What is the point of paying 1 million dollars for the unlimited pass but you're only allowed to fly 1 millions worth of flight cost? OF COURSE they're gonna travel MORE than what it's worth. Otherwise it wouldnt make sense to purchase the pass in the first place.
@@prumchhangsreng979 yeah agreed but its so dumb of the airline to not have seen that coming. Shouldve imposed some sort of a penalty on it as part of the terms and conditions. Huge corporate blunder this is
@@AimanZ535 People back then were very uneducated and they're probably still alive today. I mean look at the mess they've made out of this country throughout the years.
I think what AA was not willing to tolerate was booking but not flying, they were not only losing the seat, but also extra taxes. I think that was pretty much abusive. But it's their fault for not putting that on the terms and conditions.
The modern day equivalent would be unlimited mobile data. You pay for it, but god forbid you actually use it... they either throttle back your speed or warn you about abusing the service
Aren't most of those "unlimited" data plans just a marketing gimmick for "a lot of data" considering how they also have "Beyond unlimited" packages as well?
this is gonna be on the airlines, 100%. They have the army of lawyers and skyscraper building full of employees, why didn't they gather a group together to brainstorm up a solid contract with foresight on possibilities of abuse of the airpass? No, they weren't really thinking at all, they just needed the money.
Yeah. And as a buyer you have to factor in that AA was in dire need of money at the time the first tickets got sold: the moment AA goes bust your ticket is worthless. It was a high risk high reward investment that paid of, in return AA got cheap puplicity, yes millions are cheap for such a big company. Ofc that good puplicity got burned by their lawyers later on.
Sometimes they treat customers like naive people. You really thought someone who buys a 400 000$. Will travel just 10 times a year 😂 like they are naive. They gonna throw 300 000$ away Keep in mind its 400 000$ of the 70s and 80s. Which would be a 800 000$ pass for 2020 with inflation
Gregory Smith I agree. Using it isn’t abusing it and I don’t even care that he flew with a bunch of strangers, he should be able to fly with who ever he wants. But I draw the line at booking and canceling more flights than he’s even taking. That seems like a dick move, especially when he knows how much he’s making out on that ticket. Though it is AAs fault, they should have had a contract ahead of time, they probably just wanted that “no conditions” selling feature.
Now imagime this in current time: You buy this unlimited pass by getting a massive loan but you change your profession to a travel vlogger. You can churn out unlimited content, people will love it, your revenue sky rockets, you pay off the debt, and now you are 100x richer than you once were.
HONESTLY! If I had this pass I would probably get a high paying job out west or east and on the weekend travel back home to Texas where cost of living is low :)
You could still create a lot of content for $370,000 flying economy. I’d say by the time you spend $370k on flights if you hadn’t started making a decent living from UA-cam it will never happen.
Just imagine being broke and having this pass. You could live and shower at any airport and then travel anywhere in the world just to eat first class dining food on the plane.
I have a friend who worked as a UA first class flight attendant when he was young. The pay was shit and he had to live with a bunch of roommates to get by, but he did have the benefit of flying for free. So on his off days, he would looking for the longest flight that had a same day return flight and just fly, eating and drinking first class items because otherwise he couldn't afford to buy his own food.
My Dad's friend bought into this (along with the companion voucher). He flew to Heathrow to pick Dad up and took him back to Houston(?). Said it was a bizarre experience; having your friend fly for 24+ hours just to pick you up and then get treated like royalty on the flight. Apparently even back then (sometime around the late 90's or early 00's) they were trying to buy the tickets back from him for $300k or $400k (I forget exactly how much, but roughly what he bought it for 10/15 years prior). He refused! 😃
I would have sold it back to them, but inflation-adjusted. The AA folks who came up with this scheme were really dumb - they should have at least asked the traveler to pay the airport & security fees
I would never had the money for the pass, especially when it was $3 million. But if I had, I would use it all the time too but would never make multiple reservations like that.
Yes you would. What if you make a reservation and your flight is cancelled? It pays to have a backup reservation, especially when it doesn't cost you anything.
Zachary Henderson yes true I would totally exploit that. But the guy the vid was talking about took it too extreme. Like he had a 5-1 no show to show rate. That’s crazy. For every flight he actually flew he didn’t fly 5.
@@flashstar1234 yes, BUT he was well within his right to do that. It wasn't a good thing to do, but as long as it didn't violate the terms and conditions of the contract he signed when he purchased the ticket, oh well. Besides, and every other circumstance Airlines love it when passengers-particularly first-class passengers-schedule flights and don't show up.
Did they have videos back then? Pretty sure it would be a flight safety demonstration right? In that case, he would've probably been able to give the flight safety demonstration himself if he had to lol
@@vincelam1998 As far as I know, before individual displays, they had RGB projectors and CRT displays, so everyone had to watch the same show (usually mapped to audio channel 0 or 1) or different audio channels with different songs and such, but I think that some airlines even had audiobooks as part of those channels.
"Adjusted for inflation" Yep... Lets be fair however, even if AA terminated these contracts by abusing their power, getting 40 million dollars worth of flights for 250K is still a win.
@Josh Well, these scumbags did make flying a reality for most of the world. They obviously make it for money, but the "quality of life" does improve for most people over time.
I remember an old German movie about the same topic. It's from 1985 ("Grenzenloses Himmelblau"...best translated as "The endless blue sky"). The actress , Inge Meysel, was the last holdout to the expansion of an airport. Since they could not evict her, they made her an offer. For leaving her house to be demolished, she will receive a lifetime pass with no strings attached. Thinking that old lady would A) not use it very often and B) would probably die anyway. They were wrong on both counts. She started to really enjoy her life, flying everywhere, using the aircraft as her home. In the end they made a deal with her to stop her from flying every effing day and bought her a new home or something like that. It was really funny and shows that something like this should be thought through before offered. In the cases shown here, I think the airline made the mistake to not look at the full picture. Of course they flew more often. I would do that, too. Everybody would. The only thing that stops me from flying first class just for fun is the price tag. Remove that and I WILL use it. They should factor in all passes they issued. I bet there are a few that never used them to the fullest. Some might even have died. Those are the ones that MADE money for the airline. Others will cost money. This is a simple mixed calculation. All businesses use this. One item is cheap to lure customers in to buy the more expensive items. If you get a flat rate for your mobile data or wifi, most people will not use it, other will overly use it. When you were smart, you make a lot of money with that. If you are dumb, you have to pay the price. To cancel their passes without proving their fault first is a dlck move. Unfortunately they were not rich enough to sue the airline for all their money.
If it was me i would have not gone for it. Seeing how often airlines close down. I would have not taken that risk. So these people who bought them definitely deserve the rewards.
Not to mention, these were non-transferable so once you die, the pass expires. Statistically, there were bound to have a good handful of sales that resulted in the buyer being dead not longer after and hardly ever using it. Airline profited severely to hedge the risk of the other side.
Yup they were expecting their rich old customers would die of a heart attack quick. Haha. But yes careless booking & cancellation should have been penalised if done over 50 times a year. I guess some passengers went out all abuse. Glad the others are still reaping the rewards. But some of these people are private jet level people.
