Frequent Flyers

Moving from the PNR to the Customer Record

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In the airline industry, the passenger name record(PNR), is a single record in a computer reservation system that contains a single reservation for one or more passengers. The problem is that PNRs have no memory. They represent one trip. They…

Do Loyalty Programs Encourage Loyalty?

Yesterday, we read in USA Today’s Travel section that airports are starting to add loyalty programs to encourage travelers to patronize them. This is particularly useful for smaller airports, where people might otherwise drive to larger airports in the region. Even…

WestJet May Have the Right Idea with its New Loyalty Program

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WestJet has launched a new frequent flier program, called the Frequent Guest program. Now, the way that they are organizing this program is unique. It seems to be a program for the average flier, rather than the frequent flier. We recently bemoaned the fact that airlines have effectively devalued their miles by allowing people to accumulate them on every credit card purchase. We know this is a good deal for them, and for many consumers, but it devalues the definition of the term frequent flier. These companies keep devaluing their miles and limiting the number of award seats.

How We Preserved Our Skymiles for Another Day

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We’re sad to say that we haven’t flown on Delta much lately. For years, Delta was almost all we flew. We have a bunch of Skymiles, enough for a flight. But, then, other airlnes came to town, with new options, and we didn’t spend as much time with Delta. And our Skymiles were set to expire before we could enjoy our 50,000+ miles.

Rant: FREQUENT Flier Programs

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The idea of a customer loyalty program is a good one. We want to be rewarded for our patronage of any given company, be it an airline, or be it the local supermarket. But there is a serious problem with these programs for their patrons. People forget one word. FREQUENT.

JetBlue Revamps Frequent Flier Program

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We’re not a hoarder of frequent flier miles. We have them, of course. But, we’ve never been aggressive about it. The credit-card programs only seem to devalue the miles or points in these systems. JetBlue, however, has made several improvements…

News of the Week: Upgrades and Downgrades

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We thought we’d clear our backlog of interesting news out before the weekend. Enjoy! JetBlue set a world performance record with one of its Embraer 190s as the regional jet was returned to JetBlue’s home base at JFK from its…

Roundup – Lower Fares, Paypal, and More

On the lighter side of travel…teacher Dave Barclay flew from Toronto, Canada to Cardiff, in Wales to attend a wedding, only to discover that the wedding was scheduled for next July. Barclay, who spent $1015 on his flight, commented that…

Roundup

There’s a lot to catch up on… Qantas is expanding its flight schedule to the United States, effective March 2008, bringing total flights to 46 flights per week. The increased schedule includes daily service between Los Angeles and Brisbane effective…

United Amends Mileage Plus Frequent Flyer Program

United announced today that it will amend its mileage policies for its frequent flyer program. Miles that are in accounts that are inactive for eighteen months will expire. United does this in the hope that their “most loyal customers will…

Frequent Flyer Roundup

There has been a lot of talk about Frequent Flyer programs of late…especially considering the issues in redeeming, since more and more people are accumulating mileage through credit cards, and the airlines are offering fewer seats and raising the amount…

More Potty Humor

CNN reports that the pilot on an Air Canada Jazz flight from Ottawa to Winnipeg on Saturday returned from the airplane lavatory to discover he was locked out of the cockpit. With 30 minutes to go, the pilot went to…

Frequent Flyer History Lesson

Insideflyer.com has a fascinating article on the early days of frequent flyer programs here. The days of frequent flyers getting special discounted fares seem gone. The majority of frequent flyer programs are based on awarding mileage or points based on…