“I have basically been ignored”

If you’re a United Airlines or Continental Airlines frequent flier, chances are you’re a little nervous about the impending corporate marriage that will create the world’s largest airline. Rightfully so.

Mergers are messy. Loyalty programs are complex things, and combining them is never easy. Just ask Delta Air Lines, which hooked up with Northwest Airlines last year and had to put the WorldPerks and SkyMiles programs together.

Actually, I was just up in Atlanta visiting Delta. Although my meetings were largely “off the record” I can tell you that people seemed traumatized by the complex task of combining the loyalty programs. It will be no different when United and Continental merge.

Here’s an example, which comes to us by way of Kerneth Hall of Bloomington, Minn. His mileage transfer didn’t go as he expected. Actually, it didn’t go — at all.

I have been having communication and receiving no help in regards to converting my Northwest WorldPerks miles into the Delta SkyMiles program.

I did the electronic transfer in late 2009 and the transfer said “complete.” My WorldPerks miles did not transfer. I called Delta SkyMiles account support in 2010 and was guided in making the transfer of miles.

The transfer was completed and the Delta rep said I should see the 125,169 miles on my Delta SkyMiles account in about a week. It is now the end of April and after making several calls to Delta I have basically been ignored.

I was a platinum WorldPerks member. I would appreciate if you would express my frustrations with Delta SkyMiles in your syndicated newsletter.

I contacted Delta to see if they could get this mileage program sorted out. A few days later, I heard back from him.

Thank you very much for you contacting Delta in regards to the merger of WorldPerks and SkyMiles points. I received a confirmation email from Delta today and my total miles have been corrected.

It was very kind of you to help me with this problem. It seems since my retirement and lack of flying I have lost any clout I may have had.

I’m not sure if that’s true — I certainly hope Hall hasn’t lost his clout — but I’m glad Delta could fix this problem.

Sometimes, merging mileage accounts takes a personal touch. United and Continental will know this soon enough.

  • Carrie Charney

    I’ve never flown Delta. I haven’t flown Northwest in years. I only kept my NWA miles by using their credit card once a year. However, my miles transferred smoothly without my having to lift a finger. “Murphy’s Law (Charney’s Law?) dictates that my miles and perks as a platinum flier on Continental will not transfer easily. And, I am not looking forward to the expected loss of good service (and meals) that I have enjoyed for the most part till now. One can dream, but not hold one’s breath…

  • Ed

    I did the transfer from WorldPerks to SkyMiles online and received the 500 bonus miles without a hitch. Perhaps people whose names did match exactly (Kern instead Kerneth, middle initials, Jr., etc) had more of an ordeal? Something to get aligned now on UA/CO accounts to avoid headaches later.

  • Brian A.

    I must agree with Ed…I had Platinum status in both programs, went through the web site process, and my miles (including lifetime amounts) were transferred without a hitch. Overall, I thought that Delta did a good job integrating the programs, the only negatives that I see are:

    * the three-tiered award mileage program and award reservations web site are a mess (compared to either program 2 years or so ago i.e. before Delta introduced the 3rd tier). It is very difficult to find award flights at the low mileage level and you must always cross-check with the phone reservations to ensure that you have the lowest rate. Which is counter-productive from a cost perspective – if your web site is robust enough to offer award travel availability across all reward partners, then your customers don’t need to make that expensive phone call to reservations.

    * some of the free perks of NW were not adopted. Example – I was in the ATL Sky Club lounge a few weeks ago. You still have to pay T-Mobile for wireless internet access. In the NW World Clubs, the wireless was always free.

    One huge benefit of the merger is that Delta food/amenities were adopted, at least in business class. The NW business class food and amenities were atrocious – the only positive aspect about their biz-class experience was the lie-flat-on-an-angle seats. Biz class seats on the old DL equipment still suck, though they are starting to put lie-flats on routes where they are at a competitive disadvantage. Several years ago, DL promised to put lie-flats on their whole fleet by the end of 2008, but that never happened.

  • Paul in WI

    I am an Elite customer (Plat) since 2001 with NWA. I flew Delta only as part of SkyTeam code-share ticket, never cared for them otherwise. I travel out of MSN, NWA always took care of me. They where never the prettiest girl at the airline dance, but they where dependable, took care of you, had that Midwest work ethic and in nine years, I could count on one hand, the number of times I had a cancelation that led to major (5+ hours) travel disruption. Now that the Atlanta mafia bought out NWA, the only benefit I have seen to date is that Delta serves Coke products over NWA’s Pepsi. Otherwise, I am not a fan of this buy-out, it’s hardly a merger as all vestiges of NWA are gone. We lost competition, we lost many FF benefits, I have seen more mechanical delays or cancellations with Delta than I ever saw with NWA and we went from 3 SkyTeam members in North America to one. In my view, NWA and Continental should have merged, with NWA owning part of CO, it should have been a no-brainer, better hub placement, more complimentary. Last week, I re-qualified already for Gold, going for Diamond on Delta this year, then if things do not improve with Delta, will likely go and get comped and join up with UA/CO. However, with UA/CO having it’s main flights from MSN to ORD, this is a negative, I would hope that UA/CO takes pressure off of ORD and makes use of CLE and DEN more. ORD and any airline that uses it as a hub are to be avoided out of MSN as many ATC actions lead to cancelations, which means a trip in/out on a Van Galder bus for 3 hours… That’s why I went NWA via MSP or DTW. Let’s hope for a better UA/CO link up. Long Live Red Tail!