While customer outrage can move mountains, there is also nothing quite like the threat that comes when competitors start to smell opportunity.
After major U.S. airline Delta Air Lines (DAL) -) announced that it was both making it more difficult to earn the loyalty status necessary to access its lounges and cracking down on how many times members can enter them in the middle of last month, multiple competing airlines spotted their chance to win over frustrated customers.
Related: Airlines are cracking down on lounge crowding in a way you won't like
New York-based JetBlue (JBLU) -) offered to extend the status travelers held with Delta to its own airline while Alaska Airlines (ALK) -) took things one step further and offered to give status one tier above than what they had. Delta's silver status, which gets one the most basic perks such as priority check-in and boarding, can become MVP Gold with Alaska. At most airlines, perks such as free food and alcohol as well as easier same-day flight changes begin at the second loyalty tier.
Delta CEO said sorry and 'we're listening to the feedback'
In announcing the offer, Alaska Airlines took a dig at Delta by saying that "loyalty is about more than just revenue."
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After observing both the customer anger and competitors' rush to sweep in on the opportunity, Delta's CEO backtracked and said that the airline "probably went too far" in pushing forth the changes.
"I will tell you that we're listening to the feedback," Delta head Ed Bastian said in a recorded Rotary Club of Atlanta meeting on Sept. 25. "We are reading the feedback. Our reservation agents are talking to customers that call in and the feedback matters. And we're not ready to fully — we're still assessing what we do."
While not going into specifics, Bastian said that modifications to the updated loyalty program would be coming "sometime in the next few weeks."
The main changes that Delta had wanted to introduce included caps on lounge visits that are currently unlimited to status holders and scrapped waivers that allowed passengers to earn status by spending $25,000 on eligible credit cards. As of 2024, customers will need to spend a respective $6,000, $12,000, $18,000 and $35,000 directly with the airline.
We 'didn't want to have to keep going through this every year'
Both in announcing the changes and in his Rotary Club speech, Bastian explained that the changes were necessary because it was getting hard to continue providing the same "level of premium experience" amid high number of travelers and understaffing following the pandemic. Delta's SkyClub lounges, in particular, were growing increasingly crowded and some travelers complained that they no longer had the same "luxury experience" they were designed to create.
"Our team wanted to kind of rip the Band-Aid off and didn't want to have to keep going through this every year with changes in nickel and diming and whatnot," Bastian said. "I think we moved too fast and so we're we're looking at it now."
"Frequent flyers are livid over Delta Air Lines' changes to its SkyMiles program — and other airlines see an opportunity," The Points Guy's David Slotnick wrote of the situation before the backtrack was announced.
