No AZ status miles bonus in F on AF flights?

Old May 3, 2016, 4:17 pm
  #1  
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No AZ status miles bonus in F on AF flights?

Hello all
I've recently become an AZ Freccia Alata Plus member (Elite+) thanks to a status match promotion. Soon I'll be flying Milan to Shanghai on AF via CDG in F class.
I expected to receive tons of miles (both award and status) thanks to both status and F class bonuses. AZ website states:

-about status bonus for Freccia Alata plus:
"Earn 100% extra miles on flights operated by Alitalia, Etihad Airways or our SkyTeam Partners, thanks to our Exclusive Bonus"
-about F class bonus on AF:
in FIRST (P) "double the miles flown" for flights over 750 miles.

The website does not specify if these bonuses are both award and status, so I gave them a call to find out. She didn't sound very sure and put me on hold for a while before coming back with the terrible news: these bonuses don't apply for elite status, meaning in my case I'd fly F on one of their closest skyteam partner to get only 1x status miles, as if I flew on a non-discounted economy fare!

In total I would only earn less than 15K status miles (CDG-PVG o/w 5700, LIN-CDG 1000).
How could that be possible? Has any AZ member had similar experience on other Skyteam members in a premium class?

Surprisingly, if I switched to Flying Blue, according to their online calculator for the same itinerary I would get more than 50K level miles (more than a AF gold treshold with one round-trip tkt only). 15K vs 50K for the same route in the same alliance, this is quite confusing to me....
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Old May 3, 2016, 6:44 pm
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Hi alexmil (are you Italian?),

as CFP you will earn 300% flown miles on your F trip but only 200% are status miles (J and F earn double miles). The tier bonus miles as CFP (+100%) are not counted as status miles.

https://www.alitalia.com/content/dam...rFrance_it.pdf

Last edited by Sciamano; May 4, 2016 at 6:07 am Reason: calculation mistake
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Old May 4, 2016, 3:03 am
  #3  
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Thanks for the info Sciamano!

yes I'm italian (but I know nothing about AZ and skyteam since before this status match I've always been loyal the other two alliances ).
Clearly the Millemiglia customer service representative didn't know much about this, as she said that trips in F on AF give 200% award miles but only 100% status miles!

Even with 200% status miles it seems much more convenient to switch to Flying Blue as they give 300% status for F trips and the gold threshold can be reached with only 40K..

I believe AZ isn't very interested in rewarding F passengers since they don't have that product in their own cabins...
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Old May 4, 2016, 4:20 am
  #4  
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Originally Posted by alexmil
How could that be possible? Has any AZ member had similar experience on other Skyteam members in a premium class?
Yes, in general and across most frequent flyer programmes, the "status bonus" is only ever applied to Award Miles, never to qualifying/tier miles.

If you think about it, it would be unfair otherwise. If, as an FAP you got a 100% bonus on tier/qualifying miles, then this has the effect of reducing the thresholds for status(because you are earning elite qualifying status miles at higher rates than a status-less passenger). That would not be fair.

Everyone can earn tier/qualifying miles "faster" by booking into premium cabins. But not everyone can automatically have status. As such, to make status qualification easier via such a "bonus" would be unfair. [OK, some programmes do make it easier for elites to retain status; however, Millemiglia doesn't discriminate - the same amount of flying is needed to obtain/retain status, regardless of your current status]

It's in the interests of fairness that tier/qualifying miles are awarded on the basis of fare class/cabin, and NOT by status level.

Originally Posted by alexmil
Surprisingly, if I switched to Flying Blue, according to their online calculator for the same itinerary I would get more than 50K level miles (more than a AF gold treshold with one round-trip tkt only). 15K vs 50K for the same route in the same alliance, this is quite confusing to me....
It's not at all surprising. In general across all frequent flyer programmes, the "native" frequent flyer programme of the airline in question will be among the most generous for flights on that particular airline, with their partners either matching the mileage, or as is far more common, giving less.

If you had instead booked a J class ticket with Alitalia, you would earn 300% in business class (so: effectively you would earn 400% award miles [the 300% from business, plus your FAP 100% bonus], and 300% tier/qualifying miles).

It shouldn't be *that* surprising that Alitalia rewards you more for flying on Alitalia, than for flying on Air France.

(It's also a bit inaccurate to compare 15k Millemiglia miles with 50k Flying Blue miles. They are not actually the same thing. (They are from different programmes and are earned, and spent, on different partners and in different ways at different rates) And 15k is not the correct number).



CDG-PVG-CDG is 11,541 miles according to the Great Circle



Note that the airlines themselves may use a slightly different number.

In Millemiglia, you stand to earn 23082 (approx) tier/qualifying miles, and 34,623* (approx) award miles for your CDG-PVG-CDG return F journey [* 200% flown miles = 23082; 100% bonus = 11541; total = 34623].

Note that the mileage amounts given above only refer to CDG-PVG-CDG.

The legs in business class MIL-CDG-MIL have not been considered as I don't know what business farecode you would be travelling in.

If you were to travel on AZ's new FCO-PEK-FCO service (starting mid July) in business, you would earn 30,453 (approx) elite qualifying miles, and 40,604 (approx) award miles - before the route bonuses are applied for this new route.

Last edited by irishguy28; May 4, 2016 at 4:54 am
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Old May 7, 2016, 7:03 am
  #5  
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wow thanks for your very extensive and detailed explanation Irishguy28.

The issue came after a wrong information given me by the AZ MilleMiglia customer service: an F ticket on AF gives 200% award miles but only 100% status meiles.
Thankfully I see on your calculation that this was wrong and F tkts give 200% status miles too! that makes more sense.
I think this was a very basic information that MM customer service representatives (answering the CFA+ dedicated line) should - or better say MUST - know!!
I do totally understand and agree on the status bonuses not applying for flights on other airlines..
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Old May 7, 2016, 7:53 am
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Originally Posted by alexmil
I think this was a very basic information that MM customer service representatives (answering the CFA+ dedicated line) should - or better say MUST - know!!
I do totally understand and agree on the status bonuses not applying for flights on other airlines..
You could also find all this information on the Aliatalia site by yourself!
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