I defected from KLM to UA, where I am PremEx at this time. It was a difficult but necessary decision.

The most obvious advantage of KLM (and other European carriers) is that they frequently offer double FD points/miles, typically during January and February. In 2001 KLM extended their offer until June. No matter what status you have with KLM, you earn a lot of points during these limited periods. In addition, they sometimes offer promotions where (assuming that your IQ is at least a two-digit positive number) you easily earn 70000 points. A typical 3000 point question was "The swan is the symbol animal of KLM. What is the symbol animal of KLM?". Maybe I am simplifying things here a bit, but they want to infiltrate your brain by studying one of their broschures for five minutes, and after that you are easily able to answer a number of questions worth 36000 points. I am not kidding, I received (upps) 33000 points this way, ****. That corresponds (almost) to a free JFK-AMS-JFK roundtrip!!! In addition, they had an internet game, where you had to answer another set of 12 questions, each correct anwer worth 3000 points. Each questionairre contained a link to a webpage with the right answer, and, of course, you could switch to that page before submitting your final answer. This promotion gave me another 36000 points, yeah.

If you are a low volume FF (say you fly up to 20 or 30 kMiles a year, three or four roundtrips EU-US), then the FD program is quite nice. During the double point periods you might be able to establish silverwing or royalwing status and to earn free flights. However, if your flight volume goes up (say you fly 50 kMiles a year and beyond), you can easily establish high status with your US based carrier (i.e. PremEx on UA, etc.), which means you receive double miles whenever you fly, not just in those limited promotion periods.

One other aspect which influenced my decision, with the FD program you easily earn free single leg flights. For instance, you can receive a free JFK to AMS roundtrip for 35k points. However, if you need to go from PHL to DUS, you have to spend a serious amount of additional points for your intra-US and intra-EU legs.

One nice aspect of the FD program which I am missing in the US carrier programs is the possibility to receive free oneway tickets.

Scotsflyer, do you have a link about the UA comp initiative for royalwing FD members?

Regards
Chris

[This message has been edited by parallelrechner (edited 11-02-2001).]