mat_bkk

Hi There,

After checking the last activities on my M&M account and seen the generous 50% mileage for a S class ticket on LX and a 100% even more generous P class ticket : I am wondering why am I still flying with them ???
Are we masochist ???

So my question is simple : what is the point of staying with M&M when TK or A3 have very advantageous FFP ?

Mat

weero

"Flying with them" has not that much to do with the FFP for me.

I haven't collected a single non-CC M&M mile in a year now but I fly LH sometimes because they offer an E+ and have A380s. November to February I cannot fly BA as LHR is de facto closed.

SFO777

Simple for me. You can't book LH First Class award seats with any other FF program unless you want to play the lottery in the week before departure.

oliver2002

If you live near MUC or FRA you fly a lot of LH. At one point you want to fly direct and not bother connecting and wasting time someplace even when flying leisure. When with M&M, you have access to award inventory others don't have. If you are SEN/HON you can pretty much pick and choose which flight you want @:-) The miles for that you generate via non-flight activities. Flying accrual is mainly for status achievement

If you live someplace else and have to connect anyways and have decent service from other providers it comes down to earn/burn ratios etc. There is no cookie cutter template you can use.

htb

I think you're living in the past.

- Possibilities for miles generated via non-flight activities are currently drying ou
- Access to award inventory is not of much use if you only get 25% award miles
- SEN/HON is out of reach for most if you only get 25-50% award miles
- As weero pointed out: the choice of the mileage program has nothing (little) to do with the airline you fly

M&M is still great for people on corporate fares that book into high booking classes, or people who get to fly business. That means, for most people it's a poor program. For most people then getting status (since they are not flying business) is a great advantage and almost any other program makes that easier as well.

If awards are a priority, I would try to find a program that does not charge outrageous fees for awards as well.

HTB.

SFO777

Not if you want advance First Class awards which you can't get anywhere else.
As for the fees, they are now much less for those paying USD.
Taxes/fees on this weekend's FLR-FRA-DEN tickets were only $313, the cheapest I've seen in years.

As for other programs, if you can find F seats in the last week, UA is 110,000 miles and $143 ($68 for elites).
Both SQ (80,000) and AC (62,500) charge YQ which are higher than what LH charges.
And except for SQ, LH's 50 euro change fee is lower than UA ($75-$100 for non elites) and AC ($90).
UA's redeposit fee is a ridiculous $200 for non-elites compared to 50 euros for LH.

Pattrick555

What is the best way to generate miles via non-flight activities for example? I could retain my FQT status by flying 30+ segments by year but in terms of miles it's not as generous =)

N1003U

+1. I O&D almost exclusively from FRA for long haul (occasionally ZRH, and before that I traveled a lot between NYC and FRA on multiple carriers), and non-stops matter to me. Compared to mid-level status on other airlines, I find the treatment as SEN, particularly at FRA, to be somewhat better, for things like IRROPS, seat assignment, the mythical seat blocking, willingness to be creative in solving my particular problems on the rare occasions they arise, even name recognition, compared to the treatment I get elsewhere as a generic *G. IME, at other airlines where it is "easier" to qualify for mid-tier recognition, gold is often the new silver (or worse) in terms of real-world experience.

I suppose generic non LH *Gs are tolerated as they are a real source of revenue for things like lounge visits, which helps to offset the cost of potato salad and pretzels.

And as a SEN, those snappy red leather baggage tags and key rings are cool! Put one on a Rimowa suitcase, and there will be no doubt to anyone in the vicinity where your allegiance (bias, whatever) lies...

I am still an M&M member as of April 2015, and as far as I am able to discern, I am still alive (and I am not sure but I believe the same applies to oliver2002).

Corporate is >40% of LH revenue (last I looked), so I can understand a program that appeals to the corporate segment. I suppose it comes down to the marginal business that can be stimulated by loosening up the program compared to not watering down benefits for existing status customers.

That said, the point is well taken that for small retail customers, and those condemned to fly on low economy fares, the program has become much less attractive. Despite lip service to the effect that LH wants to try to do something to make M&M a bit more attractive to small business customers and retail frequent flyers, I don't think they have done much. I am a small business/private retail customer, and if I were not based at, nor regularly fly to, an LH hub, I would probably be actively exploring alternatives.

As SFO777 points out below, the fees are not necessarily outrageous, depending on the type awards being booked and how important availability, and/or partner, or premium awards are when booking. For me 255k miles plus some 1500EUR is fees is a bargain for two F stools round trip on an LH longhaul. Intra EU economy awards? Not so great.

