Ordinary Gweilo

This week I received a letter from one airline telling me that they will be renewing my membership of their frequent flyer program and simultaneously discovered that my membership of another program has been downgraded from silver to ordinary. 

The first airline is one I have used twice, first for a return (short-haul) flight in business class more than 2 years ago, and the second for a return flight on an excursion ticket (no mileage) about 18 months ago.  I have never met their official criteria for the frequent flyer program, but they enrolled me and keep renewing the membership.

The second airline is one I have been using regularly for several years, and for a brief period I actually achieved ‘gold’ status in their program, before returning to silver.  Originally their system was that once you qualified for the silver level you kept it permanently as long as you carried on flying with them, but a while back they changed the rules so that you had to qualify each year otherwise you would be downgraded.  I wrote a complaint letter, and got a fairly sympathetic response saying that they would consider the individual circumstances before making the decision to downgrade the membership level.

It seems that in the last twelve months I fell just short of the qualifying level.  So, naturally, they downgraded my membership level.  How pathetic is that?  Not that it really matters – the benefits are not significant, and I can’t remember ever getting anything out of it – but in terms of PR and marketing it seems ridiculous.  The cost to the airline is minimal, and surely you want loyal customers who will choose your airline rather than a competitor?

The really odd thing is that generally they seem to be quite good at customer relations.  Some time ago, two former colleagues of mine were travelling on different airlines out of Hong Kong at the same time, both in business class, and wanted to sit together in the lounge before departure.  One airline was not willing to allow a customer using another airline into their lounge, but the other readily agreed.  Which one is more likely to get their business next time?