Maybe I’m out of touch.
I heard a radio ad this morning proclaiming a new great benefit for Delta customers who get a Delta Premier American Express something-or-other card. Ooh, a great new benefit…I like the sound of that. Ready for this great new benefit:
“If you sign up for the credit card and become a member, your 1st piece of luggage is free!”
Impressive. This is a head-scratcher for me. I haven’t traveled via airplane much recently but I know that everyone is charging for luggage and everything else. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time before I’m required to bring my Fastlane transponder with me on the plane so that when they fly through the new floating air tollbooths I can get charged appropriately.
It’s one thing to raise prices and charge for everything and give me some reason. At least you are pretending to be “honest” with me. It’s another thing to pretend that you are actually going out of your way for the customer while treating us like we’re complete idiots.
It would sort of be like Apple saying that they’ve invented this new great feature for their iPhone OS called “Multi-tasking”.
Look, run your business. Do what you need to do. Don’t treat me like an idiot and pretend like you’re doing me any favors with your faux-addon-benefits which were part of the “ah, yeah, obviously that’s included” category not too long ago.
By the way, I’d rather pay $250 for my ticket and have my luggage travel for free than $200 and then have to pay $50 for my luggage. Then I don’t feel like I’m being nickel and dimed.
