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Back to a travel related blog entry (Domino 7 schtuff later)


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I received an interesting email from the Magician of Information, Bas.  This time the topic was on how the business traveler is getting treated as second class more and more.

Generally, the travel industry agrees that business travelers who pay more deserve more. It is the ones who book deeply discounted airfares, hotels or cars through the Internet who perturb them.

So when you travel, do you not try, or even in some cases your company might make you, take a least cost option.  At least a reduced cost option.  But does this mean you should get poorer service?  I feel that if I happen to get a great Internet rate on a hotel room, when I register and show a status card, I should get what comes with it.  I have only had one instance where they said, well you booked this on a special rate.  With a simple question of what the rate mattered they couldn't answer.  Now this really stuck out from the article
Efforts to rein in bargain-hunting business travelers have included changing loyalty programs so that benefits are tied to fare prices instead of just the number of miles flown, as Delta Air Lines did last year. The pay-for-perks attitude also extends to employees, who seem less willing to tolerate business travelers who demand to be pampered even when they travel on the cheap.

So I know AA can do segments or miles, which just makes some people want to take hops on trips instead of direct since doing short flights would never get you status in miles.  If I use status to upgrade a cheap coach ticket to First Class based on how much I fly, does that mean I am entitled to lesser service than those that paid more?  One flight attendant in the article stated just the opposite.
Although he was put off by the passengers' sense of entitlement, he says he did not allow it to interfere with his job. But his disdain for passengers with Champagne tastes and beer budgets is widespread in the travel industry, especially among employees who have accepted pay and benefit cuts to help their companies weather hard times. For such customers to demand red-carpet treatment strikes them as impudent.