I ve written here and elsewhere that this era of miles/points and free trips will be ending or great

A couple of days ago I wrote about Delta s policy change whereby it s no longer possible to upgrade Premium Economy tickets on Air France to business class using Delta SkyMiles or systemwide upgrades. Well, it looks like this change could be worse than we expected. Much worse.
Up until now the business class award availability that Air France gave their own Flying Blue members access to matched what they gave their partners access to. That means if Air France Flying Blue showed Classic business class award availability, Delta SkyMiles members could redeem their miles for that at the low level.
Back in March Delta had an IT issue whereby they couldn t display Air France transatlantic business class award space. That was eventually resolved, though it came at a cost. Air France award availability was never as good after the IT glitch package tours to europe as it was before. And the other thing that makes that different than this is ExpertFlyer still showed the business class award space throughout the IT glitch, which they re not showing now.
Air France will no longer release any business class award space to Delta SkyMiles. package tours to europe This is entirely possible and well within their rights, and it would be the biggest blow to the SkyMiles program on the award redemption side in a very long time.
Air France package tours to europe plans on only releasing a sub-set of their award availability to Delta SkyMiles package tours to europe members, and in order to make that happen they re having to temporarily block all redemptions as they get their systems figured out.
I m fairly confident this isn t just a harmless IT glitch. If either of the above explanations is the case, it would be a huge blow to the SkyMiles program. And the timing of this is funny, because just a couple of hours ago I made the following prediction (without even considering this IT glitch ):
And while I hate to do this, let me make a prediction. I'd be willing to bet we'll see a trend over the next few years whereby non-US airlines increasingly release award space exclusively to their own members. At the end of the day there's such an inequality in terms of the number of outstanding miles between the US and the rest of the world, given the huge number of miles earned through credit cards in the US. Not only do I think foreign carriers will think their premium cabins are too accessible (especially due to US airlines often selling miles cheaply), but they'll also feel like their own members are at a disadvantage, and more may go the route of Lufthansa. Not something I'd like to see happen or that I have inside knowledge on, though if I were a betting man…
I recently got a Paris to US flight but it was complicated and the agent had to contact Air France for it to be released. It was not on the Internet. Very interesting post and concerning for me with several hundred thousand Skymiles and hoping to get to Seychelles and Austrailia someday.
@ JohnnieD When the transatlantic flight isn t available on Air France they ll show flights with connections that have a shorter segment on Air France (like an intra Europe flight). Fortunately Alitalia still has some transatlantic award space.
We re discussing this on the FT Delta board bad news bears. I posted an example there of LAX-CDG, and how you can book LAX-MEX-CDG on AM, but can t do so on AF non-stop, even though both show as available
The last time this happened was in late March (end Q1) and this time it s in late September (end Q3). Seems to me there s a chance that Delta s trying to save revenue by blocking package tours to europe Air France bookings.
I had no problems seeing space on AF before and this tells me that AF is blocking package tours to europe availability based on POS (like LH does) and this will be a real blow to ALL US based programs. It is the end of the world as we know it.
I ve written here and elsewhere that this era of miles/points and free trips will be ending or greatly restricted in the future. As Delta did, any of these companies can change package tours to europe the rules overnight and those millions of miles someone has accumulated can be nearly worthless.
I m cashing in a bunch of points for a 10 night trip later this year to Europe where it might end up only costing me $500 for hotels and two business class tickets instead of the thousands it would have cost. I m thankful for the opportunity (such as Lufthansa first awards) but I can t see it continuing.
If this is indeed a permanent change than I give up. Take away the air france availability then the available delta flights to europe(which are tough to get right now BUT still somewhat attainable) will dry up. How does one begin to defend this crappy program anymore? Frustrating if you re hub-hotstage to DL.
I have spent all year collecting 200k delta miles via credit cards, buying things and selling them on ebay and other schemes. I was able to book two roundtrip non-stop air france business flights but like a previous poster said, I ended up having to call them, and they put me on hold to contact air france first. The space was available on expertflyer but not on delta.com, but I did end up getting the tickets. Looks like I did it just in the nick of time
Spent just short of an hour yesterday trying a MIA-Europe booking with DL miles. When it came to CDG routing, she told me the AirFrance upgrades are gone, but it seems as though biz flights are unavailable as well. There were a couple of JFK-CDG opportunities, but MIA was unavailable during late May/early June. She assured me it was because of popularity; after we hung up, I booked AA with a very wide selection of availability.
If Air France is closing off business class to Delta or other partners, it d be a foolish move, IMO, since AF is a high-visibility member of Skyteam, and they already have the rule of not releasing first class space to anyone other than their own elite members. But here s the thing: while I have seen multiple Air France business and economy trip reports, most of those writers report that the first class cabin of the aircraft is completely empty!
IF it s true that Delta gets restricted or no availability on Air France (my opinion is currently package tours to europe I don t know- wait until the drama deepens )- Delta has got to react to that (If they don t, then my miles are going to Alaska or Korean) or they ll face a serious backlash package tours to europe from their most loyal members. The one way I see they can benefit and look good is by opening up more award space on their own aircraft to Europe. But how full are BusinessEilte cabins across the Atlantic anyways? And then again, when was the last time Delta Skyinches got MORE valuable with time?
What if this is Air France s way of evening out the playing field (and also to try and solve their financial situation) since Delta rarely releases low-level availability on their own flights for Flying Blue members? The only thing I can see next is the finger-pointing followed by fluffy speeches, liquidating of points for fed-up Skymiles members and a defection.
I ve been flying air france fir the last 22 years and been platinium for life and they sucks as lucky said their business class is a poor product and i didnt notice any change when they launched the new product,skyteam is the leftbehind of major alliance.
I find availability is just linked to status. Use the partners Gold nothing available use my Platinum Plus, Bingo. If you want to see a scary future see their any seat award and watch 100 s of thousands of Points BURN
I was planning on redeeming Skymiles for LAX-CDG-JNB roundtrip in business class on AF for March 2013. Looked at it up on Delta.com last month and was available. Now that I ve decided to book it, AF business class is not available anymore!
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