Delta SkyMiles Makes Another Partner Award Devaluation

So between AlItalia's Millemiglia going down (Transfer partner of Canadian AMEX), and Delta devaluing, do you have a preferred Skyteam points program?

I fly Skyteam at most a couple of times a year (Eastern Canada is mostly Star Alliance world), so miles that don't expire would be ideal.

While 95,000 or 125,000 Skymiles is still too many, might it be that there is simply no saver level availability on the days that display 125,000?
Quite frankly, for saver level that seems like a lot of availability less than 30 days out. Of course. almost any flight that requires 95,000 miles(saver level or not) one-way seems exorbitant.

And at a time when China Eastern economy fares ex-USA are costing basically nothing! The number of markets available in Asia ex-USA at circa $450 r/t on China Eastern is mind-numbing.

So why Delta why.

PS I wouldn't burn my Skymiles on C.E. biz class, that's for sure

Why does each calendar have low level availability on 9/4, which is earlier than the other two weeks? Doesn't seem to make sense if they're charging for close-in avail

While I don't like it, the plan makes sense. Award redemptions on last minute flights can be attractive alternatives to paying last minute air fares. It's how I use a lot of miles. I assume Delta would rather steer the customer to buying the revenue ticket and away from the award redemption.

But it is revenue management. Your argument that the airline should be most desperate to sell a ticket shortly before departure could just as well apply to cash bookings, too, right? The reason it doesn't is because the airlines want to train people to book in advance so they can charge more to those who have an urgent need to travel at the last minute, usually business travelers.

And there are lots of small business owners who will consider using miles to book travel instead of cash, so for those people, they were getting a deal on last-minute travel.

You may not like this, but it makes perfect business sense to me.

Hi Ben
Frankly, as a European based reader, I always got the impression that you guys based in the U.S. can hoard on miles in a very too easy way.
These changes are simply the reflection on balancing earn vs. spend

DL leads and the other two will eventually follow.

@Bgriff,

I completely understand what you're getting at since you could easily just presume miles are a currency. However, I think Ben's point is that seemingly few last-minute trips are booked with miles in the miles/points game. Those last-minute miles/points bookings are usually the result of someone having a flexible schedule, a lot of miles/points, and the desire to snatch seats that would otherwise be going out empty but are being given away at a discounted miles/points price. That being so, it makes little sense for close-in booking with miles/points to be outrageously expensive.

I'd posit that last-minute trips are generally the result of urgent business dealings where a company is likely paying the fare. In that case it makes perfect sense to gouge customers because they *have* to be somewhere on short notice and are willing to pay. But miles/points users tend to plan their use of the miles/points currency so as to not waste them on silly award redemptions.

I think it's worth noting that there were other more positive changes too. I was searching for DCA-JFK and found them at 5500 each way, which seems way lower than my memory serves and lower than in travelisfree calculator. Also, routes for PWM-DCA were at 7k each so not sure if new or I'm just noticing these power domestic fares.

Maclover +1 !!!
I am still amazed how many creditcards an American can apply for and earn points and bonuses on.
It is so d@mn easy to collect points living in the US. That is also why it is so d@mn easy for airlines to devaluate as most of you sit on tons of points. For us mere Europeans collecting points is done by actual flying.
For me trying to get a ticket on points in C-class means flying one alliance multiple flights per year for a few years.

So why do airlines devaluate their points? Because it is too easy to collect them!!

Screw Delta. When the credit card waiver for DM is dropped, I'm done.

skypesos

To be fair, United charges a close-in booking fee if booked within 21 days of departure... though 30,000 miles is worth a lot more than the USD $75 United charges to non-elites. (And this pricing applies to elites as well...)