Yesterday, I got involved in a Twitter debate on what is the worth of a mile earned in India, and I thought I’d put my views across on the blog to share with all of you and hear what do you have to say. This will be a series which will focus on valuing the key mileage currencies in India.

For earning capabilities in India, there are 4 kind of miles one could earn and accumulate, using different ways. Here they are:

• Jet Privilege miles: Earn them by flying the airline or its partners, or credit card spends, or multiple program partners who are listed on the airline’s website.
• Air India miles: Earn them by flying Air India/Singapore Airlines/Lufthansa.
• Citibank PremierMiles: Earn them by spending on your Citibank PremierMiles credit card.
• American Express Membership Rewards: Earn them by spending on your American Express cards issued in India (non-cobranded).

If you want to see how to earn these miles with Credit Cards, here is a primer for you I wrote earlier in the year.

The primary dissent I had with the people I was sparring with was the utilization of these miles, which impacts the underlying valuation of the miles. I’ve noticed in the past that most people tend to use the mileage currency for booking domestic tickets. Nothing wrong with the approach, but I just feel you’re trading yourself cheap.

Here is an example or two of what I see as value v/s not:

• A Mumbai – Delhi economy class ticket, which would usually go for Rs. 5,000 if booked sufficiently out (3 weeks ahead), being booked on miles, where Jet Airways would at least charge you 8,400 Miles + Rs. 1,200 for the reservation. In this case you’re selling yourself cheap, because you’ve used 8,400 miles for a net value of 43 Paise per mile. On the other hand, if you made a last minute trip, when prices are sky high, it may be better to use the miles.
• Similarly booking the same ticket on any airline and redeeming your PremierMiles for it. So, if you paid Rs. 5,000 for the ticket, you’d be redeeming worth 10,000 miles if you chose to use your PM (1 Re. = 2 PM). Again, you’ve sold out cheap, because you’ve only got a net value of 50 paise per mile. That is the method Citibank wants you to apply, because it makes it really cheap for them to finish off your transaction.
• However, you could have gotten way more value out of your Citibank PremierMiles as well. For instance, imagine a USA (West Coast) – India return ticket in Business Class on Singapore Airlines, which usually goes for Rs. 350,000+ (USD 6,700+) coming to you for 155K PremierMiles and USD 800 fuel surcharges. In this case, all you had to do was to transfer your PremierMiles to Singapore Airlines’ frequent flyer program, and redeem for a ticket there. Your value earned per mile: Rs. 2 at the minimum. And this for a stable fare between the two countries on this airline.

So, before I go down to writing my analysis, would you quickly help me with your views on how do you use your miles? Pick in the poll below, which will be open for 48 hours:

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Also feel free to leave your views in the comments section. I want to know your views

Related Posts:

• Hang on, do not use your Citi PremierMiles for Jet Airways redemptions

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Like some of you know, I trekked all the way from Mumbai to Colorado Springs (via AUH,JFK/LGA, DEN) to meet the Boarding Area set of bloggers and some other awesome bloggers for a weekend conference (sort of thing!) mixed with a tequila night and other fun stuff made possible by Randy Petersen and the House of Miles crew.

While I’ll discuss that on the blog later, on the way out, I thought I’d build in a couple of days in the schedule to pop into New York and soak in the city (always a good idea!), apart from meeting friends I haven’t met in a while. I had a schedule mess, and I eventually arrived in NYC a full 12 hours later than originally planned. And since I was tired, I did not eat anything on the 3 flights I had (COS-DFW-LAX-JFK) or in-between (those times were spent getting tickets reissued with the airline!).

So once I finally managed to settle into my hotel at NYC, I had to eat! And since I am not the room service kind of guy, I had to step out to eat. Shake Shack was right next door, but this was not going to be enough. So, I decided to walk it a bit to arrive at one of my favourite carts in New York at 46th St and 6th Ave, called the Biryani Cart. This was a random discovery in one of my trips a couple of years ago, and I have been always very happy customer to go back to these guys. The high turnover stuff here is the Kati Rolls and the Biryani, and I haven’t bothered to try the other new stuff that comes and goes. However, the guy makes a mean greasy Biryani, not too spicy (maybe in line with the local palate) and worth the 6$! Along the way, he won a couple of Wendy awards too! I grabbed a takeaway and brought it back to the hotel to eat in my room, so don’t be surprised with the luxury setting around!

The evening worked out no different. Initial plans were to step into a Greek restaurant mid-town, but after a few rounds of drinks with friends, we were not so game to make the trip uptown. As well, as it turned out the restaurant was temporarily closed.

