Originally Posted by NWIFlyer

Part of this differentiation comes down to the fact that SK was in severe financial trouble a few years ago, and needed to do something drastic to increase their load factors.

So, first of all they improved their FFP offering, both in terms of their own (Eurobonus) and the mileage they awarded other *A schemes. It's now minimum 100% earning in Y, 200% in Y+ & J for A3's Miles+Bonus.

They also gave lounge access and fast track to Y+ upwards (although not to *G in straight Y [GO]).

Then they looked at their pricing and made that more competitive.

This has arguably been so successful in terms of increasing loads that the downside to the Y+ offering intra-Europe, which is what passes for SK's business class, is that the middle seat is not blocked and often occupied. On the other hand, Y+ on TATL is as good as anything in the European market right now, including BA. I'm flying to IAD in October from ARN on that basis to renew my *G - at about half the money BA wanted.

Now, SK still has a way to go before they're stable, so we can expect this generosity to continue to for a while yet.

BA, on the other hand, is massively profitable having gone through that stage and has no need to give anything away - so it doesn't. Of course, the salutary lesson here is that these things tend to be cyclical, that's exactly what SK used to be like (at least on earnings, if not so much profit), and look what they're having to do to recover again now ...