@@praddzzz Anyone with enough money to fly private and the time to deal with public airports would have jumped on this deal, and several did, including Michael Dell. I don't know if he was private jet rich in 1981, but not having to pay a few hundred thousand a year just to maintain one sure saved him a boatload of money over the years I bet. Planes are not like cars, they cost money just sitting on the ground parked. Owning a private jet only makes sense if you absolutely need the ability to leave for anywhere, anytime, no hassles or delays, and are paid well enough to justify it.. and even then you might still need to charter a backup if yours is down for maintenance or inspection when you need it. Inspections and maintenance cycles can take anywhere from hours to days to weeks depending on the type of inspection (100-flight-hours, annual), aircraft model, age, how often (or infrequently) it flies, whether any non-routine procedures are required, etc and so on... and car mechanics are generous saints compared to aircraft mechanics. And we haven't even mentioned insurance yet, that's a whole nother rabbithole. This all being said, many CEOs and powerful company executives own planes, but they're usually small passenger planes with propellers. You can beat a cross-country commercial flight in a fast turboprop with all the time you save flying general aviation instead of commercial.
@Wild Tangent You’re right. There is a saying among rich men. If its floats,if it flies & if it f**ks then you are better off renting it. Haha Also to mention the hangar charges & also landing charges depending on weight class of the aircraft. There are so many charges. Its scary. I had suggested someone a nice used jet once. But realized running it is no small feat.
It was much riskier than stocks, $400k diversified in stocks would give you a bigger benefit than this ticket, not only the initial investment would rise but as well the dividends would pay for your first class tickets.
before the subprime mess i had a unsecured line of credit for 80k and im just a home builder basicly it was achecking account with no money in it I wont even mention the mortgages that were around then....funny thing is the easy money is back if you no how to get it or want it shits going down again
I agree that 16 trips to London in less than a month is ridiculous. But AA didn't specify any limits. So they didn't do anything against the rules. I'm surprised these guys didn't follow through with their suits. They seemed to have money if they shelled out 250k.
Dave Depilot it’s not ridiculous considering those flights are happening whether he goes or not. Also he’s clearly just taking a majority of the flights for shits and giggles so it’s not like he would be paying for all those flights if the pass didn’t exist, he just simply wouldn’t do it
Here's what I don't get. If you have a time machine, you don't need American airlines, or money at all for that matter. You have a friggin time machine!
Thank you for this excellent report. Over a long period of time, I have read many iterations of the passes and the stories. NONE, even in major, usually reliable media, have presented the facts as fully as you have. I read a lot and it is unfortunate how frequently only 50% or 65% of the facts are told.
@@gillsabji Guessing that he means that they shouldve made a company with a few planes that would be flying around with the AAirpass holders. They would operate like a normal carrier except they could put up their hands and say "oh no weve gone bankrupt!" when the AAirpass users started to cost way too much.
only if they installed a comfortable seat with more leg room. I think in the near future they will remove all seats and pad the walls and push as many as is possible in like an Indian train.
This story holds an important lesson - don't remove the cost from a certain action. Had it only been the excessive flying it would have been easier to forgive, bit the blatant disrespect shown when booking a huge number of very expensive flights and then canceling them the last minute is just too much.
Wrong. I read an article on this. All Rothsteins bookings were made by his booking agent from American Airlines. She made the reservations, never said it was wrong - it wasn't, neither were the cancellations. American Airlines could have just come to an agreement with him. They never reached out and asked if he could not do the cancellations, they just cancelled his pass. Even his booking agent was shocked.
If it's not against the terms and conditions, they can go and be butthurt in the corner, if it is explicitly stated in the terms and conditions, then the termination is valid, and justified
The best part of this pandemic was the airlines’ suffering. Of course you have to feel bad for the workers who are just doing their jobs but it was nice to see these abusive airlines like American and United take huge loses. They extort the working man for every possible penny during the good times but now need the people again to keep afloat
Not truly on the same level, but when I just graduated uni, I bought an Air Canada North America Pass that let me fly Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays anywhere in North America. It was the best investment ever! It cost me approx 400 bucks per month? I don't remember but it was awesome. Went to NYC for the weekend, Seattle for seafood, Miami for Sun, Vancouver whistler for snowboarding, Detroit for the autoshow haha
To be fair, as the video mentions, they did waste a lot of the airline's resources by making 20k+ speculative bookings and cancelling them last minute. That's like leaving leftovers at an all you can eat. Wasn't good on AA to break their promise, but these people weren't in good faith either.
Back in 1981 when these passes were sold AA flew only within North America and nobody could have predicted that several years later they, along with UA, would replace PA and TW as the major US longhaul international carriers. I do wonder why at the time of the major route expansion, when AA changed from being a US Domestic/North American regional carrier to a worldwide international carrier, AA didn't attempt to restrict the validity of the passes to the North American network which existed at the time when they were sold instead of allowing unlimited worldwide F class travel which would never have been their intention or a reasonable expectation of the purchaser at the time of purchase. Aside from the fact that standard US domestic F class and longhaul international F class are not the same product, if you buy an unlimited pass from a domestic carrier you don't expect to be able to fly around the world with it! I have an airline background and am confused about the claim that AA had to pay these large amounts of taxes every time one of the pax was a noshow. This makes no sense and needs clarification. The amount of taxes would vary according to the actual journey being made; it cannot possibly be a fixed amount identical for every journey. It is also difficult to comprehend how taxes could be payable if the pax did not travel. There is something very much not right here. In addition, back when these passes were purchased, taxes were few and far between; it is in more recent times that 'taxes and other charges' have become commonplace. Why did AA accept to pay these Government imposed taxes on behalf of the pax rather than making them pay the taxes themselves? Concerning the behaviour of the pax in making the double/multiple bookings, this is again something that AA reservations staff should have been able to minimise. Full fare pax travelling on fully refundable tickets have always had a habit of this sort of behaviour (which is one of the main reasons why airlines overbook flights) and airline reservation departments are experienced in dealing with it. Airline reservation systems can detect such bookings. Airline staff can contact pax, have a polite word with them and establish which of the bookings they actually intend to use. If things got out of hand a polite letter from an appropriately senior person at AA asking them to refrain would have probably done the trick. This was pre-internet so there must have been an established procedure to follow for the pax to make their reservations and collect the physical ticket. The claims about AA having to upgrade pax from lower classes to fill the unoccupied seats and therefore loosing money is also highly questionable. Such upgrades would only have occurred if the lower class was overbooked and therefore, instead of losing money, AA was actually saving money by not having to deny boarding to the overbooked pax who could be upgraded instead. I get the impression that AA allowed these individuals to get away with murder for years, made no attempt to impose any reasonable constraints on them, such as refusing to issue multiple tickets for impossible multiple journeys or remonstrating with them for double bookings, frequent no-show etc, agreed to pay a fortune in taxes on their behalf (apparently) and then one day all of a sudden they came down on these individuals like a ton of bricks.
American Airlines: gotta dump these passholes before they start living on the jet full time. Reminds me of internet service where 1% of users consume 98% of the datacenter bandwidth torrenting absolutely everything available for download on pirate bay, transferring hundreds of terabytes per month ;) But hey, if I can't use it to the maximum potential then don't advertise it as unlimited.
make up the lost money by transporting small but important things that need to get to another place quickly witth your unlimited pass and charge less than the postal service
AA paid the Court Justice a whole lotta money to back them up in those lawsuits. How crooked. But those two guys really abused their free pass. The whole thing is really funny though! The thought of flying anywhere at anytime first class with all the perks, WOW !!!! Insane !! 🤓
@@rugbytimezone5480 do u people even watch the video. These guy book and actually show up ratio are 1-5. Meaning they only show up to one flight for every 5times that they booked. Altho it isnt against any policy, they are clearly being a dick. Stop defending. I dont side with anyone but clearly, neither the airline or the user are any better than the other
Mr Watto not all true, just a business making a stupid decision and now makin excuses cuz they didn’t expect them to fly as much and costing them millions.
