Which Air Group is Best?

[katoeylover]

Qatar now (from July 19th) has a daily flight from Doha to Washington DC and a flight 4 days a week from Newark.

[Guest]

I have frequent flyer programs with all of them but the Best one so far has proven to be star alliance... Lufthansa, Swiss, Austrian, Singapore Air, Thai Air has been proven to be the most comfortable ones and the most helpful...

I remember ones I had to fly from BKK to London via Frankfurt and I lost my connection flight... Lufthansa sent me an sms to my mobile to announce me that a my new flight and seat assigned to me. I was impressed at that time... Singapore Air is by far the best service I have seen in Airlines, followed by Thai Airways....

On the other side IBERIA, British Airways and KLM have the worst service EVER received... rude and CHEAP... sorry to tell you that but it is SAD BUT TRUE

Darkest

[Pinga]

Since I live in South America, I use One World. Not for flying American which is a dismal experience, but for LAN. Yesterday traded in 220,000 kilometers for business class Cathay flights from LAX to BKK and Jakarta. Unfortunately only two stops per airline so I´ll have to pay for my Jakarta-Cebu-Jakarta flight. Cathay is really expensive, the girl at LAN showed me that the ticket would have cost $9,300 if I hadn´t used kilometers, I paid $76 for the taxes. Living in Peru I will get to Comodore (the highest freq. flier status with automatic upgrades) for only flying 50,000 kilometers plus two paid trips in business to Buenos Aires or Brasil during this year.

[rxpharm]

I've been a member of Air Canada Aeroplan since 1995 - been able to have a Star Alliance Elite (Gold Card) for the past 5 years. Makes life a lot easier to use the Star Alliance lounges (free wifi, food, booze, showers (in some), papers, tv, etc). Having the extra 15 kg luggage allowance is also handy. Checking my bags all the way to my destination is also fantastic despite changing one or two different airlines in the Star Alliance. Also priority boarding is handy to snag that overhead bin for the laptop/carryon bag.

They are making it easier to book rewards (at least through Aeroplan), can book online - no blackouts, so if you can book far enough in advance you can generally travel on the dates you want.

It has the most airlines in a group, with 16 right now (South African Airways just joined), with two Chinese Airlines to come into the group end of 2007 beginning of 2008. Unfortunately when Varig had their financial problems they were kicked out - so South America is under represented.

[gunslinger]

Star Alliance for me, simply because of Singapore and Thai Airways. Having gold status has got me a lot of upgrades on Thai between Singapore and Bangkok and on UA between Singapore and Hong Kong.
I've flown a couple of LB's over to Singapore on Swiss Air, where you can find some real bargains sometimes

[Guest]

I have over 1M miles on Star Alliance. I would say they have got to be the worst in the world for booking free tickets.

I tried to book tickets to Canada in early May for a flight in Late July. None available. And, the best routes were not even candidates for using points.

This is my birthday month. I am supposed to get one free upgrade on Thai airways. I tried on my last trip to India a few days ago. They said "No seats, but if you want to use your points, there is a seat." (so birthday points are lower than real points).

I can give 100 examples of how I got screwed trying to use my 1M miles.

So basically I think their whole program is designed so you can never use the miles when you really want them (like for a big trip).

In the ridiculous 50 some trips I did last year, I never got upgraded once. And believe me, I asked. I've been put in middle seats so many times when there were empty seats everywhere else, I'd need more hands and feet to show it.

Can you tell how I feel?

[Looker]

(ziggystardust @ Jul. 14 2007,21:38) Can you tell how I feel?

For sure pissed off!
Feel a bit strange, however, having such an amazing record, that you are treated so unfairly.
In comparison to yours, I've a ridiculous mileage but I can say that always get aisle seat and booking free tickets has not been that bad so far.
Could that be the travel agent you're using sometimes doesn't notify the airline or book the seat?

In any case, it's no longer as it used to be some 10-15 years ago with mileage and credit card bonuses. I remember, talking about credit cards points, with both VISA and AMEX I was getting good rewards back then. Now I've to spend almost 10 times to get the same

[mardhi]

(ziggystardust @ Jul. 14 2007,20:38) I have over 1M miles on Star Alliance. I would say they have got to be the worst in the world for booking free tickets.

I tried to book tickets to Canada in early May for a flight in Late July. None available. And, the best routes were not even candidates for using points.

This is my birthday month. I am supposed to get one free upgrade on Thai airways. I tried on my last trip to India a few days ago. They said "No seats, but if you want to use your points, there is a seat." (so birthday points are lower than real points).

I can give 100 examples of how I got screwed trying to use my 1M miles.

So basically I think their whole program is designed so you can never use the miles when you really want them (like for a big trip).

