Hi Guys
I know its all speculation and the media are going crazy writing about it all, but one thing they always mention is floating or seperating the frequent flyer business and how it worked well with Aeroplan and AirCanada.
Does anyone know much about what changes occured when Air Canada did this and what it might entail for QF?
I can't say what changes occurred immediately after spin-off, but Aeroplan today IMHO is a God-awful scheme if your main use of it is flying.
Its now an omnibus 'points' thing, with hotel, credit card and other earning and redemption vehicles sitting alongside the flying earn. Sounds OK, but that makes Aeroplan much less sensitive to the wants of 'frequent flyers' than an in-airline scheme. (I know QFF does lots of non-flying points things, in fact makes huge profit from it, but I
believe its main focus is still flying.) Also, Aeroplan doesn't handle all of the Air Canada frequent flyer scheme. Air Canada has 'e-upgrades' which they administer and create the rules for. There is a mind boggling matrix of fare types, times when upgrades can be requested, times they are allocated, status levels, when status levels are obtained, etc etc.
I still haven't figured out the difference between 'Aeroplan miles' and 'Air Canada miles'.
If you follow the Air Canada / Aeroplan foum in, say, FT, you'll see a much different mix of thread topics than, say Qantas. Its all about miles redemption costs, how/when to upgrade etc etc.
But the main downside is that with a spun-off scheme is that frequent flyers become much less important in the overall scheme of things.
