Delta has sure had an interesting year. Early last year they announced big changes for Skymiles 2015, where instead of earning miles based on the actual miles flown, they instead were going to start crediting miles based on the cost of the ticket purchased (with a multiplier that depends on your elite status)
(SEE ALSO: Huge changes to the Delta Skymiles program – earning by price)
(SEE ALSO: Delta Skymiles changes – followup / analysis)
One of the other big changes was changing the Delta award chart with the introduction of a 5-tier award redemption system. It was never quite clear what the availability was going to be like at each of these tiers, so it was hard to know if that was good, bad or neutral. Most folks were just hoping that they would fix this
Navigating the Delta award chart with the new award calendar
Later in the year, Delta finally fixed its award calendar, allowing you to finally USE the Delta award chart. For the recent future, even if you found a good deal on the Delta award chart, it was hard to actually GET any tickets, because the award searching on the website was so bad. Nothing ever seemed to price, and even if you could get things to price, it was usually not at the “Saver” level.
But in October, they released an enhancement to the award calendar search (SEE: Delta Award Travel: 5 tricks to Delta’s improved award search calendar)
A sample booking from CVG-SLC nonstop
I didn’t get a chance to actually use it to book an award, but reports were positive, and people were also looking forward to the addition of being able to book a one-way flight using the Delta award chart.
Delta award chart 2015 released
Then, in November, they released the complete Delta award chart 2015 – having previously released only the award chart for originating in North America.
(SEE ALSO: Complete list of 2015 Delta award chart changes)
(SEE ALSO: 2015 Delta award changes – followup and analysis)
But now, the Delta award chart is GONE!
As reported by a couple of folks (View from the Wing part 1 and part 2, One Mile at a Time, Mommy Points, Miles to Memories and many others), the Delta award chart has now been removed from Delta’s website.
Worst part is that it seems to be intentional! @DeltaAssist shares on Twitter
@newyorkmetz12 Sorry, the chart is no longer available. The award levels are illustrated based on your search parameters. *AA
— Delta Assist (@DeltaAssist) February 7, 2015
(SEE ALSO: List of Airline and Hotel Twitter contacts)
Talk about a major bummer!!! There are some that are saying that this is the first step for Delta in moving to a revenue based redemption model (where each point is worth a fixed amount, similar to Southwest Airlines). I’m not sure about that, but I will say that it is completely ridiculous – given the fact that their computer pricing system has been notoriously buggy, now we are supposed to just TRUST them that the prices are correct?
I have not really had much of an opportunity to use Skymiles (Even though I am somewhat Delta-captive in CVG), and now I look even LESS likely to use them.
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
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