Rapid Travel Chai

Delta has two publicity moves with changes to SkyMiles:

• No notice to members
• Deceptive spin, the ‘enhancement’ canard

This week Delta emailed members titled “SkyMiles Program Developments Worth Noting,” adding a new move.

Many commentators have jumped on this, to summarize:

• JFK-LAX/SFO nonstops now eligible for RPUs (without stating what Points, Miles & Martinis reported, that Diamond Medallions from Aug 1 will no longer get complimentary gate upgrades) and by the way, if you’ve already redeemed your Choice Benefits, don’t expect retroactively to switch to RPUs, see what happened when they launched GPUs mid-year.
• “Our lowest awards,” which included I believed the first official public statement of a 21-day pricing increase for awards that applies to all members (it was only last year than elites had better award availability).
• “A heads up for summer 2016,” on award dynamic pricing, disingenuous in the extreme as these already are in effect. This is the one I was impressed Delta didn’t even try to spin it. An airline that can’t find a way to torture language into ‘enhancements’? Or just too lazy arrogant to even try. They are brazen enough to see how much they can dupe members into spending on tickets, maybe Delta has an office pool? Examples from UPGRD Matthew.
• More stuff including absurdo-pricing on mileage upgrades, View from the Wing hit this hard, and some non-updates/recycled news.

So now we have the, “Hi, you’re being screwed announcement,” on the central piece of the notice, the drastic move to dynamic award pricing, where they won’t stop anywhere near 1 cent a mile. I prefer that over silence, pandering and deception, too bad the rest of the email had all of those!