Mr Watto watch the video my guy, they terminated they pass which they paid for cuz it was too costly for the airlines and not what they intended/expected. Idk but seems like bad business decisions. Not “If it’s too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true”
If you fly a lot, this would be actually a good deal (By a lot I mean at least once a week). Especially having in mind that you'd always fly first for the rest of your life. The only downside is that it would be only one airline, and might not be as connected as some other one. It's certainly a better deal than flying private.
truth be told. me and my gf flew with AA last year. It was okay, and we even got upgraded to "extra legroom" seats on our flight back home, but I didn't like how you had to PAY if you wanted to use wifi for a 3 hour flight. They had a thing where if you had t-mobile phone service, you get ONE HOUR free, but come on, really?? I have only flown AA, Alaskan, and Hawaiian in my lifetime, and Hawaiian is the best out of those three in my opinion. Too bad they only fly to and between certain places.
COME PLAY WITH ME !¡! I got into This Same Game with American Airlines, bought the companion ticket too! Mine are for the VIP Admirals' Club, I have unlimited access to the first class lounges at over a thousand airports. They keep trying to restrict them, but I haven't lost access yet. LAX has three clubs covering more than a hundred thousand feet.
my god. once you buy this your life is pretty much free. imagine flying for 12 hours a day and getting fed and sleep on the plane, going to a hotel and having free food and sleep again!
The stories that you uploaded and did research are so informative and fun to watch. Thank you for uploading and wish your channel get more sponsorship in the future.
The one MOST IMPORTANT NOTE to this entire video... that makes AA out to be the bad guy... is SECTION 12 OF THE AGREEMENT! It's almost as if that section was intentionally NOT shown so as so keep this whole video vague. If there were TRULY "NO CONDITIONS" then there would not have been THAT MANY sections in the AGREEMENT. I would not be surprised if section 12 doesn't SPECIFICALLY SAY that they aren't allowed to pick up RANDOM PEOPLE or BOOK HUNDRED OF OVERLAPPING ADVANCE FLIGHTS ONLY TO CANCEL THEM MINUTES AHEAD OF TIME. Just the fact that there are MANY others still holding onto THEIR PASS shows that those two PROBABLY were actually abusing their agreement... but we may NEVER KNOW NOW.
Imagine This Would've Happened in 21st Century after UA-cam came, *take a loan, travel the world, different cities everyday, different countries every week and Post it on instagram and make Travel Vlogs on UA-cam, Earn Even more money, Pay Back loans, become Famous and Rich* 😱
Fundamentally, there are two issues at hand with this scheme: 1. Sunk cost fallacy. Some people feel like they have to use the pass because they have it. Travel for London for brunch, for example, I won't do that even if the flight is free. It's going to cost me quite a good deal of time, if not money. And even traveling first class is not as comfortable as the comfort of your own home. I mean occasionally and rarely for an exotic experience and eat something upscale, sure. But as a frequent thing, no thanks. 2. Some people are selfish and brutally so. In that they don't care how much it cost the other party as long as they can get any value out of something. Booking a backup flight, for example, might only have an actual value of like a few bucks, if even that, to the traveler. But will cost the airline thousands. In a way, it's the same thing as stealing the catalytic converters off a car--the thief only gets a few bucks for the scrap value but the car owner now have to spends thousands to fix the car. Except it's legal in this case, but the fact remains that "value" is disproportionally destroyed as a result. This is essentially the sort of technically legal but morally wrong things that our parents should have taught us not to do. Not unlike, for example, MLMs. The legal status is hazy but we know they are scams. To be clear, I'm of the opinion that more than one party can be at fault. I do blame the passenger for abusing as opposed to just using the pass. But at the same time, the airline certainly displayed a lack of foresight to not realize this is going to happen.
"American Airline wasnt true to their words but SomeVPN is..." Yeah, right. One time my internet provider offered promo tariff with TRUE UNLIMITED TRAFFIC (it was time when traffic was counted and limited), many peoples did get it (i wasnt eligible as existing customer), so in about half of year fun things started - company started to cancel contracts with people who use "too much internet". BTW, same story was with MoviePass. All those companies see that deals like "ok, they will never really exceed average levels of usage, right?". Yet, if those folks really sold their companion passes to strangers its their mistake and even if they not those two really overdid.
7:30 it COULD retail for that much, but it wouldn’t. Because flights ALWAYS have left open seats in first class. The whole reason AA offered the deal for first class is because it is the least booked part on a plane
That's very close to the plot of a German TV-movie from the mid-'80s (Grenzenloses Himmelblau): A pensioner refuses to sell her home and is thus blocking the expansion of an airport. An airline that has a huge interest in the expansion happening is trying to bully her into selling, finally sweetening the deal by offering her a lifelong, unlimited pass. As the "smart" manager said: "She is an old woman who has never travelled much, she will only use the pass once or twice and that's it." The pensioner ends up enjoying flying and racks up thousands of airmiles. Then the airline panics and tries to back out of the deal. I wonder if headlines about the AA tickets inspired this story. This would mean that the writer foresaw the problems and the airline's U-turn before AA themselves ever realised there was a problem.
Sounds like insurance. Insurance companies sells you insurance with the promise that you will be covered when you need it. They take your money. When you need the insurance they back out of the deal and refuse to cover you but still keep your money.
shit you not, my mum works at a pretty famous tourist attraction, a family booked it out after hours for a private tour, my mum was chatting to the daughter asking what else they had done today since it was a holiday for them, she so casually told my mum that they went to Sweden for lunch to their dads fav restaurant then just flew back to Edinburgh back to the hotel and came to the tour. like it was nothing for them, like me ordering a take out is the equivalent of that situation for them.
The government doesn't "allow" the airline to break the contract. It's the airline which breaks the contract and then when they are sued can bury the plaintiff with legal fees that are unaffordable. That has been our legal system for a while. Justice for the rich.
Imagine selling those companion tickets to strangers for regular ticket prices. Doing this for 18 years as a main job - no taxes on this money - thats a nice income.
lol, just imagine, buying a air flight ticket and just travelling everywhere, you don't need any money in any country, want food? travel to a place. want sleep? travel to a place.
If somebody did research into the habits of these passes, it wouldn't surprise me if it turned out like it does for Interrail passes or even something as basic as unlimited commute via bus/tram/train inside city limits. The big thing is that you can show up with only carry on luggage bare minimum, get a ticket and a return ticket anywhere, and just plan what part of the jetlag you are sleeping on the train, and literally ignoring the need for actual travel planning. Normally you would have to book it in advance, to avoid paying last minute fees. Fees means you can't just sleep anywhere, you need to plan sleeping ahead of time. And by virtue the return flight, or the connect flight after that. If you just have to show up, the entire logistics of it goes out of the window, because hotels do not operate like that outside of various events where they are fully booked.
In Brazil I'd be able to sue the airline with a fresh out of university lawyer, win the case and probably get some money from the airline for my trouble and pay the lawyer from that money. US we always hear the "you can't sue a multibillion dollar company because it'll drag forever and you'll go bankrupt from lawyer fees". There's no justice in the land of the free.
