nearly impossible to exchange for flights at a reasonable price.  I tried for over a month to book award seats to India.  Delta claimed that nothing was available, even though their website listed plenty of flights.  One call to United and we're booked in award seats on a better itinerary than Delta could have provided.


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## x3 skier (Jan 20, 2010)

Judy said:


> From my perspective, I'd say you were lucky.  Either that or earning all of those miles got you titanium level frequent flier status that gets you special treatment.



Never higher than the second level tier on any airline in my life, but it was on three or four airlines at a time. Not so much paid travel recently so I am lowly Gold on AA and Silver on DL. Just flew back from Steamboat Springs and was upgraded to first class on a $200 RT fare as a Silver FF.

Cheers


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## x3 skier (Jan 23, 2010)

My luck continues. :whoopie: Just bagged two Biz Tix DAY-LHR for Oct @ 100K + $230 in fees and taxes each. Return is via AMS but who cares? 

Cheers


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## thheath (Jan 23, 2010)

x3 skier said:


> My luck continues. :whoopie: Just bagged two Biz Tix DAY-LHR for Oct @ 100K + $230 in fees and taxes each. Return is via AMS but who cares?
> 
> Cheers



Good for you.

I alway enjoyed gaming the system to get the best FF flights or free upgrades with Delta.  They always treated me well.


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## Carolinian (Jan 24, 2010)

Shoulder season?  Well, I guess that is the best one can hope for with DL these days!  When I was a DL Medallion, I never used miles for TATL tickets unless they were high season, as they were poor value in low or shoulder season compared to high season.  Same as a NW elite.  Now high season award tickets are rare at DL unless you give them megamiles.

My last TATL redemption with DL was a couple of weeks ago for a shoulder season ticket.  It cost me 75K miles for a poor schedule that required an overnight layover, but after days of checking, it was the only thing at all useful that I found even if it was shoulder season.  I was quoted over 100K for the other itineraries in that time period.  All the routings I checked for high season were hopeless. And this was through the elite line, which is supposed to have greater availibility. With either NW or the old DL, it was generallly no problem to find what I wanted in high season for 50K, and with NW that always got me an exit row seat as well on the TATL legs.

This redemption worked out to about 1.2 cents per mile in value, while on the old DL or on NW, I would typically have gotten more like 3 cents per mile.  That is a far cry from an award reservation I did at almost the same time on BMI for an intra-Europe award, where I got over 8 cents per mile in value. BMI miles rock!

TATL= TransAtlantic


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## dougp26364 (Jan 24, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> Shoulder season?  Well, I guess that is the best one can hope for with DL these days!  When I was a DL Medallion, I never used miles for TATL tickets unless they were high season, as they were poor value in low or shoulder season compared to high season.  Same as a NW elite.  Now high season award tickets are rare at DL unless you give them megamiles.
> 
> My last TATL redemption with DL was a couple of weeks ago for a shoulder season ticket.  It cost me 75K miles for a poor schedule that required an overnight layover, but after days of checking, it was the only thing at all useful that I found even if it was shoulder season.  I was quoted over 100K for the other itineraries in that time period.  All the routings I checked for high season were hopeless. And this was through the elite line, which is supposed to have greater availibility. With either NW or the old DL, it was generallly no problem to find what I wanted in high season for 50K, and with NW that always got me an exit row seat as well on the TATL legs.
> 
> ...



Don't worry about the poor schedule. With Delta, you're only booking a flight to/from a location. They're bound to change your flight schedule several times before you go. Lately they seem to be changing our flight schedules, and messing up our seat assignements at the same time, on a monthly basis if not more frequently. Our last flight (came home yesterday) had at least 8 or 9 changes before flying including a last minute change to the flight home which I caught only when I went to do online check in.

Delta doesn't adhere to any schedule you might have booked. I'm sure that poor schedule you have now will change more than a couple of times. Sometimes for the better, sometimes it will be worse. The one thing I'm certain of is that there will be multpile channges before you depart. Booking with Delta only means you have a ticket from point A to point B. There is no schedule you can can't on.


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## x3 skier (Jan 24, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> Shoulder season?  Well, I guess that is the best one can hope for with DL these days!



That's usually the only time I fly TATL as my TS in London is the second week on Oct. I like avoiding the majority of tourists in the Summer although London is always busy.

Would you would be happier if I could not get any ticket at all on the Evil Empire?  In any event, this makes for about the tenth year in a row for success in getting the flights I want.  

Cheers


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## Carolinian (Jan 24, 2010)

thheath said:


> Good for you.
> 
> I alway enjoyed gaming the system to get the best FF flights or free upgrades with Delta.  They always treated me well.



That was the old Delta.  This is the new Delta.  Big difference.

Delta was always great on awards in the old days.  I will agree with you on that.  Even when Rob Borden screwed up things on the earning side something terrible (see www.saveskymiles.com ), the redemption side stayed great.  However in the runup to the takeover of NW, in the last year or so, they have, under Jeff Robertson, screwed up the redemption side worse than Borden screwed up the earning side.  And while trashing the earning side only impacts miles you might earn in the future, when they trash the redemption side, they trash the value of all of the miles that you have already earned and are sitting in your account.  That is far worse.  For those who earned those miles as NW Worldperks miles, it is worse still.


