A thousand frequent flier miles may seem like nothing, which is probably what the folks at Alamo were thinking when David Goeman repeatedly asked the car rental company for his missing award points.
But little things matter. Alamo shouldn’t have forgotten about Goeman’s miles, whether it was 100 or 1,000 or 10,000 of them. And he shouldn’t have had to keep asking.
Alas, he did. And when nothing seemed to work, he turned to me.
Here’s his story:
I rented a car from Alamo under a joint promotion with Northwest Airlines June 12-18, 2009 at the Sioux Falls SD airport (FSD).
I never got the 1,000 WorldPerk miles the promotion promised.
The Alamo customer care rep, with whom I’ve been dealing on the Alamo Web site, totally agrees that I should be awarded the 1,000 miles, and has continued to pursue it on my behalf … to no avail. Alamo is apparently ignoring their own customer care person.
There’s a “time” issue here. The Delta takeover of Northwest will include the incorporation of WorldPerks into the Delta SkyMiles program as of next month (October 2009), so, if Alamo ignores it for another two weeks there will no longer BE a WorldPerks program and it will become even more difficult to pursue.
Can you urge Alamo to fulfill their obligation – the recommendation of their own customer care agent – and get the darn 1,000 miles awarded to my WorldPerks account?
OK, three months is way too long to wait for a mileage credit. But is Alamo running down the clock? I’m not so sure about that. When Northwest’s program merges with Delta’s, there will probably be mechanisms in place to ensure miles aren’t lost. (If there aren’t, then we’re about to find out.)
I find it odd that Alamo appeared to be ignoring the advice of its own customer service agent. Goeman could have made more of his requests in writing to create a paper trail (instead, he posted his requests to an online bulletin board) which might have accelerated the process.
I contacted Alamo on his behalf. A few days later, he received the following note from the company:
Good morning, your issue was sent to me for immediate handling and resolution. We have contacted NWA directly and your 1,000 miles will be added to your account within 3 business days. Thank you for bring the matter to our attention. I apologize for the trouble and effort made to resolve this issue and truly appreciate your business. Please feel free to contact me should have any future issues or concerns. Thank you Mr. Goeman and have a great day.
Problem solved? Yes — and no.
Goeman has his miles, but was all the time and effort he put into getting just $10 worth of frequent flier awards worth it? And, more importantly, were the miles worth it?
Please don’t get me started on the actual value of frequent flier miles. I’ve called them the crack cocaine of the travel industry in the past, and my position is unchanged.
Loyalty programs benefit the travel company, first and foremost.
Perhaps Alamo was doing Goeman a favor by stalling his mileage credit.
(Photo: mdpNY/Flickr Creative Commons)
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I’m not a fan of Alamo. A well run frequent flier program will just give you a goodwill credit rather than have you run down miles or points.
You are correct. People attach way too much value to all these miles and points. It is a loyalty program. Loyalty goes two ways. A company gives me something (of undetermined value) in the hope I come back for more. And that sometimes works. But if they start messing with the things they themselves gave me, without me asking, that I just take note. It is a sign that they are not loyal to me. That doesn’t help me being loyal to them.
Furthermore, I never expect to get anything for my miles. If I do, good for me. If not, whatever.
Alamo does seem to do everything they can to NOT award airline miles in conjunction with rentals. In fact, I have been informed that the lowest rates often do NOT qualify for airline miles, specifically the AAA rate.
I have asked at which rate does the rental qualify and in some cases the daily rate is a couple of dollars more. Even when I proceed with that particular rate it seems that Alamo has a tough time crediting them and to have them do so invites a challenging if not unfruitful exercise in acquiring actual throughput. In other words, it seems that they do not want to award airline miles for rentals.
Even though Alamo and National are owned by the same company, I never had had a problem with getting those miles when renting from National! So, anecdotally, renting from National gets you the airline miles. However, when renting from Alamo, good luck. Oh, and by the way, does everyone know that a VW Beetle is classified by Alamo as a “Mid Size” car? Go figure.
Many people do not realize that they pay to collect miles when renting a car.
I checked on the Alamo website under car rental policies, Frequent Traveler Service Charge
The site stated:
“Frequent Traveler Service Charge
For rentals picked up after September 4, 2009, Alamo charges a Frequent Traveler Service Charge of up to $.75 per day (except $1.50 per day up to $4.50 per rental for Southwest) for qualifying rentals in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. This Service Charge is collected by Alamo in order to offset a portion of the administrative and program costs arising from our participation in these frequent traveler partner programs.
When a renter chooses to receive miles in the American Airlines AAdvantage program, the Frequent Traveler Service Charge will be calculated based on the Federal Excise Tax (7.5%) expense incurred by Alamo when it purchases miles from American Airlines.
Alamo participates in the following Frequent Traveler Loyalty Programs that may be subject to service charges:
Alaska Airlines – Mileage PlanTM
American Airlines – AAdvantage®
Continental Airlines – OnePass®
Delta Air Lines – SkyMiles®
Hawaiian Airlines – HawaiianMiles®
Hilton Hotels – Hilton HHonors®
Northwest Airlines – WorldPerks®
Southwest Airlines – Rapid Rewards®
United Airlines – Mileage Plus®
U.S. Airways – Dividend Miles® ”
I agree with you, Chris… “Loyalty programs benefit the travel company, first and foremost.”
Chris is absolutely right about the value of frequent flier miles. Maybe he was the writer who called air miles “Confederate Currency.” It would be a perfect description of their ever and rapidly devaluing nature if Confederate currency vanished in a puff of smoke after 18 months.