Let’s be real...some this flying was ridiculous and served literally no purpose other than to utilize the pass. Flying to London 16 times in a month means literally spending DAYS in an airplane in a very short period of time, would be wildly unhealthy, and far from enjoyable. If someone offered me free flights to London for a month I’d go once or twice. If I was going there for business or pleasure I’d actually stay there for awhile rather than shuttling constantly. It’s like these dudes were torturing themselves just to make the deal even better. If they bought a free McDonalds pass they’d eat 40 McDoubles a day and die in short order.
I did not know they only cancelled Steve and Jacques' passes, I thought they revoked all of them. This really puts the lie to their excuses; the fact they've let some of those people keep the pass for almost FORTY YEARS now proves it really is just the volume of usage they cared about. "Unlimited" really does not mean Unlimited.
I'm glad that these two guys got their passes revoked. They went too long abusing the system, and making flights more expensive for everyone on the plane, incuding economy tickets. AA should have written their terms better but i'm glad they revoked the passes when they did, if not sooner. Steven Rothstein and Vroom are the bad guys here, not AA.
If you did something like this as a small business owner, you would be criminally charged with fraud and jailed. Since they are a mega corporation, they can flex on you without the fear of the criminal courtroom.
I had a friend who had this pass and he used it a lot. I went on many trips with him as he had the companion pass also. The thing not mentioned in the video is that these people also got advantage points at a rate of 1 1/2 points per mile as it was first class. My friend didn't live to be really old but in about 15 years he managed to acquire 25 million advantage points, I saw the embossed card with the numbers on it that they gave him. He had a game of trying to get the most miles he could from a flight when they had special offers for so many extra points for doing more segments on a flight or more flights per month, some months he got 35 to 40 k miles. So altho he didn't live all that long and could not leave the pass to his wife at least he left her 25 million advantage points. I also knew Jack Vroom and he got his pass back after a court fight.
Airline offers Unlimited Free Travel ---- Passenger traves unlimited... STOP STOP STOP!! You're violating the terms of use of the Passes.
what a douche
Hey you’re the dude from infinite flight 😂
They didnt count on some actually flying that much
They had no right to terminate their passes
And now another “AA” airlines just introduced an unlimited travel pass (but with more strict rules): Air Asia
What is the point of paying 1 million dollars for the unlimited pass but you're only allowed to fly 1 millions worth of flight cost? OF COURSE they're gonna travel MORE than what it's worth. Otherwise it wouldnt make sense to purchase the pass in the first place.
@@prumchhangsreng979 yeah agreed but its so dumb of the airline to not have seen that coming. Shouldve imposed some sort of a penalty on it as part of the terms and conditions. Huge corporate blunder this is
They could have just charged the Tax cost.
But no.
For a company that big to not thought of the consequences for the Unlimited pass, it's funny
@@smolpotatoe1744 Exactly! Perfect example of being so eager to make a quick buck that you don't think things through.
@@AimanZ535 People back then were very uneducated and they're probably still alive today. I mean look at the mess they've made out of this country throughout the years.
I think what AA was not willing to tolerate was booking but not flying, they were not only losing the seat, but also extra taxes. I think that was pretty much abusive. But it's their fault for not putting that on the terms and conditions.
AA offers unlimited travel
Passengers actually travel: Shocked pikachu face
Steven Rothstein had one. But they revoked it.
@@skylineXpert he abused it
Steven Rothstein 0:44 , 1:28 , 3:07
It was 1981
It would have been...
Shocked Monchhichi face
@@VonniXfiles How can you abuse something granted as "unlimited"? Unlimited is unlimited, it means theres no limit set for the amount of travels.
The modern day equivalent would be unlimited mobile data. You pay for it, but god forbid you actually use it... they either throttle back your speed or warn you about abusing the service
fr once i had unlimited and got throttled after using only 6 gb. now i pay for only 10gb and get to use it all without throttling
LOL, I pay 30$ / month and have unlimited data
Eemuumi no
Aren't most of those "unlimited" data plans just a marketing gimmick for "a lot of data" considering how they also have "Beyond unlimited" packages as well?
I regularly use about 50 GB/month on my normal mobile plan (19€/month) and nobody has complained or throttled me yet.
this is gonna be on the airlines, 100%. They have the army of lawyers and skyscraper building full of employees, why didn't they gather a group together to brainstorm up a solid contract with foresight on possibilities of abuse of the airpass? No, they weren't really thinking at all, they just needed the money.
Yeah. And as a buyer you have to factor in that AA was in dire need of money at the time the first tickets got sold: the moment AA goes bust your ticket is worthless. It was a high risk high reward investment that paid of, in return AA got cheap puplicity, yes millions are cheap for such a big company. Ofc that good puplicity got burned by their lawyers later on.
Sometimes they treat customers like naive people. You really thought someone who buys a 400 000$. Will travel just 10 times a year 😂 like they are naive. They gonna throw 300 000$ away
Keep in mind its 400 000$ of the 70s and 80s. Which would be a 800 000$ pass for 2020 with inflation
Using it isn’t abuse.
Gregory Smith I agree. Using it isn’t abusing it and I don’t even care that he flew with a bunch of strangers, he should be able to fly with who ever he wants. But I draw the line at booking and canceling more flights than he’s even taking. That seems like a dick move, especially when he knows how much he’s making out on that ticket. Though it is AAs fault, they should have had a contract ahead of time, they probably just wanted that “no conditions” selling feature.
Agreed, all us normals can see loopholes from a mile away, while this is the result of your highly paid idiots.
Now imagime this in current time:
You buy this unlimited pass by getting a massive loan but you change your profession to a travel vlogger. You can churn out unlimited content, people will love it, your revenue sky rockets, you pay off the debt, and now you are 100x richer than you once were.
HONESTLY! If I had this pass I would probably get a high paying job out west or east and on the weekend travel back home to Texas where cost of living is low :)
The ultimate UA-cam channel...unlimited content
You could still create a lot of content for $370,000 flying economy. I’d say by the time you spend $370k on flights if you hadn’t started making a decent living from UA-cam it will never happen.
nothing in that contract says you can not profit from travels!!!
Bdbdbf Dvdjdjd you don’t go to a bank for a loan like that. You go to a venture capitalist but you better have a good plan
If i had this, i wouldn't stay in my apartment. I'd just fly the rest of my life
WoistdasNiveau and be fed good food everyday by the airlines
that sounds tiring tho
@@summerfinn2300 at least you get to eat food and enjoy the air conditioner
No rent
@@summerfinn2300 It's first class lol
Just imagine being broke and having this pass. You could live and shower at any airport and then travel anywhere in the world just to eat first class dining food on the plane.
Bruce Frausto That would be an interesting experiment. See how long someone could last with no money and just this pass and a carryon bag
I would charge people to come along with me.
@@jihadityrone2197 and you get terminated, that's how they do it.
Real life hacks
I have a friend who worked as a UA first class flight attendant when he was young. The pay was shit and he had to live with a bunch of roommates to get by, but he did have the benefit of flying for free. So on his off days, he would looking for the longest flight that had a same day return flight and just fly, eating and drinking first class items because otherwise he couldn't afford to buy his own food.
I feel like the people with these lifetime passes all own private jets by now
Kai H what?