So we walked over to another one of my old favourites in the face of a windy NYC evening, this one is called the Halal Guys and located at 53rd St & 6th Ave, right around the corner from the Hilton. I first went here when a friend told me they used to drive all the way from D.C. just for a midnight meal over here (and then go back!). The guy makes a spicy hot platter, with oodles of white sauce which I think is yoghurt-based to go along. Almost always crowded, night or day, go for the platter (rice and gyro, with lamb and chicken), which gives you a taste of all he has, unless you have a specific preference for lamb or chicken and don’t want to have the other.

And by the side of the cart, you’d find an array of sauces, mostly the white yoghurt-based sauce I mentioned before, but also some barbeque sauce and in one corner, the hot-sauce. Do not try to have lots of it unless you’ve tried it before, because it is some real hot and wicked stuff! Most people won’t even look at it because it’s stowed in a separate rack. The portion sizes are massive, but I managed to wolf down a full helping by myself.

That was another $6 well-spent! Have you been to any of these places or do you recommend any street side food I should try when back in New York whenever?

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Err, I know the sense of entitlement this post evokes, but stay with me, and hear my story of le-sigh and disappointment. The title of this post the exact words I heard from the TSA this evening at JFK.

I am flying the American Airlines First Class in their 3-class Flagship Service First Class today, in fact this post is being written somewhere up in the air right now. This made me eligible to use the brand new Flagship Check-In service introduced by American Airlines earlier this month at Terminal 8, New York JFK. After a red carpet experience with American’s staff at JFK, the agent at the check-in counter hands me back my Indian passport and my boarding pass, and tells me that I’ll be able to use the TSA-Pre security queue specially organised for the Flagship Check-in passengers.

Now, I’ve read it in the past on American Airlines’ website, where they describe the Flagship Check-in experience:

An expedited security line, offering you premium access through security checkpoints

Now, this is something I assume standard fare for the elite and premium cabin travellers, and I expected this to be American’s “Priority Access” service & no more. However, American has a designated queue at the JFK airport for its Flagship check-in eligible passengers, and apparently all of them get TSA-Pre. Except me and a few of course!

When the agent told me I was going to get TSA Pre, I assumed that there was a special arrangement where all premium cabin passengers were going to get this service. In my 1.5 years of flying around in the USA as an alien, after the TSA Pre was announced, I did never get the 3-beeps and I assumed I knew it was because I was an alien for all purposes and hence…

Anyhow, I turn up and the TSA asks me for a USA identification, which I definitely don’t have except for my Starbucks card and my AA EXP card, so in spite of the 3 beeps, he politely tells me, “AJ, no Pre for you!”. But he was right.  Worst bit, there is no other Priority Security queue, so I wasted about 30 minutes to get to the scanners and go over, which left me with exactly about 15-20 minutes to pop into the lounge and get something to eat. And that, after a long day in NYC when I sparingly ate due to various reasons!

Hey TSA, I’d be happy to volunteer in the beta for a program which lets aliens come through the TSA checkpoints with some ease!

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I’ve been an ardent fan of the Citibank PremierMiles Credit Card. I believe its a secular mileage-earning credit card, and pays you a good amount of miles for your travel spends, specifically airline bookings, and I rate it high up there in my mileage earning CC 101. However, I’ve been disappointed a bit this past year, since they lost Jet Airways as a mileage transfer partner, and capped off the limit for mileage earning on tickets to Rs. 500,000 per annum, amongst other devaluations.

However, seems like some of these changes are out of the window, and there are some real ‘enhancements’ in the true sense of the word and not how rhetorically airlines/credit cards/loyalty programs use the term these days.

One of the key changes made is that Citibank has knocked off the Rs. 500,000 per annum limit for the credit card to get you 10 PremierMiles/Rs. 100. Although they say it is temporary and will be in effect till December 31, 2013, I’d imagine if it gets the kind of success that Citibank expects for this promotion, they might as well take the limit off for good (especially since the competition such as Jet Airways American Express Platinum CC, does offer unlimited miles).

The enhancement I was talking about, is that Citibank is now adding capabilities to the PremierMiles portal, which allow you to earn 10 PremierMiles/Rs. 100 spent even on the hotel reservations and car reservations you will make via the portal. In theory, this is not even an enhancement but a getting even move since Citi has gone on to add partners such as Yatra.com and GoIbibo.com which have the 10PM/Rs. 100 earning not just for flights, but for hotels and car bookings as well.

However, it seems like Citibank will be tweaking the backend to accommodate these changes, and as per them, the website will be down for maintenance as of 2nd-4th June 2013. The FAQ file is listed here, and is named “transition of service partner”, which kind of makes me believe that they are moving away from cleartrip.com as their backend, to maybe goibibo.com which supports redemptions at this moment on its own site as well.

All in all, good stuff coming our way and we should be happy about it!

