Rowyourboat

Oh wow that's great to know. I had a first world problem recently where I made changes to my F flight and accidentally got rebooked as a P fare, so I got too many miles and became Platinum. I was hoping to stay Gold and have the miles rollover (I would be at ~68k), but now I'm 79k and platinum.

Good to know there's a Gold soft landing in case I do not get enough for Gold next year.

/first world problem over

Gajan

To be honest, I would expect some that benefit from the rules, some do not.

I do get the impression that it - on the whole - the changes should be neutral.
We will have to wait until Monday to find out more!

Fabo.sk

Hmm, if no segment qualification, that will be a big change for lot of European fliers.
All the more reason to do my status run if still feasible. No way I'd get 40k miles on my Europe hops. Even at 100% miles.

Xandrios

Depends how much those Europe hops will cost, as earning based on distance is pretty sure to be removed..

To be quite honest I had already, kinda, decided to not try to requalify next year. If qualification by segments is going to be removed chances are that I wont be able to requalify - even if I wanted to!

Sjondorn

I'm one of the folks that qualify by level miles and not segments, so I hope that'll get easier in return

Fabo.sk

True enough, though at ~80EUR plus tax per segment average, which is about what I can expect long term even in a fairly good case, it makes a bit less than ~50% fare buckets current equivalent at 4 miles per euro.

Which means I'm unlikely to be much worse off mileswise, but suddenly instead of 15R/Ts (unless I fly via CDG to chase the status a bit) it'll be 50 R/Ts at 100 eur per segment to make it easy to calculate (at 100*4 = 400 miles per segment, 100 segments for 40K for Gold)

By comparison a 100% mileage bucket equivalent for shor intra-european flight would cost about 375-400 return, twice that for connecting flights. I don't know how much they cost now.

caliform

Same, and since I tend to pay a premium for tickets at least it'll be reliably rewarded.

jms_uk

If USA3 programs are anything to go by, level miles earning probably won’t change much, only the award miles.

Goldorak

We all feared that the segment qualification would disappeared one day because it was too easy and too cheap to qualify that way for Gold or Plat. But I hope that they will keep a sort of segment qualification scheme, either by increasing the number of segments required or adding a reasonable minimum annual spending requirement. Indeed, the segment-qualified elites bring less revenue to the airline but they are frequent flyers and loyal to the airline and they enjoy their benefits. If they don’t have Elite+ benefits anymore, those will massively go to competition for whatever reason : non-stop flights instead of having to connect CDG/AMS, cheaper, etc.
We are talking about a loyalty program...
Monday will be a febrile day for our community . We know which thread willl be the most active

Mirk

That's exactly what I was going to say. If it's only a matter of how big your wallet is, then it's not loyalty, it's a club/membership.
I often pick KL/AF and prefer to connect rather than take a direct flight because of the quality of service and reliability even if it is a bit more expensive.
I upgraded my Amex this year and I now have a PP card, so with the savings of taking direct I could add fast-track and checked bag whenever I need. I'm also very well covered in case of IRROPS with the Amex so the switch away from AF/KL will be eased.
If they drop segments for a full revenue-based program, a lot of loyal FF will book away.
I've requalified (with segments) early for next year and since segments don't carry over, I've booked trips with FlyBe, Ryanair and BA in order to test my alternatives.

orbitmic

if im not mistaken, miles rollover is only when you maintain or increase status anyway and not when you drop status.

canadavid

Talking about segment, what should we expect with the 2-4-8 segments given with AF/KLM Amex co-branded card ?

If qualification by segment is not any more possible, there will be changes in Amex card as well.
I would think, as already suggested, that they will add a minimum spend...

San Gottardo

Yes, it’s a loyalty program.

But: underlying its original design was the (right or wrong) assumption that loyalty would translate into profitability for the airline. With constant erosion of fare levels over the past 15 years, that is no longer the case. Therefore airlines have to find a different way to use these frequent flyer programs as ways to create profitability for them.

To believe that status was merely a nice gesture to say thank you for turning up on board so frequently is naive.

orbitmic

I think that’s a bit of a bold statement to make. My limited understanding is that loyal customers still generate significantly higher marginal profit than average and that the gap is even higher in the context of ‘crises’ which might of course reoccur any time.

Personally, i think the issue is more that for the reasons you very rightly point out of lower margins, airlines have less money to play with that before, and also that whilst frequent flyers still generate significant profit, airlines have finally understood that their behaviour is far more complex than one thought as is the nature of their loyalty. In other words, even highly profitable customers still want value for some of their trips and it’s not a case of people either always flying F/J all the time or flying y/low cost all the time. Instead, one might well fly J/F on many trips but cheapest Y on many short European hops without being the unlikely schizophrenics airlines once suspected.

ultimately, all this pushes airlines to reconsider where their limited investment in loyalty can and should be targeted and I fear that in that context, the ‘cheap’ segment qualifier is going to be an obvious victim. Personally, I’d guess segment qualification of sorts would be kept at silver level, and maybe at gold level with a minimum miles or spend target but I doubt it would be maintained at platinum level, especially with platinum for life.

skyhighlander

And who says it did not translate? They can't possibly know it as they have no way to measure this "profitability". Does KLM know how many times I've chosen them over BA because of status and Sky Priority and how many times I've chosen BA?

No, they don't. It's a guessing game, and there's no way to know in advance if savings made on priority services and Crown Lounge meatballs will offset the money lost on bookings that no longer be made with KLM once status of many expires.

I know they would not make any extra money on me then, as I would have no reason not to book with whoever's fare and luggage cost is the cheapest, but perhaps in the grand scheme of things and considering how large their "hostage base" at AMS and in France is, they will make savings (because it is about savings, I know marketing people are of great faith, mostly in themselves and their ideas, but I don't suppose anyone's expecting an "influx" of new pax after the announcement ).

So yeah, I think since they're doing well as a whole they're willing to try new things, so even if it backfires a bit, it's not a big deal.