Simple: by their standards, he's not a loyal repeat customer. People who the airlines care about - and will move heaven and earth for - are their top-tier freq

Simple: by their standards, he's not a loyal repeat customer. People who the airlines care about - and will move heaven and earth for - are their top-tier frequent flyers, guys who fly 100K+ miles per year. If someone picks up that many flights, it means they do most of their flights for business (very few people fly for pleasure that far), which means they're buying much higher-priced tickets than people who are traveling for pleasure, and are the ones whose presence makes a flight turn a profit. An example: if you're Super-Elite on Air Canada (95 flights or 100K miles per year) you have guaranteed flight availability up to six hours before departure. What does that mean? If you want to fly on a flight that's fully sold out - any flight - and call AC more than six hours before take-off, they will kick someone (or two people, as you can bring your companion too) off the plane so that you can get on. You will also get different call-center numbers, access to more rewards flights, more upgrade certificates than you can possibly use, and free upgrades when you choose not to use a certificate. Legacy carriers, for the most part, do treat their frequent/loyal customers quite well. It's just that when you have that many routes and that many flights "frequent" is a lot more than most people who aren't business travelers think it is.