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Email this9:34 am
December 23, 2011
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See here....
http://www.cbc.ca/news/busines.....gn_id=A100
2:28 pm
October 21, 2013
Online
Ah... three's nothing quite so good as bad publicity!
8:55 am
April 6, 2013
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Air Miles deserves the bad publicity, especially if allegations of "baiting" prove to be true.
This is from the CBC article kanaka pointed to:
The class action's statement of claim alleges that hurdles customers have faced trying to cash in their miles include:
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- Being blocked from some rewards when members actually have enough miles to buy them.
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The representative plaintiff in the lawsuit is David Helm from Red Deer, Alta. He has been collecting Air Miles since the 1990s.Helm told CBC News he found out about the new expiry rule in 2014 from his neighbour.
Since then, Helm said, he's been struggling to find ways to redeem his soon-to-expire miles and is still stuck with about 1,700 of them.
"The only stuff that's available to me is junk that I don't want."
Helm recently set his sights on two flights to Texas, but said that when he attempted to book the trip, the flights had disappeared.
Helms said he also tried to get a TV that his girlfriend can find available when she logs in using her Air Miles membership. However, she doesn't have enough points to buy the product. Helm does, but claimed Air Miles won't give him access to it.
Other Air Miles members have complained to CBC News that they've had a similar experience of being blocked from some rewards once they have enough miles to buy them.
Some Dream rewards I was planning to redeem for also "disappeared" once I had the miles needed.
4:50 pm
October 21, 2013
Online
I think that everybody who can do so should continue to try to redeem all their AirMiles as soon as they can. I am fortunate in that a year or two ago I got rid of all the ones that would expire this year by cashing for GICs at BMO. (This was discussed here at highinterestsavings, so y'all could have done likewise if you had enough Miles.) That deal, of course, is long gone. But I am going to continue to get rid of the current ones asap. They are all going into "Cash" rewards now.
The reason I make this suggestion is that I don't know what AirMiles has in real assets or what you would get from suing. It's all "funny money" in one sense, although I expect the merchants pay them real money to participate.
If this lawsuit breaks them, there may be little or nothing to gain. If merchants bail on them, there will be even fewer places to redeem and they will cut back on staff. And good luck to the judge who has to determine a "real" value for what remains of your AirMiles vis-a-vis assets of the company. AirMiles has, I believe, made it clear all along that AirMiles have no market value - at least other points plans have done this. They're only worth what you can redeem them for, and if there's nothing left to redeem them for,... well, you get the picture.
I recall that some years back the AirMiles plan in the US went bankrupt. I'm pretty sure that nobody got anything for their leftover AirMIles. It could happen here too.
I know that if I were an AirMiles merchant, I would be thinking seriously about getting out of this programme right now.
9:09 am
April 6, 2013
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Loonie said
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I recall that some years back the AirMiles plan in the US went bankrupt. I'm pretty sure that nobody got anything for their leftover AirMIles. It could happen here too.
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The former United States Air Miles participants may have got something. This is from the May 30, 1993 travel advisory in The New York Times Air Miles Suspended:
Air Miles, a year-old program that enabled consumers to accrue frequent-flier points by using certain credit cards or shopping at designated stores, has been suspended in the United States, according to Keith Mills of the Loyalty Management Group in Boston, which operated Air Miles in the United States.
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Mr. Mills said that tickets already issued for Air Miles credits would be honored by the airlines. For consumers without tickets, it's another story. "If the program is revived," he said, "the miles will be valid and no changes will be made." Mr. Mills said the chances of revival are "50-50."If it is not revived, Mr. Mills said, participants will be paid from a trust fund the airlines [American, United, USAir and Air Canada] had required Air Miles to establish, and although he was unable to say how much people would get for each mile accumulated, he said there were "multimillions of dollars, offset by tens of millions of miles."
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12:04 pm
October 21, 2013
Online
Interesting. Somehow I doubt Canadians would get anything. Airmiles in the US was only a year old at the time of its demise apparently, which would have meant that the airlines had the clout to insist on the trust. I doubt the multitude of Canadian merchants affiliated with it have this advantage as the programme has grown and become quite "successful".
And then there's the matter of figuring out how much they are "worth"...
Let's hope they smarten up. All they have to do is cancel that stupid deadline and treat people equitably, both quite do-able.
12:24 pm
December 23, 2011
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This is "my" opinion only. AirlMiles have been deceptive cheaters over the years. I doubt if they could adjust the deadline and treat people equitably as suggested. They are greedy and we collectors haven't really dug in to see the deception game they play. They have dug themselves into a huge hole that they likely won't be able to climb out of. Hopefully more collectors will see the bad publicity and recollect if they received a good deal or were ripped off. And personally I hope AirlMiles disappears!
Ps. The original idea of setting up AirlMiles to allow multiple companies offer the program was to our and their benefit. But it appears AirlMiles marketing practices and greed has poisoned the program with no cure
Pps. And for items to disappear and reappear...wow! Our local Global TV did a test signing onto Airmiles using two different accounts and proved it was selective based on some type of criteria that was purposely excluding some collectors from specific "awards".
8:57 am
June 10, 2016
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I have about 15,000 Air Miles, all Dream miles, and figured flying somewhere far away would use them up pretty quick.
I've never tried to book a flight through Air Miles before. Their online booking system seems deliberately designed to be as useless as possible. There's no way to find out where they fly or what's available when; you can only plug in dates and destinations. I tried a few, and none worked. So I called the number where friendly staff were supposed to help me with my booking. Except they'd cancelled call-in flight booking.
Sigh. Back online, I rolled the departure dice at least a dozen more times... not a single flight was "available". My spidey senses are screaming SCAMMERS!
That's a lot of miles, going nowhere.
10:20 am
December 23, 2011
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Airmiles U.K. ending?? The writing is on the wall, so to speak. Is it "all" over??
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new.....etime.html
ps. note date of article..UPDATED: 07:09 GMT, 10 October 2011
5:11 pm
April 6, 2013
Offline
kanaka said
Airmiles U.K. ending?? The writing is on the wall, so to speak. Is it "all" over??
AirMiles UK is gone. It became Avios in November 2011.
This is from The Independent (Friday, 11 November 2011): The end of Airmiles:
…After 23 years, the retail-reward scheme with 2.2 million collectors will be transformed from one minute to midnight on Monday. The BA-owned programme currently provides free flights to reward customers for their loyalty to banks, supermarkets and petrol stations. But, after a 32-hour shutdown (until 8am on Wednesday), holdings of Airmiles will be automatically exchanged for a new currency, Avios, at a rate of 1:10. So if you have 750 Airmiles today (currently enough for a trip to Paris), they will be worth 7,500 Avios from 16 November.
On the same day, the number of points required for a ticket to most destinations also rises tenfold, but with some changes to popular places. The points required to reach New York fall by 20 per cent. But two of the top three Airmiles destinations, Amsterdam and Paris, will get harder to reach. They currently "cost" 750 Airmiles, but from 16 November, the fare rises to 9,000 Avios – a 20 per cent increase in the amount you have to save.
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