In the ridiculous 50 some trips I did last year, I never got upgraded once. And believe me, I asked. I've been put in middle seats so many times when there were empty seats everywhere else, I'd need more hands and feet to show it.

Can you tell how I feel?

Wow Ziggy you seem to have some bad luck - but presumably trying to get seats flying between HKG and Vancouver (assuming your thinking was to use TG to HKG and then owards on Air Canada) is probably pretty tough in the school hols given the amount of traffic between the 2 places with HKG Chinese holding residency in Canada. I just glanced and economy is very full most days - Business is wide open even in *Alliance redemption booking class. Maybe the key would be to use mileage for business Class.

In terms of upgrades, happened to me probably every 4th trip between BKK and SIN (the only route where I had to fly economy, everywhere else I could travel business). I have also redeemed business class miles to LON on TG, with 2 days notice (for a funeral) and used my GOLD 1 class upgrade from Business to First without any problems whatsoever. Also booked redemption tickets in First and Business Class on multiple carriers easily including over Christmas (ie LON to BKK on the 19th Dec rtning on 6th Jan) with about 8 weeks notice. Certainly my experience (albeit I only redeem in Bus & first class as the mileage differentials are negligable) has been really great with TG.

Cheers
Mardhi

[PigDogg]

Not sure guys but I don't think booking problems are necessrily Star Alliance problems, Could be that Sing is FF customer friendly and Air Canada not.

For me i deal with United when booking. But I prefer to travel on Thai when I'm paying and travel Sing when receiving. But either way I'm dealing with the United reservations people.

[rxpharm]

Right, pigdogg and mardhi the rules for upgrading and booking reward travel depends on where your frequent flyer plan originates. Air Canada cannot give upgrade awards for other than Air Canada flights - so I cannot get upgrades for non AC flights. The other limitation is that upgrade coupons are restricted to full fare economy flights. Booking reward flights requires planning several months ahead, sometimes up to 6 months on busy sectors. While there is no blackout period, there are only a limited number of reward seats available. If you know when you want to use those miles, book as far ahead as possible to get that free flight.

The big advantage for Star Alliance is that you can request free flights on sectors not covered by your airline - but once again, planning far ahead is essential to get the dates you want. If you require booking a flight not covered by your airline, you need to remember that the other airline will give reward seat preference to their frequent flyer members first - so again planning ahead is crucial.

I don't know how One World operates, but I guess it may be similar.

[SamplerDoc]

If Any of You can Think of a way to Pile All the Miles into One Airline if say you have Miles on a variety of Airlines, That Would Be Awesome  

[Road Runner]

(SamplerDoc @ Jul. 15 2007,09:23) If Any of You can Think of a way to Pile All the Miles into One Airline if say you have Miles on a variety of Airlines, That Would Be Awesome

Yes!........ buy up all the airlines in the world.


RR.

[gunslinger]

On BMI Gold you can redeem miles 5 days or more before the flight, I've done this countless times on many routes which BMI does not even cover and you can cancel right up until the departure time and get your miles back straight away,
As others have said it seems to depend on which arline you are have your programme with.

[Guest]

Mardhi, I tried booking Business and First in all available routes...Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, London. Seats available in Business now has no relationship to "seats available for mileage points". If there are say 20 biz class seats, generally only about 2 are available for usage with points. And silly me thinking 3 months advance booking was to close to departure.

I do upgrade to Biz from full fare economy on some of my Asian trips, and that works ok.

I do book aisle seat on every flight and do not always get it.

Anyhow, I think the points marketing has nothing to do with what happens in reality.

As a side note. I use a Canada "TD Visa Travel Card", which gives points for flight for every dollar. Then you can book a flight on any airline on any class, and they buy the ticket (not a mileage ticket), so availability is the same as for anyone purchasing a full fare ticket. That is how I'm going to Canada. This is a far better system, and the booking agents were absolute world class compared to the idiots at Thai and Air Canada.

I think this "Visa Points" is a better way to go but I don't know so many companies doing that.

[mardhi]

Yes I understand that - I was actually looking directly into the airline res system when I was making the post. The booking classes vary by carrier, but its easy enough to do the coded request if you know your way around the systems. However saying that, 3 months out will be marginal - 2 weeks out will be far easier - the airline systems can better forcast what they are likely to end up load wise - American Airlines system is still the best at managing that yield allocation and its used by loads of airlines worldwide. I'll explain it a bit more when I next bump into you somewhere.

Incidentally many Asian airlines will waitlist their GOLD card passengers on their own metal, North American will not, European may at their discretion. SQ will regularly do a seat conversion from fare paying to redemption if your a GOLG PPS holder the flight is looking pretty open and unlikely to fill up completely. TG have not got a clue and override their system all the time. There is another way round how to get seats you want - as I say, I will explain it when I see you but bit late for this upcoming trip.

Cheers
Mardhi