Originally Posted by
mrawesomeness
Not sure if this is the best place to add my to cents worth so delete or move if deemed irrelevant
From a very lowly Koru Member here, I appreciate that I don't spend anywhere near as much money on flights (either domestically or international) when compared to a significant number of fine folk here. I get very little work paid for domestic flying (have to drive instead) and due to study commitment of the better half, don't do much international either.
But
When I do I'd like to have a selection of the comforts and benefits of those that have earned the right to have them, hence why I am prepared to pay for Koru. I can see why some would like to see these prices increased but why should our subscription/membership prices be an easy/first target.
In regards of the full lounges, unlike those that get lounge passes with credit card spend, I have at least given a significant dollar value to AirNZ.
Rather than pick on those that have paid to enjoy some benefits, how about doing away wth credit card sourced lounge passes. Or start enforcing a no guest if lounge is full option or no vouchers accepted if full etc.?
While I don't see any need to add to the list of available benefits to Koru Members, if some are taken away or the price increased substantially, they may end up driving away a number of customers and loose some potentially easy revenue
While I may draw some flak for the above, how is a customer that has paid for Koru/Economy any different from a customer who is Elite and paid for J and all the good things that go with that. At the end of the day they are both a customer who is prepared to pay for a level of service/experience that they individually feel right for them. By all means look after the Elites as they have earned their status/benefits/perks (I look at those Elite bag tags with supreme envy) but don't shaft those that aren't in that situation.
i have a lot of sympathy for some of the points you have made. However there are a few errors in your argument - Air NZ makes significant revenue from selling lounge passes, APD and SP to banks who use these as loyalty incentive for customers - in many cases probably more for some customers than the cost of Koru Membership.
it takes a lot of flying to achieve Gold let alone Elite. I too pay for much of my own travel. It is not easy despite what some have said here. For years I had to work hard to maintain Gold. I even did status runs on a few weekends flying AKL-WLG-AKL-WLG-AKL on a couple of days in the past. I valued the Gold extra cabin bag/extra luggage/better phone service so worked hard to stay Gold, choose more expensive flights on NZ over cheaper alternatives and sometimes overshot my SP requirement but was keen to maintain at least Gold.
If you fly mainly main centre domestically and Trans-Tasman Elite is very difficult. Regional is even worse. You would have to potentially fly AKL-NPE-AKL 188 times (376 flights) in a year if that was the only route you took and AKL-IVC-AKL 107 times (214 flights) if that was your exclusive route.
Yes I’m now Elite but only because I’ve been lucky enough to do some pretty expensive long haul J travel such as AKL-IAH-DFW-IAH-AKL last November which cost $12.6k for that trip alone. I should requalify again this year but again only with expensive long haul J flights. Most of us know that J on NZ is often significantly dearer than other J alternatives and while the soft product is good with generally good service the hard product is somewhat dated.
In terms of your question how is a Koru/Economy passenger different to an Elite passenger the answer is they have paid significantly LESS in terms of premium to achieve their status. In fact the value from KORU per dollar premium paid clearly exceeds that that we get from Elite and certainly that which Gold members get in my opinion. While long haul J has some nice touches what we pay for it vastly exceeds worth in true dollar terms - some of choose to do it because we are lucky enough to be able to pay the premium to enjoy a somewhat better experience but there is no doubt we are paying a significant premium.
i wonder whether Koru should lose guest privileges but allow a guest membership at 75% of base cost, Gold should still have a lounge guest, and Elite remain unchanged.