Related Posts:

• PremierMiles adds GoIbibo.com as earn/burn partner

• PremierMiles devalued for good by Citibank
• Sunday Plastic: The ‘new’ Citibank Premier Miles Credit Card
• Hang on, do not use your Citi PremierMiles for Jet Airways redemptions
• Citibank PremierMiles: New promotion and Indigo redemptions
• Citibank adjusts some PremierMiles redemptions
• Citibank PremierMiles: Etihad Guest is a partner, Indigo changes & dynamic redemptions go mainstream

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On my way back from the Boarding Area Conference (BACon) at Colorado Springs which ended today, I was booked on a very simple route to get to New York via Dallas/Fort Worth in the afternoon. If all would have been well, I’d have been on the East Coast by now, sleeping in a hotel room in Manhattan. However, it was not to be.

Once we were seated on our slightly delayed flight, the captain informed us we had a flat tire on the plane, which could happen on landing at high altitude airports such as COS, and as such, they won’t be able to move before the tire was changed. The good news, he said was, they had a tire and a jack at the airport, so all they had to do was fix this thing and it would be 30 minutes to 45 before we’d be on our way, considering paperwork needed to be done. I thought, even a plain and simple car tire takes a while to fix, so this plane isn’t going anywhere soon! This is how it looks when there are people trying to replace a plane tire.

We were advised to deplane and wait inside the terminal and things were not looking good now. I was booked on the second-last flight to NYC that evening from DFW, and I called to protect on the last flight out, however I was informed the flight was sold out and I could not go anywhere till the morning. I would be on my way on the first flight out in the morning however.

A short while later, we heard that the brakes had also come off while fixing the tire, so there was no way this plane was going to be fixed anytime soon since they’d need stuff which was only going to be available in Denver. So, the flight take off time, scheduled for 1:35 PM was now looking at 7:15 PM or so. The agent was honest and asked to call AA Reservations to rebook on the 4:55 PM flight, since they were not going to be able to handle all the load themselves.

I managed to get across to the Executive Platinum line, and they rebooked me onto the 4:55 PM flight, that too getting me in First again. However, I was now supposed to be sleeping at DFW and going to New York next morning.

I decided that sleeping was going to be a waste of time so I’d rather keep moving. Hence, once in Dallas, I called again, and tried to get on a more sane routing, which meant flying on the next plane from Dallas to Los Angeles, and then going on the red eye from LAX to New York JFK. That means, a simple thing like going to New York now looks like this routing.

So, I just got off coach in DFW-LAX, where they were asking for volunteers for a bump and offering $500 to stay over the night, and off I go on the 3-class LAX-JFK redeye where business class upgrade has been confirmed. However, I’m right now in the LAX Admirals club, and this beast is teasing me to go to Australia. I think I’ll just head out to board for JFK instead.

Laters!!

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A week ago, I posted about a promotional sale that Jet Airways had launched around its global ops to celebrate its 20th anniversary. However, there was nothing for India announced then.

However, that offer came soon after. Jet Airways is offering for its domestic flyers in India, a discount code on your next booking, if you book for travel commencing on or after June 16, 2013. For a one-way reservation in Economy or Premiere, you get a coupon code for Rs. 500 off on your next booking, and for a return trip booking, you get Rs. 1,000 off on your next reservation (valid only on domestic travel). The coupon codes need to be used up before September 30, 2013, however you could book any dates into the future using those.

Not exactly the best promotion out there, but if you’re a Jet Airways regular, you may want to use this promotion for your next and the trip after on Jet Airways. Specially because Jet Airways has withdrawn the return fare discounts it used to earlier offer on their own website, something competition such as Indigo and Spicejet still offers.

Related Post:

• Jet Airways’ North America, Europe & SE Asia anniversary discounts

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Unbundling airfares was expected to take off in a while, however the airlines are already set to go ahead and charge exotic varieties of add-on charges on top of your ticketed price right away.

Indigo was one of the first to take off with the new charges, and will now charge an additional Rs. 200 if you want to pre-book a window or aisle seats on their planes. If you want a front row seat or an emergency exit, you should be ready to fork out another Rs. 500 for this privilege. They’ve fondly called this Seat Plus. If you intend to pre-assign a non-premium seat, just pay Rs. 100. This is working out exactly as I predicted on May 1.

Like you see, for an international segment, the charges go up to Rs. 300 for a window/aisle and Rs. 800 for a premium seat. For any other seat, it would be just Rs. 200. However, if you turned up at the airport and these seats are going vacant, you could switch to them for free.

