julien51

Hello,

We're wondering if it's worth subscribing to the bluebiz program in my company... any feedback on it?

Thanks

kevinflyaway

Well first of all its free...so why not!

Basically you get BlueBiz points on tickets with certain booking codes. Cheap tickets mostly Q, L will earn you 20 points for intercontinental flights. Wereld Dealweken tickets are code R and will earn nothing! Europe flights earn as low as 4 points for a return, more flexible tickets 16, 24.....but real interesting are the intercon. biz tickets, which earn 200 points ( I could happily book such ticket for a colleague and earn the points)

BlueBiz is not personal so either you have a big company and buy a lot of tickets, or you are freelance like me So all my friends or colleague fill in my BlueBiz number, next to there own FB number.

I've been a member for almost 2 years now and have earn around 750 points, so thats € 750,- worth of a ticket or upgrade now-a-days. But you have to really try and call/mail a lot, since a lot of points didn't add automatically :S

But in the end its something you get extra for just filling in your company number so I would always do it.

Brobbel

Yes, but as small user you have to bear in mind that Bluebiz points are valid for just 2 years. Your points are valid until end next year and then vanish when you didn't use them. So that's different from FB, on which you can extend the lifetime of your miles with simply flying once every 20 months, in case of BlueBiz that doesn't work!

kevinflyaway

Hmm....your comment made me wonder. I just checked my balance again and it says my points are valid until 1st of january 2014. Last points were credited on the 28th of december 2011.

The terms however do mention the 2 year valid point.

Maybe its a glitch because of the transfer to the 'new' BlueBiz program, but still

Other points were credited in november?!

Brobbel

Under the new "enhanced" system your points are only valid 2 calender years. The points earned under the old program remain valid up to 31-12-2013. Points earned in November or December are also valid 2 calender years (2012 and 2013), so they will remain valid up to 31-12-2013 also. Points earned this year will stay valid up to 31-12-2014.

raistlin

And even if they do, they post after 3 months. That's really horrible.

more4less

I agree it is not great but it is for free!

In the last 15 months I have managed to book 3 return tickets in Y within Europe. Unfortunately my plans changed and I lost one of the tickets but still and I am happy with the balance and I even got FB Miles for the 2 tickets I used. ^

carnarvon

The last few simulations I made showed around 1 point = € 0.50, not € 1.

I called them to get their advice on use of points, trying to figure out if use of points was more efficient for some tickets than for others (when comparing with FB for example).

Answer was no.

And she confirmed that rule of thumb for point value was around 0.50 / point.

In which occasions did you find € 1 equivalent for one point? There could be a pattern I did not identify and which would be useful for us all to know about.

Brobbel

Maybe there is a difference between Bluebiz France and Bluebiz Netherlands.
http://f.chtah.com/i/37/276565485/Bluebiz_brochure.pdf
In this brochure (sorry, in Dutch) it is clearly marked that 1 point is 1 euro.


From Q&A on the French KLM site:
What are Blue Credits?
Blue Credits are the currency of the Blue Biz programme.
A Blue Credit represents the value of one unit of the local currency (i.e. in Euro countries, one Blue Credit equals one Euro). In some countries Blue Credits represent the currency in which airline tickets are sold, e.g. in Turkey and Israel.

carnarvon

Well, the brochure is wrong then.

I had a look at a few example and will give you one here CDG/TXL/CDG 16-19 Feb.

AF 2034/AF1135 : € 174 or 350 points
AF 1434/AF1735: € 261 or 575 points.

More examples abound.

As I said, if someone is aware of a better exchange rate for BlueBiz points, it would be great to know.

Brobbel

It's not just the brochure, it is the website also.

carnarvon

What are you trying to say?

That the website is as wrong as the brochure?

In that case, this is well noted.

Now remains the question : have you or anyone else in this forum ever found better conversion rates than +/- € 0.50 / point?

I am talking actual flights, not AF/KLM's info, since it appears to be misleading, at least in the simulations I made .

Brobbel

What I was trying to say was that the website has the same information as the brochure. I just looked and at the page "What is Bluebiz" in Dutch also states "Elke Blue Credit is € 1 waard. " (every Blue credit is worth € 1)

For award booking I have no recent experience, for gifts at their webshop the Credits are worth about € 1 (except for the Ipad2, which costs 550 Credits instead of € 479,00). I just called them, and they also stated that 1 Credit is 1 €. Unfortunately when trying to make a fakebooking the system only shows the € amount, no credits, until the page I have to give personal information. Because I don't want to make a booking right now I stopped at that point.

But then again: I'm talking about the Dutch program. I do not know if the same applies for the French program, although I guess it should be the same.

carnarvon

Yes it should be the same for France and NL...

I do not understand what you are trying to do for fake bookings.

You should first log onto your bluebiz account by selecting "book an award ticket", then you are prompted to account number and password.

Once this is done, the page looks similar to the one for bookings for paying tickets, with summary on top of number of points, account number etc,.

You choose the destinations, then the flight list is the same as when in €, but the "prices" are in points. All this before you have to confirm anything.

You can compare with the same flight combinations paid with in €.

bodory

I have a BlueBiz FR account and it is indeed the rate I find.