Every airline is devaluing them by passing them out like peanuts to anyone who wanders by. It’s not just hotel rooms and car rentals. A lot of the inflation of frequent flier miles is due to credit card rewards. It always amazes me that people who could have gotten cash back on credit purchases opt instead for frequent flier miles. United tells people who sign up for their credit card that the 30,000 miles they get just for signing up will buy them a round-trip ticket! United’s marketing materials don’t mention to where you can fly, or the time frames in which you can book, but hey, your business is worth a round trip to Hawaii over Christmas to them, right? And here’s your free lunch.
In 2006 I burned 300,000 frequent flier miles for two business-class tickets to Australia on United. In 2008, the same number of frequent flier miles got me two coach tickets. A month after our trip, two coach tickets to Australia were 320,000 miles, and that business-class trip would be 540,000, a 45% devaluation over two years. For someone who travels at the rate I did just a year ago, a trip to Australia in any class is now the rabbit at the dog race. No matter how long I accumunlate miles, I’ll never be able to keep up with the ever-increasing reward mileage required to pay for that trip. That’s part of why I travel about 1/3 of what I used to, and do most of my business using web conferencing now. The burdens keep increasing and the rewards keep declining.
There’s nothing wrong with accumulating air miles, if it doesn’t cost you anything in real or opportunity costs, and if you redeem them the first chance you get, but way too many people think “getting miles” on a credit card or for a hotel room or car rental is just like getting cash back on the card or a lower price on the room. They’re not worth the trade-off, and they’re really not even worth the effort.
I don’t think I would have worried about 1000 miles. On the other hand, I stayed at the Djibouti Sheraton for 18 days in January of this year. The place had no hot water during the entire stay, and all Starwoods has offered me is a free two night stay in this property. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to Djibouti, but this is NOT a vacation spot. On top of all this, I have yet to receive any credit for the stay. How about it Chris? What did you find out?
The woefully misnamed loyalty program isof course designed to benefit the company first and foremost. Whoever came up with the phrase loyalty program earned his/her money many times over.
The truth is so-called loyalty programs at best represent an agreement between the company and the travelers. The agreement goes as follows: You, Mr. Traveler intend to spend 100 nights in hotels. If you divert some of those hotel nights to my brand, I will increase the return on your investment of those hotel dollars spent. The more nights you stay, the greater the return on your investment.
Specifically, the traveler may get concierge access, free breakfast, a better room, etc., at no additional charge. This is a business proposition plain and simple, There is no loyalty either way. The relationship remains only as long as both parties believe that it is mutually beneficial.
Fail to divert the requisite number of nights annually, and the hotel program cuts your perks. Similarly, if the hotel consistently fails to deliver the perks, the traveler goes elsewhere.
It therefore behooves the traveler to ensure that he or she is indeed getting a greater return on their travel dollars as a result of participaing in the “loyalty” program.
@ Carver: There is no loyalty either way.
There is. And you mention it yourself:
Fail to divert the requisite number of nights annually, and the hotel program cuts your perks. Similarly, if the hotel consistently fails to deliver the perks, the traveler goes elsewhere.
The “problem” is that a lot of companies are not delivering on their promises and customers are walking (rightfully) away, while companies make a big booboo.
I see a lot of apples to oranges to Buicks comparisons going on in this discussion, and while I’m hardly a defender of the way airline loyalty programs are run, it’s only fair to point out the differences.
When Gerry said he spent 300,000 miles for two business-class tickets to Australia in 2006, he had to have been using what are now “Saver” tickets, which are the highly capacity-controlled flyer seats. The 320,000 he spent in 2008 for two coach tickets were standard, aka “rule-busting” seats, ones where there are no capacity restrictions. Now, in 2006, there may not have been the latter type, and the capacity controls may have gotten much tighter on the “saver” tickets, but you’re still talking two different products. If there had been no capacity-controlled seats in 2006 available, he wouldn’t have even had the option of spending the higher amount on rule-busting coach seats.
And yes, it’s been hard to get tickets to a really good location, at a really good time of year, for the “saver” level of miles for a very long time. At one time, maybe some airlines just gave you any available seat if there was one available (Southwest did that until just a few years ago), but capacity controls have been a factor for more than a decade on most airlines, and the they do not want to give away any seat they think they can sell – unless by doing so, they can burn enough of your miles to reduce the liability glut on their books.
Now, as for the customer with the 1,000 mile problem: yes, that’s a very small number of miles in one sense. However, in another, it could make a big difference. For example, I have (currently) 49,731 miles currently unused on one airline. That’s only 269 miles away from either a rule-busting domestic ticket, or two saver-type domestic tickets. I’m not going to purchase a huge block of miles (the minimum on this airline to buy is 5,000) just to top off the account, so next time I rent a car, I’m going to get miles for it, which will push me over the top and extend the miles (I’ve got just over a year left on them now). If I’d done that, and then didn’t get 1,000 or even 500 miles that I’d paid for, it would mean a lot more than it would to someone who flies, say, 100,000 miles a year or more. I tend to leisure travel to offbeat places where I don’t usually need rule-busting tickets, and so hitting 50,000 would mean my partner and I could squeeze out another long weekend vacation somewhere and spend a bit more on things to see and do since we weren’t paying for airfare.
So circumstances can be different depending on your situation. Don’t be so hasty to dismiss the value of something, even 1,000 miles.
Is a Kia Optima a “Full Size” vehicle? Alamo thinks so. I should know better after the harrowing annoyingly experiences I have had lately with Alamo.
I have been a Quicksilver Member for over 20 years. Interestingly enough some Alamo agents state that they’ve never met one before. I guess that is significant. I think it means very little to Alamo. Oh, and still no frequent flier miles even after paying the “up charges”. They continue to reassure me that they will credit them and NEVER do. I give up. Do I hear Avis trying harder?