Kai H I said that people who bought life passes probably bought jets by now bc they are so rich... I think you misunderstood my comment
Your first
Smart, Actually, you said you “feel like” it, which is probably what drew this response.
scarbo22 makes sense, I guess I could have structured it better
The guy who helped AIDS victims is actually a legend
Fr
I mean ... they should take better care of their bodies
Maxim Lisichkin many who have it couldn’t have prevented it (contraception isn’t an option for many in some poor countries)
Tom O'Brien if I had the money I would buy it too
@@maximlisichkin1183 What an awful attitude. I bet if you got sick like that you wouldn't be spouting the same hateful rhetoric.
"He flew to Ontario just for a sandwich"
That's my kinda life
*flies in for those fucking maple donuts at tim hortons
I would stop by for curling and poutine too!
A sandwich......not poutine?
😂😂😂😂
My Dad's friend bought into this (along with the companion voucher). He flew to Heathrow to pick Dad up and took him back to Houston(?). Said it was a bizarre experience; having your friend fly for 24+ hours just to pick you up and then get treated like royalty on the flight. Apparently even back then (sometime around the late 90's or early 00's) they were trying to buy the tickets back from him for $300k or $400k (I forget exactly how much, but roughly what he bought it for 10/15 years prior). He refused! 😃
I would have sold it back to them, but inflation-adjusted.
The AA folks who came up with this scheme were really dumb - they should have at least asked the traveler to pay the airport & security fees
Does he still have it? How often does he use it?
@@method341 I believe he died a while back but he was flying weekly with it. They hated him for it.
@@shareable rip, he's flying first class in the heavens now
I would never had the money for the pass, especially when it was $3 million. But if I had, I would use it all the time too but would never make multiple reservations like that.
Yes you would. What if you make a reservation and your flight is cancelled? It pays to have a backup reservation, especially when it doesn't cost you anything.
Zachary Henderson yes true I would totally exploit that. But the guy the vid was talking about took it too extreme. Like he had a 5-1 no show to show rate. That’s crazy. For every flight he actually flew he didn’t fly 5.
@@flashstar1234 Well, he had years to get used to living first class.
What's funny is that AA sold such stupid contracts.
@@flashstar1234 yes, BUT he was well within his right to do that. It wasn't a good thing to do, but as long as it didn't violate the terms and conditions of the contract he signed when he purchased the ticket, oh well.
Besides, and every other circumstance Airlines love it when passengers-particularly first-class passengers-schedule flights and don't show up.
@@flashstar1234 and booked everything thru a booking agent. if it was against any rules the agent would have let him know.
I don’t think there’s a single person on here that’s shocked an airline didn’t keep its promise.
Sounds like AA is pissed because they got beat at their own fraudulent game.
Respect to Vroom for helping AIDS victims see their families. they did nothing wrong here.
3:17 That also basically means he would've seen flight safety videos 10k times
Did they have videos back then? Pretty sure it would be a flight safety demonstration right? In that case, he would've probably been able to give the flight safety demonstration himself if he had to lol
@@vincelam1998
As far as I know, before individual displays, they had RGB projectors and CRT displays, so everyone had to watch the same show (usually mapped to audio channel 0 or 1) or different audio channels with different songs and such, but I think that some airlines even had audiobooks as part of those channels.
@@kbhasi Oh wow that's interesting. TIL! Thanks!
Liam really?
In First class. Put on your headphones and play your Walkman.
American Airlines: NOOOOOO U CANT JUST FLY EVERY WEEKEND AND WASTE OUR MONEY
Jackes Vroom: Haha the airplane go Vroom Vroom
Lol
"Adjusted for inflation"
Yep...
Lets be fair however, even if AA terminated these contracts by abusing their power, getting 40 million dollars worth of flights for 250K is still a win.
@Josh Well, these scumbags did make flying a reality for most of the world. They obviously make it for money, but the "quality of life" does improve for most people over time.
I remember an old German movie about the same topic. It's from 1985 ("Grenzenloses Himmelblau"...best translated as "The endless blue sky"). The actress , Inge Meysel, was the last holdout to the expansion of an airport. Since they could not evict her, they made her an offer. For leaving her house to be demolished, she will receive a lifetime pass with no strings attached. Thinking that old lady would A) not use it very often and B) would probably die anyway. They were wrong on both counts. She started to really enjoy her life, flying everywhere, using the aircraft as her home. In the end they made a deal with her to stop her from flying every effing day and bought her a new home or something like that. It was really funny and shows that something like this should be thought through before offered.
In the cases shown here, I think the airline made the mistake to not look at the full picture. Of course they flew more often. I would do that, too. Everybody would. The only thing that stops me from flying first class just for fun is the price tag. Remove that and I WILL use it. They should factor in all passes they issued. I bet there are a few that never used them to the fullest. Some might even have died. Those are the ones that MADE money for the airline. Others will cost money. This is a simple mixed calculation. All businesses use this. One item is cheap to lure customers in to buy the more expensive items. If you get a flat rate for your mobile data or wifi, most people will not use it, other will overly use it. When you were smart, you make a lot of money with that. If you are dumb, you have to pay the price. To cancel their passes without proving their fault first is a dlck move. Unfortunately they were not rich enough to sue the airline for all their money.
AA: Makes something
Passenger:Makes the most of it
AA: You can’t do that
That's capitalism for you. It's a shame the government didn't step in to make the company uphold their end of the deal.
They're dumb to add that tbh
Summary: American Airlines made a stupid mistake and threw a hissy fit
If Sam Chui owned one of these.. oh God..
Sam already makes use of this, just without the pass^^
more videos then.
Don't bring sam chui here. He's just a corrupt dishonest communist reviewer who comes from a country that created the Corona virus.
@@kav2000 wow
@@kav2000 dont bring K here. He's just a corrup dishonest republican viewer who comes from a country that created the war in afghanistan.
AA: “I am altering the deal, pray that I do not alter it any further!"
If it was me i would have not gone for it. Seeing how often airlines close down. I would have not taken that risk.
So these people who bought them definitely deserve the rewards.
Not to mention, these were non-transferable so once you die, the pass expires. Statistically, there were bound to have a good handful of sales that resulted in the buyer being dead not longer after and hardly ever using it. Airline profited severely to hedge the risk of the other side.
Yup they were expecting their rich old customers would die of a heart attack quick. Haha. But yes careless booking & cancellation should have been penalised if done over 50 times a year. I guess some passengers went out all abuse. Glad the others are still reaping the rewards. But some of these people are private jet level people.
@@praddzzz Anyone with enough money to fly private and the time to deal with public airports would have jumped on this deal, and several did, including Michael Dell. I don't know if he was private jet rich in 1981, but not having to pay a few hundred thousand a year just to maintain one sure saved him a boatload of money over the years I bet. Planes are not like cars, they cost money just sitting on the ground parked. Owning a private jet only makes sense if you absolutely need the ability to leave for anywhere, anytime, no hassles or delays, and are paid well enough to justify it.. and even then you might still need to charter a backup if yours is down for maintenance or inspection when you need it. Inspections and maintenance cycles can take anywhere from hours to days to weeks depending on the type of inspection (100-flight-hours, annual), aircraft model, age, how often (or infrequently) it flies, whether any non-routine procedures are required, etc and so on... and car mechanics are generous saints compared to aircraft mechanics. And we haven't even mentioned insurance yet, that's a whole nother rabbithole. This all being said, many CEOs and powerful company executives own planes, but they're usually small passenger planes with propellers. You can beat a cross-country commercial flight in a fast turboprop with all the time you save flying general aviation instead of commercial.
