First time out - airline blues

This is my first venture into the "blogosphere" (I really detest buzz words, just fyi). This seems to be the way the world is headed and I decided I didn't want to be left behind completely. Thanks to my friend and colleague Pamela Samathivathanchai for making this possible. She is a "Digital Native" (another buzz word) and set this whole thing up for me.

Currently, the airline industry is on my s**tlist, specifically Continental Airlines (www.continental.com) and, by association, Northwest (www.nwa.com). Northwest holds my frequent flyer miles. Continental is their share partner. As you may or may not know, this means that Continental miles count for Northwest and vice versa. I currently enjoy Silver Elite status on both airlines which gets me the occasional free upgrade to first class and special ticketing, security and boarding privileges. Nice perks when you travel as much as I do for work.

I flew over 40,000 miles with these airlines this year, the majority with Continental as a matter of convenience at my particular airport. You only need 25,000 miles to maintain your status. Yet, I came up over 4000 miles short with just under 21,000 miles credited. How can that be, you ask. I asked too.

Seems Continental has certain fare classes that only receive half miles. Problem is, it's not readily apparent what these classes are. They aren't tied to promotional codes and free tickets that you would expect not to count. It's much more insidious than that. You can pay the full, published fare and still wind up in one of these classes simply because you booked early and got a good deal. I have been assured by Northwest that it's there in the fine print somewhere as they were telling me that I was SOL and would lose my status on January 1.

I book most of my travel through a professional travel agent who was also unaware of this "fine print." This leads me to believe that this information is not common knowledge and Continental doesn't care too much that it isn't. I have another trip coming in January that I already booked on Continental. My agent checked after I found out about this practice and, yes, I was once again only going to get half mileage. So I asked my agent to get me into a different fare class. This cost an extra $43. Plus, even though I didn't change my flight, my seat or any arrangements, I had to pay a $50 change fee. Basically, I had to pay them more money for the privilege of paying them more money.

Does anyone else besides me think this is nuts? I mean, the airline industry as a whole is on life support. Their customer service, with a couple of exceptions, is viewed as anywhere from poor to horrendous. Yet, they do this to a guy who has flown them loyally for over 77,000 miles and dozens of flights in a two-year period.

I'd be interested to hear from others who have had problems with these yutzes.