AAirpass: with $250k you travel free for life, the story of the beautiful idea gone wrong
All travel lovers have wondered at least once if there was a ticket that would allow them to travel at [...]
American Airlines
Oneworld
All lovers of travel have wondered at least once if there was a ticket that would allow them to travel for life around the world.
In this article:
Somewhat like theInterRail, or the ticket that allows you to travel unlimitedly On second-class trains to or within European countries participating in the project, But only for a certain period of time.
Well, this airline ticket did exist! It was called AAirpass and was issued by American Airlines. In practice, with a one-time cost of 250,000 you could travel in business class with the American airline in a manner unlimited and for life to all destinations served.
A beautiful idea, you could save for a lifetime by putting money aside, then spend your retirement traveling, or the wealthiest could stop worrying about tickets or of the tariffs.
Did you get your flight cancelled, miss your connection, land late?
You could get up to 600€ compensation per person
A beautiful idea yes, but the success of this project was disastrous....
With such a note, it was presumable that the holder would not sit idly by, indeed he would be more in heaven than on earth. And so indeed it was for the few who were able to understand the uniqueness of the offer.
Customers have used the AAirpass so much that they have consumed their own passports, their flights also cost 10 times more of the cost of the ticket itself, this forced the company to stop the project, to pick up all tickets and to face the resulting lawsuits.
The history of American Airlines' AAirpass.
In the early 1980s, the commercial aviation sector underwent a turning point, Several airlines sprang up and slowly began to nibble away at the market Of the biggies, including America Airlines.
La competition became so ruthless that losses of more than 70 million to American Airlines. So then-Administrator Robert Crandall had the idea to create the famous AAirpass thinking that never would anyone fly so much as to reach significant numbers.
Unfortunately, the board of directors did the math badly. Although ticket sales gave the company oxygen, a few years later AA realized the terrible error. Most of the people who bought the ticket, in fact, flew so much, by at the very least, double value.
Buying the ticket were 28 people in total, one of which, Steven Rothstein who traveled to 25 years, booking more than 10,000 flights and with an average of 2 million miles per year, before its revocation in 2008.
Steven Rothstein traveled for 25 years taking 10,000 flights
Steven Rothstein was one of 28 enlightened customers who purchased the American Airlines lifetime pass, seeing it revoked in 2008, however, after 25 years and 10,000 flights. Steven did not buy only 1 pass, over $250k he spent more 150k to get the same pass for a Companion.
He traveled for an average of 2 million miles per year, most often together with the wife, often and willingly with his children as well. He has traveled the world undisturbed for over 20 years, costing the company much more than the ticket it bought, an AA estimate says over 20 million dollars.
The history of the revocation of the pass is not so simple actually, American Airlines made a mistake, that's for sure, by performing the calculations wrong and losing a lot of money really.
For its part, however, many were using the pass in a manner fraudulent, lending it or reselling flights (at the time, the controls were not really that strict).
Rothstein also seems to have abused not only the pass but also the reservations, American Airlines' estimate is 3000 flights booked against 2500 cancellations during 4 years and often the chaperone did not exist except through a fictitious name in order to reserve the seat next door And have more space.
Errors there have been some on both sides, both from American Airlines and from customers who have used the pass. The fact of the matter is that it is unfortunate that such a pass no longer exists, although nowadays there are plenty of ways to Travel and get free tickets!