@Wild Tangent You’re right. There is a saying among rich men. If its floats,if it flies & if it f**ks then you are better off renting it. Haha
Also to mention the hangar charges & also landing charges depending on weight class of the aircraft. There are so many charges. Its scary. I had suggested someone a nice used jet once. But realized running it is no small feat.
It was much riskier than stocks, $400k diversified in stocks would give you a bigger benefit than this ticket, not only the initial investment would rise but as well the dividends would pay for your first class tickets.
How did that loan work tho.
"I need a loan of 400k for booking an airline ticket"
2nd mortgage
he could have took out a loan for like 100k, as he had some money before, If he even considered this thing
before the subprime mess i had a unsecured line of credit for 80k and im just a home builder basicly it was achecking account with no money in it I wont even mention the mortgages that were around then....funny thing is the easy money is back if you no how to get it or want it shits going down again
just a joke he isn't asking yall
Having something valuable to secure the loan against helps, also this was back in the day banks were giving out loans to anyone.
They should have put a maximum miles per year, something very, very high, but not “16 trips to London in 25 days” high.
I agree that 16 trips to London in less than a month is ridiculous. But AA didn't specify any limits. So they didn't do anything against the rules.
I'm surprised these guys didn't follow through with their suits. They seemed to have money if they shelled out 250k.
@@DaveDepilot-KFRG i think if you have a lot of money u dont want to waste your time. rather enjoy the things u can do with it.
Dave Depilot it’s not ridiculous considering those flights are happening whether he goes or not. Also he’s clearly just taking a majority of the flights for shits and giggles so it’s not like he would be paying for all those flights if the pass didn’t exist, he just simply wouldn’t do it
If I ever get a time machine, I'm going to 1981 first thing.
ItsLemon
Need to wear a mullet.😂
And buy stocks rather AA FC
Here's what I don't get. If you have a time machine, you don't need American airlines, or money at all for that matter. You have a friggin time machine!
Sholom Shwarzberg having free first class means free luxury food + service + quarters
Thank you for this excellent report. Over a long period of time, I have read many iterations of the passes and the stories. NONE, even in major, usually reliable media, have presented the facts as fully as you have. I read a lot and it is unfortunate how frequently only 50% or 65% of the facts are told.
That was still a huge bet since you could never if the company would go bankrupt.
They should've given out the passes via a subsidiary companie, wich they could run into bancrupcy any time :D
Could you elaborate?
@@gillsabji Guessing that he means that they shouldve made a company with a few planes that would be flying around with the AAirpass holders. They would operate like a normal carrier except they could put up their hands and say "oh no weve gone bankrupt!" when the AAirpass users started to cost way too much.
@@C4Cole05 Even that or what they actually did means terrible PR and subsequent losses.
irondasgr
When it comes to PR they messed it up anyway.. as some personal (eg Rothschild) become prominent because of that
@@irondasgr What terrible PR? People would forget it immediately next time they need a flight and would remark "Well glad I didn't buy those passes"
The genius who thought of this brilliant idea is probably CEO now.
It would be nice if they sold unlimited economy pass
only if they installed a comfortable seat with more leg room. I think in the near future they will remove all seats and pad the walls and push as many as is possible in like an Indian train.
Rick Timmons maybe they will let passengers sit on top of the aircraft as well? taking notes from india
Passengers: So we can fly on any flight with these passes
American Airlines: Well yes, but actually no
This story holds an important lesson - don't remove the cost from a certain action. Had it only been the excessive flying it would have been easier to forgive, bit the blatant disrespect shown when booking a huge number of very expensive flights and then canceling them the last minute is just too much.
Wrong. I read an article on this. All Rothsteins bookings were made by his booking agent from American Airlines. She made the reservations, never said it was wrong - it wasn't, neither were the cancellations. American Airlines could have just come to an agreement with him. They never reached out and asked if he could not do the cancellations, they just cancelled his pass. Even his booking agent was shocked.
If it's not against the terms and conditions, they can go and be butthurt in the corner, if it is explicitly stated in the terms and conditions, then the termination is valid, and justified
He did all of that so that lower class passengers could get free first class seats )
The best part of this pandemic was the airlines’ suffering. Of course you have to feel bad for the workers who are just doing their jobs but it was nice to see these abusive airlines like American and United take huge loses. They extort the working man for every possible penny during the good times but now need the people again to keep afloat
Except they didn't really, because of the massive taxpayer funds they got.
I love this story.
What a dream to have free high tier travel with service.
Passholder: _"Unlimited."_
AA: _"You keep using that word. We do not think it means what you think it means."_
Not truly on the same level, but when I just graduated uni, I bought an Air Canada North America Pass that let me fly Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Saturdays anywhere in North America. It was the best investment ever! It cost me approx 400 bucks per month? I don't remember but it was awesome. Went to NYC for the weekend, Seattle for seafood, Miami for Sun, Vancouver whistler for snowboarding, Detroit for the autoshow haha
Not bad at all
@@NihilSineDeo09 Yeah it was awesome. This was back in 2005, I'm an old fart now.
I’d literally live in the first class lounges and cabins for the rest of my life and do nothing else.
To be fair, as the video mentions, they did waste a lot of the airline's resources by making 20k+ speculative bookings and cancelling them last minute. That's like leaving leftovers at an all you can eat.
Wasn't good on AA to break their promise, but these people weren't in good faith either.
Back in 1981 when these passes were sold AA flew only within North America and nobody could have predicted that several years later they, along with UA, would replace PA and TW as the major US longhaul international carriers. I do wonder why at the time of the major route expansion, when AA changed from being a US Domestic/North American regional carrier to a worldwide international carrier, AA didn't attempt to restrict the validity of the passes to the North American network which existed at the time when they were sold instead of allowing unlimited worldwide F class travel which would never have been their intention or a reasonable expectation of the purchaser at the time of purchase. Aside from the fact that standard US domestic F class and longhaul international F class are not the same product, if you buy an unlimited pass from a domestic carrier you don't expect to be able to fly around the world with it!
I have an airline background and am confused about the claim that AA had to pay these large amounts of taxes every time one of the pax was a noshow. This makes no sense and needs clarification. The amount of taxes would vary according to the actual journey being made; it cannot possibly be a fixed amount identical for every journey. It is also difficult to comprehend how taxes could be payable if the pax did not travel. There is something very much not right here. In addition, back when these passes were purchased, taxes were few and far between; it is in more recent times that 'taxes and other charges' have become commonplace. Why did AA accept to pay these Government imposed taxes on behalf of the pax rather than making them pay the taxes themselves?
Concerning the behaviour of the pax in making the double/multiple bookings, this is again something that AA reservations staff should have been able to minimise. Full fare pax travelling on fully refundable tickets have always had a habit of this sort of behaviour (which is one of the main reasons why airlines overbook flights) and airline reservation departments are experienced in dealing with it. Airline reservation systems can detect such bookings. Airline staff can contact pax, have a polite word with them and establish which of the bookings they actually intend to use. If things got out of hand a polite letter from an appropriately senior person at AA asking them to refrain would have probably done the trick. This was pre-internet so there must have been an established procedure to follow for the pax to make their reservations and collect the physical ticket.