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## x3 skier (Jan 24, 2010)

dougp26364 said:


> Delta doesn't adhere to any schedule you might have booked. I'm sure that poor schedule you have now will change more than a couple of times. Sometimes for the better, sometimes it will be worse. The one thing I'm certain of is that there will be multiple changes before you depart. Booking with Delta only means you have a ticket from point A to point B. There is no schedule you can can't on.



I agree, especially for travel booked many months in advance. Happens to me frequently on my TATL FF reservations the past few years. I usually call them if it is too painful and they accommodate a change without any hassle. It would be nice if they emailed the changes but I find I have to check delta.bomb to find out what has happened, if anything.

Don't seem to have the problem with flights within a month or so which is my normal booking window for paid travel.

Cheers


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## Carolinian (Jan 24, 2010)

IF my main goal with ff miles was flying TATL in shoulder season, I would be doing it on AA, not any other US-based airline.  With AA, a shoulder season ff ticket is only 2/3 the miles of a high season award ticket.  Why fly an airline that charges you the same miles for low and shoulder season as it does for high season if you are always flyer shoulder?

I am happy that you got the ticket that you wanted, but scoring a shoulder season ticket is hardly a great accomplishment.  High season is the most desired, just like a prime red week in timeshare, and that is where the big problem in booking TATL or other international award travel is at DL, and especially so if you want BIZ / 1st class.  It did not used to be that way at either NW or at the old DL.  Holding up a shoulder season award booking as a great booking is like holding up a t/s white week trade as a great trade.

Of course, the award booking crapshoot at DL today compares with the exchange reservation crapshoot at RCI.  Part of the root cause is even somewhat similar.  With RCI it is the rentals to the general public of exchange inventory.  With DL, it is the massive sale of ff miles to AMEX, car rental companies and others, bringing in lots of extra dollars for DL but flooding the ff system with lots of extra miles from all of the big bonus mile offers being thrown around with those miles.  None of the other US airlines have gone hog wild with selling miles like DL has, and that is a major reason that award booking is better at the other airlines.




x3 skier said:


> That's usually the only time I fly TATL as my TS in London is the second week on Oct. I like avoiding the majority of tourists in the Summer although London is always busy.
> 
> Would you would be happier if I could not get any ticket at all on the Evil Empire?  In any event, this makes for about the tenth year in a row for success in getting the flights I want.
> 
> Cheers


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## x3 skier (Jan 24, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> Why fly an airline that charges you the same miles for low and shoulder season as it does for high season if you are always flyer shoulder?



Mainly because I have the miles on Delta to use and I cannot get the flights I want on AA.

I can also transfer all the AMEX points I have to Delta but not AA which I would do in a heartbeat if I could since it would get me to lifetime Platinum on AA. I suppose that's why they don't allow it.

Cheers


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## dougp26364 (Jan 24, 2010)

x3 skier said:


> I agree, especially for travel booked many months in advance. Happens to me frequently on my TATL FF reservations the past few years. I usually call them if it is too painful and they accommodate a change without any hassle. It would be nice if they emailed the changes but I find I have to check delta.bomb to find out what has happened, if anything.
> 
> Don't seem to have the problem with flights within a month or so which is my normal booking window for paid travel.
> 
> Cheers



Not just months in advance. I've been having my schedules changed within the week of travel. This past trip, they changed things up a couple of weeks before we flew the first leg of our flight, then, before we returned, they changed the return flights. I'm finding that I really have to monitor my flights, even during my vacation, to keep up on when I'm suppose to depart and arrive. I never thought I'd say this about a major carrier but, booking with Delta is worse than booking on Priceline. You're paying full price but have no guarentee that the schedule you fly is anything close to the schedule you originally booked. What's worse is when I call to see if I can change to an itenerary that's either better or closer to what was originally booked, Delta limits my options (usually worse) to what they'll allow me to change to without a fee. 

I'm accustomed to being jerked around by airlines but Delta is really taking this to new levels. I have two more flights that I've already booked with them but, due to the way they've handled things these last couple of flights, those may be the last two flights on Delta, even if they are a couple of dollars cheaper than all others. Gate and flight employee's have been fine but the remainder of their service model really sucks right now.


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## x3 skier (Jan 24, 2010)

dougp26364 said:


> Not just months in advance. I've been having my schedules changed within the week of travel. This past trip, they changed things up a couple of weeks before we flew the first leg of our flight, then, before we returned, they changed the return flights. I'm finding that I really have to monitor my flights, even during my vacation, to keep up on when I'm suppose to depart and arrive. I never thought I'd say this about a major carrier but, booking with Delta is worse than booking on Priceline. You're paying full price but have no guarentee that the schedule you fly is anything close to the schedule you originally booked. What's worse is when I call to see if I can change to an itenerary that's either better or closer to what was originally booked, Delta limits my options (usually worse) to what they'll allow me to change to without a fee.
> 
> Gate and flight employee's have been fine but the remainder of their service model really sucks right now.



Interesting. one would assume that the integration (or should I say the massive totally terrible and absolutely devastating takeover) of NW would have caused some of this but that should be over by now.

If the same happened to me, I would switch to my only real alternative these days, AA.

Cheers


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