Delta Changing How Frequent Flier Miles are Earned

[monsterz]

www.reuters.com/article/2014/02/26/delta-frequentflier-idUSL1N0LV15J20140226

Delta Air Lines Inc said on Wednesday it would make a major change to its frequent-flier program, basing the number of miles earned toward free flights on how much customers spend rather than the distance traveled.


The change, which will take effect next year, will sweeten mileage awards for travelers who pay more for airline tickets, the carrier said in a statement.

Delta said the new program would favor "frequent business travelers" and leisure fliers who buy tickets at higher fares. Generally, business passengers pay more than leisure travelers.


Passengers will garner between five and 11 miles for each dollar spent on airfares depending on their frequent-flier status under the changes, the carrier said.

"The travel industry, including nearly all hotel and credit card programs, has already moved to a spend-based model," Jeff Robertson, vice president for Delta's SkyMiles loyalty program, said in the statement. "Delta will become the first U.S. global carrier to make this transition to better reward our most loyal customers."

[monsterz]

This seems like it will reduce the amount of miles that are earned even for frequent travellers. I am guessing that they will use the base fare and not include taxes and fees. United recently started requiring a minimum dollar spend for status which only looks at base fare not taxes and fees. Year to date I have qualifying dollars of $1332 and have flown 13,546 miles. With this new scheme I would be earning way fewer miles.

[boiler717]

So far this year I have $1084 MQDs with Delta. I've earned 11,476 miles from flights. I would earn 11 miles/dollar so it looks like it would be about the same, maybe slightly more with the new program. I buy a lot of last minute pricey tickets though.

[frlcb]

I think there could be some good in with the bad here. I like the one way awards. I like that a shorter flight has the potential to earn more miles, because if you were earning on miles before and now you earn on fares you will probably earn more. We will have to see how this plays out.

[gtkim]

DH will really benefit from this.  All his travel is int'l business class so he will go from earning ~30K miles per trip to 75k miles per trip.  I think he is the type of traveller this is geared towards.

[GilliC]

I wonder if there will still be fares that accrue no mileage.

At first I thought this would really suck, because our company insists we book the cheapest economy fare available, no matter how far we're flying. However, I've been on Star Alliance partner flights that were so discounted that I earned 0 United miles on a 12,000-mile roundtrip. If I was to earn even 5 miles per dollar, that would have been at least 5000 miles banked. That's nearly 50%, which is what most of my discounted flights are earning now.

[Moe]

Essentially, I'm screwed and will NEVER get status anymore. Wah wah.