The claims about AA having to upgrade pax from lower classes to fill the unoccupied seats and therefore loosing money is also highly questionable. Such upgrades would only have occurred if the lower class was overbooked and therefore, instead of losing money, AA was actually saving money by not having to deny boarding to the overbooked pax who could be upgraded instead.
I get the impression that AA allowed these individuals to get away with murder for years, made no attempt to impose any reasonable constraints on them, such as refusing to issue multiple tickets for impossible multiple journeys or remonstrating with them for double bookings, frequent no-show etc, agreed to pay a fortune in taxes on their behalf (apparently) and then one day all of a sudden they came down on these individuals like a ton of bricks.
American Airlines: gotta dump these passholes before they start living on the jet full time.
Reminds me of internet service where 1% of users consume 98% of the datacenter bandwidth torrenting absolutely everything available for download on pirate bay, transferring hundreds of terabytes per month ;)
But hey, if I can't use it to the maximum potential then don't advertise it as unlimited.
Image if selling tickets you have no intention of honouring, by overbooking a flight, was considered 'fraudulent behaviour'
1:20 no, no, no. Business class was not like this at all in the 1990s, and yes the "First Class" pass meant business class on international routes
No it was International First Class on international routes.
they tried to con their customers lol they're just upset it didn't go their way
make up the lost money by transporting small but important things that need to get to another place quickly witth your unlimited pass and charge less than the postal service
US:
The country where if you are wealthy enough you can win all court cases.
fr
*laughs in India*
It's more who can wait and waste money longer. Most people don't want to wait 20 years and spend millions.
I have seen this video somewhere else too
Me too, and I'm still watching this one lol
AA paid the Court Justice a whole lotta money to back them up in those lawsuits.
How crooked. But those two guys really abused their free pass.
The whole thing is really funny though! The thought of flying anywhere at anytime first class with all the perks, WOW !!!! Insane !! 🤓
They didnt abuse it though, they flew everywhere because they could, so they did
@@rugbytimezone5480 do u people even watch the video. These guy book and actually show up ratio are 1-5. Meaning they only show up to one flight for every 5times that they booked. Altho it isnt against any policy, they are clearly being a dick. Stop defending. I dont side with anyone but clearly, neither the airline or the user are any better than the other
prum chhangsreng Nah mate, they both are bad but the airline has definitely did worse
@@Lyenati I agree
abuse means they violated the terms and conditions.
There were none
AA would have to pay me to fly with them. Hell no.
The fact that they still honor the other 50+ passes even though they're pure losses to the airline is pretty cool.
No its basic decensy witch they threw away with most of the Bass Holger who just used it
The 50 people who still have them are in the same class as Mark Cuban he has his own jet sooo
That’s how contracts work
Getting offered something that's too good to be true, can sometimes be a good thing!
Mr Watto not all true, just a business making a stupid decision and now makin excuses cuz they didn’t expect them to fly as much and costing them millions.
Chancellor Asher not ALL true, but it happens. Take my comment with a pinch 🤏 of salt 🧂
Mr Watto watch the video my guy, they terminated they pass which they paid for cuz it was too costly for the airlines and not what they intended/expected. Idk but seems like bad business decisions. Not “If it’s too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true”
They were counting on the sickness and boredom that flight causes to all normal people... but we are not all normal people
The Joyce guy mentioned is always on my flights to London. Such a great guy.
If you fly a lot, this would be actually a good deal (By a lot I mean at least once a week). Especially having in mind that you'd always fly first for the rest of your life. The only downside is that it would be only one airline, and might not be as connected as some other one. It's certainly a better deal than flying private.
Reminder: Never fly American Airlines. Ever. For any reason.
avfusion American Companies. Deserving
truth be told. me and my gf flew with AA last year. It was okay, and we even got upgraded to "extra legroom" seats on our flight back home, but I didn't like how you had to PAY if you wanted to use wifi for a 3 hour flight. They had a thing where if you had t-mobile phone service, you get ONE HOUR free, but come on, really?? I have only flown AA, Alaskan, and Hawaiian in my lifetime, and Hawaiian is the best out of those three in my opinion. Too bad they only fly to and between certain places.
get a lawyer to explain your ticket rights before you board. you can demand a copy of last plane maintenance's before you fly.
Rick Timmons That’s it, next time I fly I will do that and read the maintenance logs while I’m in the air.
10:55 Thats the smoothest transition to an advert i've ever since... haha
COME PLAY WITH ME !¡!
I got into This Same Game with American Airlines, bought the companion ticket too!
Mine are for the VIP Admirals' Club, I have unlimited access to the first class lounges at over a thousand airports.
They keep trying to restrict them, but I haven't lost access yet.
LAX has three clubs covering more than a hundred thousand feet.
Oh yeah? Need/want a private chef?
Wow. I didn’t even know this existed.
Because it shouldn't have !
Imagine having the choice of flying to Italy, Japan, France, etc just for a sandwich
Also you earned AA miles on all these flights, which you could transfer to hotel partners and rent a car companies.
my god. once you buy this your life is pretty much free. imagine flying for 12 hours a day and getting fed and sleep on the plane, going to a hotel and having free food and sleep again!
@@PapaJenkinz Fly every night and spend the days wherever you want, no need to get a hotel when you sleep on the plane.
@@MrNateSPF unless you miss the feeling of a nice comfy bed
elsamso but think about it. The passes were for first class which pretty much meant they got a comfy bed every flight.
I love this story!
The people who took the offer absolutely amazing
The stories that you uploaded and did research are so informative and fun to watch. Thank you for uploading and wish your channel get more sponsorship in the future.
The one MOST IMPORTANT NOTE to this entire video... that makes AA out to be the bad guy... is SECTION 12 OF THE AGREEMENT! It's almost as if that section was intentionally NOT shown so as so keep this whole video vague. If there were TRULY "NO CONDITIONS" then there would not have been THAT MANY sections in the AGREEMENT. I would not be surprised if section 12 doesn't SPECIFICALLY SAY that they aren't allowed to pick up RANDOM PEOPLE or BOOK HUNDRED OF OVERLAPPING ADVANCE FLIGHTS ONLY TO CANCEL THEM MINUTES AHEAD OF TIME. Just the fact that there are MANY others still holding onto THEIR PASS shows that those two PROBABLY were actually abusing their agreement... but we may NEVER KNOW NOW.
Can't believe I only just stumbled across your channel. Thank you for creating such great content!
Beautifully written. Very tight. Perfect pacing. I will look for more videos because of how well this was done.
Imagine This Would've Happened in 21st Century after UA-cam came, *take a loan, travel the world, different cities everyday, different countries every week and Post it on instagram and make Travel Vlogs on UA-cam, Earn Even more money, Pay Back loans, become Famous and Rich* 😱
Fundamentally, there are two issues at hand with this scheme:
1. Sunk cost fallacy. Some people feel like they have to use the pass because they have it. Travel for London for brunch, for example, I won't do that even if the flight is free. It's going to cost me quite a good deal of time, if not money. And even traveling first class is not as comfortable as the comfort of your own home. I mean occasionally and rarely for an exotic experience and eat something upscale, sure. But as a frequent thing, no thanks.
