The frequent fliers who flew too much

LA Times: The frequent fliers who flew too much

I'm sure some long time AA'ers may have some thoughts on this...

This sounds like it would be a great raffle item

Some more discussion in this thread http://milepoint.com/forums/threads/wow-aa-used-to-sell-a-lifetime-1st-class-pass.35231

Thanks - I only looked for it in the AA thread.

Mike Joyce was on the oneworld megado and had the most lifetime miles in the room!

American could choose to shed the remaining passes in the bankruptcy proceedings, just like they are dropping unprofitable aircraft leases.

AAmazing they did not make the terms at least slightly more restrictive. As initially offered an expensive, but very valuable program. Will be interesting to see if it is shed in bankruptcy.

Have other US based airlines offered a similar product? If so how did it fare in their BK filings? I'm wondering if there is a precedent for this specific scenario in the other airline bankruptcies.

Sounds to me like AA had not taken the time or performed the required due diligence to determine how the AAirpass Terms & Conditions should have been structured to prevent what they eventually determined to be violations of the their non-existent rules. In my opinion, AA screwed up and then when they realized that the owners of the AAirpass were exploiting the obvious loopholes, the did what they always do...take away the privilege by changing the rules...only this time they took it a step further with legal action...Shame on AA...

United offered a lifetime pass as well I think it was part of passplus.

I found this article fascinating, but it opened up a lot of questions for me.

For one, in section 7d, they say they can issue a refund and cancel the pass. Considering that the worst offenders paid relatively little, why not just give them their money back and part ways?

Next, why did these guys get FF miles? That seems nuts. Just so they could get more free flights to give away to friends? It also gives them an incentive to fly more. Unless I don't understand the whole mileage thing.

Finally, how did this work with partner flights? One guy mentions Sydney. How did he get to Sydney on AA?

I'm not gonna get into #1 since I've avoided discussing the issues within this story and want to continue doing so, but perhaps #2 and #3 are related? If he's getting endless AA miles, award tickets would come fairly easily to get to places outside of AA's network, such as Sydney.

Also, AA did fly to SYD at one time, though I'm not certain when they canceled that route. Might have been before the introduction of these unlimited AAirpasses.