Musings of The Global Traveller
Thoughts, advice and travel news from around the world by a seasoned frequent flyer.
With the planned changes to 747 first class seating (from 16 to 8 seats) next year, Lufthansa has recently zeroed out inventory for awards and upgrades in their first class on 747 flights, starting from April 2011.
I’m kicking myself that I hadn’t finished cashing in my miles ahead of the Miles and More devaluation at the end of the year, figuring I still had a couple of weeks to lock in awards at the old mileage levels.
As posted on Flyer Talk, there is a large devaluation of Miles & More premium awards from 1 January 2011, with many going up by over 20%. Other changes include one-way awards will become 50% of the return award cost (currently 75%) and tweaks to some award rules. Upgrade costs remain unchanged.
Time for me to cash in my stash, and re-evaluate my frequent flyer mileage-accrual plans for 2011.
Air France and Emirates have both had short flights scheduled on A380 (Paris to London and Dubai to Jeddah respectively), and now it is Lufthansa’s turn with some A380 flights between Frankfurt and Mallorca. It remains to be seen if the route will stay in the schedule for long (my guess is no).
The next step in the integration of bmi into Lufthansa is the inclusion of each other in the list of airlines eligible for status bonuses from 1 August. Miles & More elite members can get their 25% status bonus when flying bmi (and they count for HON Circle miles), and Diamond Club Gold status members can get their 35% status bonus when flying Lufthansa (but oddly not for Swiss, Austrian or Brussels flights).
I had to laugh at the wording of the Diamond Club email. Describing the parent airline as a partner is an odd choice of words.
I’ve written about A380 a few times (A380 tag link), and there seems to be a lot of interest in how to fly A380 cheaply, especially in first and business class. This post summarises all the currently operating regularly scheduled A380 services, which I’ll update from time to time [last updated 12 December 2011].
There are currently 7 airlines flying A380:
The next airline to operate A380 is Malaysia Airlines which is scheduled to commence July 2012, initially on Kuala Lumpur to London Heathrow route.
Singapore Airlines A380 routes
Emirates A380 routes
Qantas A380 routes
Air France A380 routes
Lufthansa A380 routes
Korean A380 routes
China Southern A380 routes
A380 destinations in the Americas
A380 destinations in Europe
A380 destinations in Middle East and Africa
A380 destinations in Asia
A380 destinations in the Pacific
Maps from gcmap.
The first Lufthansa A380 destination is Tokyo from 11 June 2010. Beijing commences 25 August 2010, and Johannesburg 25 October 2010.
A reminder there is only 8 first class seats and reportedly Lufthansa is blocking these from awards and upgrades. So, do the same “trick” as for Singapore – book the award before a flight switches from 747 to A380 aircraft type.
Yesterday the bmi website suggested that Diamond Club is closing 16 May. Today a bmi official lurker posted on Flyer Talk that only Diamond Club members in some markets (the ones they no longer serve) are being transferred 16 May.
However, I think this is only a temporary reprieve. Clearly Diamond Club is in the process of being closed. Transferring members to Lufthansa Miles and More, changes to some partner offers (eg branded credit cards) and promotions are not signs that the program has long to live.
If you have lots of bmi miles then my advice remains to use them before they get significantly devalued.
Edited to add: Reports from those who are in the process of being transferred is that bmi Silver is being matched to Lufthansa Frequent Traveller, bmi Gold is being matched to Lufthansa Senator, but the Lufthansa status is valid until February 2012. This means to requalify they need to do so either in 2010 or 2011 calendar years.
Some stray pages (now gone) on the bmi website suggests the generous bmi Diamond Club frequent flyer program may be closing in a month’s time with a forced transfer to Lufthansa Miles & More. Last year Lufthansa bought bmi and ever since the frequent flyer program, a favourite for many people on Flyer Talk for it’s generosity, has been on borrowed time.
Since miles will almost certainly be transferred across 1:1 (as they were for Swiss a few years ago), it is a good idea to book some awards now before the miles devalue substantially (and before the Diamond Club call centre gets overwhelmed with requests).
When Lufthansa bought Swiss they gave several months notice of the closure of that program, transferred miles 1:1 at the end date and lined up the status levels. Given bmi Gold (Star Alliance Gold) is much easier to attain than Lufthansa Senator status (Star Alliance Gold) it will be interesting to see if they do a straight match or only those earning bonus miles above 55k will get Senator. I think the former is more likely but the latter can’t be ruled out (not least because Senator status lasts for over 2 years).
Edited to add – the stray pages are still there.
In late February some Lufthansa pilots had a 4-day strike that ended after 1 day to allow more talks. A further strike was called for 13-16 April, however it has just been confirmed this Lufthansa strike is now cancelled.
For British Airways passengers it is a matter of waiting for news. The cabin crew unions which have struck twice already promised a third strike after Easter. No specific dates have been called yet, but neither has the strike been called off. At least 7 days notice is required.
A couple of weeks ago I posted about a Lufthansa Private Jet promotion with Miles & More, which some Flyer Talkers are using for a HON Circle mileage run by private jet. Apparently the promotion has been so popular that the smallest, 6 seater, private jets are now sold out for the entire 5 week promotion period. Larger jets are still available, but the maths doesn’t work quite so well (not least because a maximum of 6 passengers per flight are eligible for miles).