2. Some people are selfish and brutally so. In that they don't care how much it cost the other party as long as they can get any value out of something. Booking a backup flight, for example, might only have an actual value of like a few bucks, if even that, to the traveler. But will cost the airline thousands. In a way, it's the same thing as stealing the catalytic converters off a car--the thief only gets a few bucks for the scrap value but the car owner now have to spends thousands to fix the car. Except it's legal in this case, but the fact remains that "value" is disproportionally destroyed as a result. This is essentially the sort of technically legal but morally wrong things that our parents should have taught us not to do. Not unlike, for example, MLMs. The legal status is hazy but we know they are scams.
To be clear, I'm of the opinion that more than one party can be at fault. I do blame the passenger for abusing as opposed to just using the pass. But at the same time, the airline certainly displayed a lack of foresight to not realize this is going to happen.
Agree, very well said. Both parties are at fault.
If the passengers flew almost every flight they booked, then I would probably be on their side.
"American Airline wasnt true to their words but SomeVPN is..."
Yeah, right. One time my internet provider offered promo tariff with TRUE UNLIMITED TRAFFIC (it was time when traffic was counted and limited), many peoples did get it (i wasnt eligible as existing customer), so in about half of year fun things started - company started to cancel contracts with people who use "too much internet".
BTW, same story was with MoviePass. All those companies see that deals like "ok, they will never really exceed average levels of usage, right?".
Yet, if those folks really sold their companion passes to strangers its their mistake and even if they not those two really overdid.
7:30 it COULD retail for that much, but it wouldn’t. Because flights ALWAYS have left open seats in first class. The whole reason AA offered the deal for first class is because it is the least booked part on a plane
wtf that pass seemed like the ultimate goal in life wow
That's very close to the plot of a German TV-movie from the mid-'80s (Grenzenloses Himmelblau):
A pensioner refuses to sell her home and is thus blocking the expansion of an airport. An airline that has a huge interest in the expansion happening is trying to bully her into selling, finally sweetening the deal by offering her a lifelong, unlimited pass. As the "smart" manager said: "She is an old woman who has never travelled much, she will only use the pass once or twice and that's it." The pensioner ends up enjoying flying and racks up thousands of airmiles. Then the airline panics and tries to back out of the deal.
I wonder if headlines about the AA tickets inspired this story. This would mean that the writer foresaw the problems and the airline's U-turn before AA themselves ever realised there was a problem.
At first I thought the pass was to get first class for the price of economy.
That's actually a pretty good business idea for them.
Sounds like insurance. Insurance companies sells you insurance with the promise that you will be covered when you need it. They take your money. When you need the insurance they back out of the deal and refuse to cover you but still keep your money.
I would fly out to California just to get In-and-out and be literally be in and out. lol
shit you not, my mum works at a pretty famous tourist attraction, a family booked it out after hours for a private tour, my mum was chatting to the daughter asking what else they had done today since it was a holiday for them, she so casually told my mum that they went to Sweden for lunch to their dads fav restaurant then just flew back to Edinburgh back to the hotel and came to the tour. like it was nothing for them, like me ordering a take out is the equivalent of that situation for them.
I can see AA trying to put the pass holders on a special flight on a Boeing 737 Max...
Why does the government allow a business to break contracts when they make bad decisions. When a person breaks a contract, there a penalties to pay.
The government doesn't "allow" the airline to break the contract. It's the airline which breaks the contract and then when they are sued can bury the plaintiff with legal fees that are unaffordable. That has been our legal system for a while. Justice for the rich.
Something like “no conditions apply” would not exist nowadays
IT DOES APPLY TODAY... UNLIMITED MEANS ALL CONDITIONS ARE WAIVED!
Imagine selling those companion tickets to strangers for regular ticket prices.
Doing this for 18 years as a main job - no taxes on this money - thats a nice income.
lol, just imagine, buying a air flight ticket and just travelling everywhere, you don't need any money in any country, want food? travel to a place. want sleep? travel to a place.
If somebody did research into the habits of these passes, it wouldn't surprise me if it turned out like it does for Interrail passes or even something as basic as unlimited commute via bus/tram/train inside city limits.
The big thing is that you can show up with only carry on luggage bare minimum, get a ticket and a return ticket anywhere, and just plan what part of the jetlag you are sleeping on the train, and literally ignoring the need for actual travel planning.
Normally you would have to book it in advance, to avoid paying last minute fees. Fees means you can't just sleep anywhere, you need to plan sleeping ahead of time. And by virtue the return flight, or the connect flight after that.
If you just have to show up, the entire logistics of it goes out of the window, because hotels do not operate like that outside of various events where they are fully booked.
I could have got a loan to get this ticket and live on their fleet of airplane and eat their food.
lol
Also the free food and accommodations at the different 1st class lounge.
In Brazil I'd be able to sue the airline with a fresh out of university lawyer, win the case and probably get some money from the airline for my trouble and pay the lawyer from that money. US we always hear the "you can't sue a multibillion dollar company because it'll drag forever and you'll go bankrupt from lawyer fees". There's no justice in the land of the free.
This honestly sounds like an amazing deal if you have the money. Surprised a lot of bands didn't buy these.
This is why you never fly American Airlines. They might scam you!
5:31 distracted by air crew from our land. lol
Let’s be real...some this flying was ridiculous and served literally no purpose other than to utilize the pass. Flying to London 16 times in a month means literally spending DAYS in an airplane in a very short period of time, would be wildly unhealthy, and far from enjoyable. If someone offered me free flights to London for a month I’d go once or twice. If I was going there for business or pleasure I’d actually stay there for awhile rather than shuttling constantly. It’s like these dudes were torturing themselves just to make the deal even better. If they bought a free McDonalds pass they’d eat 40 McDoubles a day and die in short order.
fascinating story and well-researched video, like it, always is on this channel. Thumbs up.
I did not know they only cancelled Steve and Jacques' passes, I thought they revoked all of them. This really puts the lie to their excuses; the fact they've let some of those people keep the pass for almost FORTY YEARS now proves it really is just the volume of usage they cared about. "Unlimited" really does not mean Unlimited.
Well, AA could just talk and request them nicely to not book flights they don’t intend to travel. Most people understands when asked nicely.
yah i dont get this part. they could just give em added rules.
They never had any intention of letting them keep their passes to begin with. That's why it was an immediate cutoff.
I'm glad that these two guys got their passes revoked. They went too long abusing the system, and making flights more expensive for everyone on the plane, incuding economy tickets. AA should have written their terms better but i'm glad they revoked the passes when they did, if not sooner.
Steven Rothstein and Vroom are the bad guys here, not AA.
You could literally not own a home and fly overnight to different destinations everyday lol
If you did something like this as a small business owner, you would be criminally charged with fraud and jailed. Since they are a mega corporation, they can flex on you without the fear of the criminal courtroom.
I would spend my whole life traveling in planes.
Your description from 1:34 to 1:54 is my goal. Wish me luck guys.
AA really expects multi-millionaires (who are really good at managing their money) to spend 250k on this pass and then only use it once in a while
I had a friend who had this pass and he used it a lot. I went on many trips with him as he had the companion pass also. The thing not mentioned in the video is that these people also got advantage points at a rate of 1 1/2 points per mile as it was first class. My friend didn't live to be really old but in about 15 years he managed to acquire 25 million advantage points, I saw the embossed card with the numbers on it that they gave him. He had a game of trying to get the most miles he could from a flight when they had special offers for so many extra points for doing more segments on a flight or more flights per month, some months he got 35 to 40 k miles. So altho he didn't live all that long and could not leave the pass to his wife at least he left her 25 million advantage points. I also knew Jack Vroom and he got his pass back after a court fight.