IME, the availability of LH award inventory to LH status customers is as good or better than any other FFP in which I have participated, and we were told in one of the Kamingesprächs that LH would rather keep qualification levels high and mileage accrual more stingy than dilute availability or mileage costs for M&M members.

weero

But isn't that the big weakness in LH's structure?

While MUC is a major centre, the airport is a minor hub. And FRA is huge and a bit out in the nowhere. The Ruhrgebiet megalopolis, Berlin, Hamburg ... all have no real airport and have to connect through FRA anyway. The pain to go through LHR or the middle east isn't all that much increased.

I fly LH because they are cheap and offer edible food and very good pilots (on the mainline services at least). But as htb says, crediting to M&M and earning with M&M is a very different thing. And for many of us, it is a thing of the past.

htb

Sorry, I don't get the logic. I don't think you have to convince corporations to book LH for their employees by giving the employees a lot of miles on top.

Unfortunately you can't choose whether you want to be charged the "not necessarily outrageous" or the outrageous fees when booking an award. If you live in Europe, they will be outrageous.


Most people will be lucky to get enough miles for two economy class seats and won't be Senators to make use of the 50% discount for the second seat. And 1500€ (no idea where that number comes from) for a flight, that essentially is supposed to be "free", is never a bargain.

Possible. But most customers won't be status customers these days, and I found sufficient availability on other programs as well, even though I admit the Senator Business Class Award waitlist IS great (and not documented in the T&Cs I believe, so most people won't even know about it).

HTB.

N1003U

Simple logic. Take good care of your best customers and don't give them a reason to look elsewhere. Maybe I have been lucky and have worked for progressive companies, but traveler feedback at firms where I have worked has significant impact on which airlines become preferred suppliers. I think there are also complications in many cases for employees to use miles earned on company business for private travel.

Where I think LH fails is that they seem to provide little incentive for the other 60% of their customers (I am one of those almost 60% retail purchasers most of the time, BTW), who need a reason to pay a premium for LH tickets, to be loyal. LH is highly unlikely to compete successfully on price because they can't really compete on cost. So, they may need a way to draw in and retain retail customers as well as contract companies. A great network ex-FRA and MUC is one way they compete, at least for my business. I suppose they could try some other things, including looking at changes to the FFP to make it somehow more attractive for smaller customers.

I do also get aggravated sometimes when I pay over 3.000€ for a P fare and I know the Siemens or VW person next to me probably paid a similar price for his or her ticket and is booked into D and getting double miles, but given my flight patterns, M&M still has enough benefit for me to stay with the program. It is when I am expected, as a retail customer to cough up 4500€ for a ticket on a route being offered by a competitor for 2500€ that I find LH and M&M rather lacking in value, but that is not strictly an FFP issue.

I live in Europe, and I still find outrageous is a relative term when it comes to fees. As a percentage of ticket value, I find the LH fees decrease with increasing travel class. For an economy redemption the fees are absurd. For a business redemption, a bit questionable. For first, not so bad.

1500€ is roughly what I paid in fees recently for an award for two return TATL F seats (738€ each, if I remember correctly), and in addition to F service, I got the exact flights and dates they wanted, on only a few weeks' notice. Compared to purchasing those tickets with cash, I find it OK value. Of course lower (or no) fees would be better, but I find as a whole, the fees are for me if not completely reasonable, then at least tolerable in enough cases.

I am trying to think of any FFP that is particularly worthwhile if one does not earn enough miles in a year to gain status. M&M certainly in my view is not.

sokolov

After being a loyal M&M-member for almost 20 years, I switched to M&B about a year and a half ago. I'm very happy with that. I should have done so much earlier.

sokolov

BA Executive Club and WN Rapid Rewards spring to mind. Not sure about BA after the current devaluation.

weero

Most *A users would probably list LifeMiles.

I find M&M as an FTL close to useless. With the waitlist and the companion gone, finding uses for M&M became quite tricky. Redemptions on SQ and LX works for me on rare occasions. But it doesn't help that M&M in my other home country operates a phone sex line for FTLs with quite outrageous fees.

At least you can still reach agents when you are willing to pay which is different from UA's MP which de facto stopped existing. "Book award" no can do. "Cancel award" no can do either .. "the system" doesn't allow it. Unless you call in 5 times ....

N1003U

Thanks. Forgot about this one. Quite possibly still useful for folks who don't travel very often (and who happen to need transport on a WN route).