Delta Dumbness
I joined my first frequent flyer program when I started working for IBM. Before then I did not really do any business travel. But when I first went to IBM I had to travel to New York just a couple of months later, and I joined the United Airlines frequent flyer program, since I was working in Boulder, and DIA is a United hub.
When I got back from New York, I had somewhere around 4000 miles in my account. Not “points” or “credits” – miles. I did some quick math and figured, “Gee, 4000 miles is enough for both Amber and I to fly round trip to Las Vegas! Let’s go!” So I called United to schedule the trip, at which point they carefully explained to me how stupid I was, because everyone knows you need at least 25000 miles to fly anywhere at all, and what was wrong with me anyway.
One day, I will meet the person who came up with this dumb scheme, and then I will spend the rest of my life in prison. Just kidding. I figure the jury will probably side with me.
Not long after this, I left IBM for Novell, and I also left those precious miles behind as I moved to Utah, where there is a Delta hub, and we are free to bestow upon United Airlines the loathing they deserve. I got a frequent flyer account with Delta instead. But I just wasn’t getting the miles. Traveling once or twice a year to San Francisco or Boston was just not doing the job.
Then one day my boss came and told me he needed me to go to Bangalore. Bwa-ha-ha-ha! At long last! A trip to Bangalore will accumulate nearly 25000 miles in a single trip! That’ll show ‘em!
I’ll tell you what – anyone who has to fly clear to Bangalore and back deserves a free flight.
So I had this nice little balance of, I think it was, 29000 miles. And then it was 30000. And then it was 32000. And all this time I could never actually get a chance to use the miles, because where am I going to fly by myself?
Two trips to Seattle this year bumped me up to 38000 exactly. My mom said if I ever went to Seattle again and wanted to take Amber, she’d watch the kids. And then my new boss at Microsoft asked me to go to TechReady in Seattle. All the stars aligned! I was finally going to get to use my miles!
Ah, if only it were so easy. I logged into Delta’s website to buy Amber’s ticket. What a shocker – the flight I needed Amber to take to come with me cost not 25000 miles, but 40000.
40000. And I had 38000.
I saw a link that said, “Transfer points from another rewards program.” One of the participating programs was the Starwood Preferred Guest program, which I’m also a member of, because the W hotels rule. It said that Starwood points convert 1 for 1 into Delta miles, so I logged into my Starwood account, and lo and behold, I had just under 2300 Starwood points! Hurrah!
Starwood told me you must transfer a minimum of 2500 points. Bummer.
I saw another link that said, “Purchase miles.” I did the calculation and saw that I could buy those 2000 miles for only about $60. The only bad thing was it said it could take up to 72 hours for the miles to be credited to my account – and I needed to leave in 70. I called Delta, to see if I could just buy the miles over the phone, and then book the flight. Alas, they could not do anything about it – 72 hours! Amazing – they are powerless!
The Delta rep suggested another approach. “Sign up for the Delta American Express card,” she said. “After you make your first purchase, your account is immediately credited with 20000 miles. You could sign up for the card today, get the card number, make an online purchase, get your 20000 miles, and then buy the flight with miles.” Ooh, that is a good idea.
So I had her transfer me to American Express. They also explained, “Yes, if you sign up, once you make your first purchase with the card, your Delta SkyMiles account will be immediately credited with 20000 miles.” Sweet! I signed up over the phone for the card. After I got done, the American Express rep said to me, “Your card should be there in about three weeks.” I said, “Okay. Can you please give me the card number now, so I can make a purchase with it today.”
“Uh, I can’t do that,” she replied.
“Well, I need to get those miles today, to use to book a flight, so I was told I could get the number and buy something online today, and get the miles.”
“Well, I can’t do that,” she explained. “And even if I could, you would not actually see those miles or be able to use them for about 6-8 weeks.”
This is a new definition of “immediately” that I am not familiar with. (However, now that I am aware of it, I plan to use it often. Amber: “Matt, will you please change Oakley’s diaper?” Me: “Sure babe, I’ll do that immediately.”)
Anyway, I got approved for the card, but I still was 2000 miles short. There was no way for me to book the flight with the 38000 miles and cover the difference. I had to take one flight in order to be in Seattle in time for a mandatory meeting, but the only way for me to put her on that flight was to pay cash. So I had to book her on a different flight, which meant she would fly out of Salt Lake four hours after I did.
Lame, Delta – lame.