Air India has been working on cutting out the free baggage allowance for customers. It used to have the most generous free baggage allowance of 25 Kgs per customer in Y, which was reduced to 20 Kgs a few years back. And now, a customer on an AI domestic flight can only carry 15 kgs of free baggage, while excess baggage will be charged at Rs. 250/kg. In case you have your Air India Flying Returns number on your ticket, you can still carry 20 kgs without any problems.

With Jet Airways, they are starting to charge for advance seat reservation, albeit only on a single route right now (of Mangalore – Dubai & v.v.). I am not sure if they are test-marketing at the moment or there are other issues w.r.t. rolling this out.

So the party was good while it lasted. Now, get ready to be nickeled & dimed at every step of the way going forward.

Related Posts:

• How will unbundling work out for India?
• India, welcome to unbundled fares!
• Air India advised to axe in-flight meals
• Get ready to pay for better meals on Jet Airways, and lounge access, and preferential seating

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I’m just trying to wriggle my way out of a bad bout of cold and flu which kept me out of action since 2-3 days. I figured a complete, medicinal recovery would be better than trying to drag my feet and keep up with work and other stuff, so I missed out some things. Here is a recap for you:

• Travel Agents across India seem to be off work on Tuesday 7th May 2013. So, if you depend on them, organise your business a day before or after.
• I am still refusing to believe this fully, but I am scared for flying Air India if this is true. Apparently on a Bangkok – Delhi flight, both the pilots went to nap, and put two cabin crew in charge of the cockpit. One of them switched off the autopilot.
• Yours truly got quoted in the Hindustan Times about the latest on Unbundling airfares in India. You can read my post on how I think the whole thing will play out here.

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On the occasion of Jet Airways’ 20th anniversary, Jet Airways is offering promotional discounts for their flights originating from Newark, ending into any destination operated by Jet Airways, if you book by the 5th of May 2013 using their US website. Be sure to use the following coupon codes while making the fare search, though I am not sure $20 for a business class ticket (Premiere) is worth it.

For those who live in Europe, there is a different promotion, a flat out 20% off if you book today (May 5) using the Belgian Jet Airways website.

Read More…

I’m pretty sure the low-fare airlines in India are already set with product propositions as to how they will charge for the various propositions such as checked bags and sale of food in-flight. Like I wrote on Monday, the Indian aviation regulator did permit unbundling of fares, which included preferential seating, checked bags and other services, a full list available here.

On a closer inspection, it does look like this stuff is at least a couple of months away, even if airlines start implementing systematic changes now. I would imagine a whole lot of this strategy will want to leverage on the internet to build in the services into the ticket, i.e., you buy it online to ensure that you don’t have to wait or pay at the airport.

If not, I see that a the self-service check-in counters will need to become more advanced to be able to accept credit cards/debit cards as well to sell preferential seats and baggage allowance. Also, the confusion that will ensue for the passengers on airports will be massive, since a lot of manual processes will be required and average processing times will go up.

But lets take a look at what will work and what won’t work soon.

a) Preferential Seating: I am looking at you Indigo, and I am thinking, you will try to sell almost all window and aisle seats as preferential seats maybe. Because you’re so money minded. I’d also expect SpiceJet, Go-Air to follow suit. For the full service Jet Airways, expect to pay for the first few rows and the emergency exits, if not more. The other way of doing this, like some other airlines do, is to block off the entire front section of the economy seating of each plane as preferential seats, and get people to pay for that.

It may be the time when some airlines could look to spend some money and get Premium Economy sections in their planes as well for domestic as well as regional routes. But who goes first is not something I can guess yet.

b) Meal/Snack/Drink charges: If the regulator allowed for this now, how were airlines already selling food on the planes since the past 10 years eh? Anyways, the changes I expect are to Air India first, who will be withdrawing meals sooner than later. Expect to buy more overpriced food in the air soon.

c) Airline Lounges: Lets step back a bit and see who is in a position to impose this charge… Air India. No airline in India has their own lounges at airports except for Air India, and they are the only ones who can perhaps now on sell airport lounge access. For the rest, I assume they will continue to provide lounge access to premium passengers without a charge, and no more. I don’t foresee for instance Jet Airways selling access to a Plaza Premium Lounge in Delhi, for a small cut on the access fee.

d) Check-in baggage: I expect the low-fare carriers to be the first off the block here, though I won’t expect a weight-allowance here. The piece system is much better since it brings in efficiency, and I’d expect airlines to move to piece system as well if they are planning to charge for check-in baggage. (you don’t want to be putting 3 seven kg bags on a plane while you can put one 20 kg bag, right?)

Are any of you readers expecting anything different? I’m happy to hear your views.

Related Posts:

• India, welcome to unbundled fares!
• Air India advised to axe in-flight meals
• Get ready to pay for better meals on Jet Airways, and lounge access, and preferential seating

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