Hanoian

Hi all

I've been an ROP member since 1997 and been Gold for the past decade. But, despite flying well over 50,000 miles with TG in 2014, TG's ever more stringent fare class mileage accumulation rules meant I failed to requalify as Gold at the end of Nov 2014.

After some research I've decided to walk away from ROP. On the basis of my VN Platinum/SkyTeam Elite Plus membership Turkish Airlines (TK) matched my status within 24 hours of me asking for it and I'm now *G in TK, valid until Dec 2016. Details of the TK status match program are here if you are interested: http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/turki...ch-2015-a.html

Once you are *G in the TK program, requalification for those who don’t live in Turkey requires only 25,000 status miles in one year or 37,500 status miles in two years. Also, TK will credit 100% for miles flown on TG, with the exception of O,I,R,L,X,N, V, W, G.

I will still fly TG (I live in Hanoi) and will likely miss the ROP Gold renewal upgrades - but that's about it. I hope ROP get their act together - I can't imagine I am the only person walking away when there are better deals on offer elsewhere within Star Alliance.

Happy 2015!

BinSabai

TK seems to be the cheapest and easiest way to get *G if this is the peak of your FF dreams!
Or are there even cheaper deals available?
If all *A airlines offered renewal of Gold at 25k miles only the *G lounges would be even more overcrowded as they are today! Maybe time *A set some restrictive policy, otherwise their *G status gets worthless

Thaikwai

So what will you benefit from as a *G member with TK? The only benefit you will get is lounge access and let's face it, most of the *A Gold lounges around the world are seriously overcrowded these days.

There is a major shift among the world's alliance airlines to move to revenue based qualification for Elite memberships, and Thai is just following the trend. You can expect to see many more airlines switching to higher revenue spend for re-qualification. Most of the major US airlines have already made the switch...Qantas are doing it also, BA and OW will be next.

When you consider that there are almost 3,000,000 members of TG ROP, the accumulated reward miles must represent a huge liability on the Thai balance sheet. I generate about 1,000,000 ROP miles per annum and I use them as quickly as possible as I am always expecting Thai to change the redemption rules, as they tried to do recently.

The principle benefit offered and touted by all of these airline alliances is the prospect of free flights by accumulating miles and cashing them in for reward flights. If you are only flying 50,000 miles a year and you do not have a credit card linked to your FF account then you are really not maximising your available benefits.

I fly approximately 150,000 miles a year but I add another >850,000 miles a year with my Citibank credit card. For me, this is the main benefit.

If you live in Hanoi then I can appreciate you using TG often (I lived in Hanoi myself 20 years ago and only flew TG!!) but you will have great difficulty using TK miles to redeem on Thai.

dsquared37

As someone who has considered TK could you elaborate upon this?

Thaikwai

dsquared37 I have a friend who did the status match with TK at the end of 2013 and he tried to redeem TK miles on Thai and just gave up after trying many times, for different dates.

Likewise I have another friend who tried to redeem Thai ROP miles on TK and also was unable to get a flight despite being extremely flexible with his dates etc.

The only hope you have of redeeming on another airline, within *A, is to start booking 364 days before your planned travel date. Some people can do this but I am never that organised. Typically I will go looking for a reward flight about two months before I want to travel and I only ever redeem on my home airline, Thai.

If you look at the posts on other *A airline forums, here and on other sites, you will find many posters complaining about the same problems.

dsquared37

I've never had a problem redeeming on TG since UA nixed their *net blocking years ago. So this is a TK problem? I hadn't heard of that but it's good to know as my flights tend to be booked like yours, if not closer in.

My problem with TK, with whom I was matched in 2013, stemmed from trying to purchase a ticket this past Nov. It was an absolute mess with the BKK office, the phone agents and the website never in agreement.

We found CX award space for the trip and never looked back.

Hanoian

Thanks for the replies. All my flying is for work, and my employer will never pay for J - so the business check in, lounge access and priority boarding make a big difference to me. I'll see how redeeming TK miles goes...but having said that most of my miles have been on KE and VN in recent years (hence the SkyTeam Platinum/Elite Plus status that was matched by TK) and as I live in Hanoi, VN's home base, I've tended to use VN miles first for reward travel. Bottom line is I am less interested in redeeming miles and more interested in smoothing my journey, whichever alliance I am booked with.

Incidentally, the flagship TK *G lounge in IST is the best I have been to - certainly much better than any of the TG J class lounges at BKK.