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Further changes: Origin and destination pricing as of June 2018

Introduction

Further to the earning schedule as per 1 April 2018, the number of miles required will also change for tickets booked after 1 June 2018, as FB will be moving to dynamic pricing. More information will be available on the Flying Blue website as from 10 AM (CET) on Monday 12 March. This is post is to give a recap of the changes.

Should you have any changes to make, please update the Wiki as more information is made available.

Best,

JOUY31 & Gajan

Change 1: Every ticket can be booked using miles

All revenue tickets will be available for purchase with award miles. There is a link between fare in cash and the number of miles required, but this can change as the ticket price increases (i.e. the conversion rate is not fixed).

Please note that by moving to the new system, there should be no difference in the award availability.

Change 2: Destination dependent

As of 1 June 2018, Flying Blue will move to origin & destination pricing. This means that the current zones will be abolished.

This means that you will see a difference compared to the current pricing depending on your destination within the current zone. In general, the following applies:

- East coast USA: decrease compared to current pricing;

- West coast USA: increase compared to current pricing;

- Asia: decrease compared to current pricing;

- Africa: depending on destination;

- South-America: depending on destination.

Furthermore, due to O/D pricing per cabin, it is also possible that the number of miles for an Economy ticket could increase and the number of miles for a Business ticket could decrease (e.g. Paramaribo).

Change 3: Changes per class of travel

Depending on your class of travel you can see the following differences in the number of miles required (for departure from Amsterdam and Paris):

- Economy: an increase/decrease of 4,000 miles;

- Premium Economy: an increase/decrease of 8,000 miles;

- Business: an increase/decrease of 10,000 miles;

- La Premiere: no changes.

For connecting long-haul flights (e.g. SIN-AMS-JFK) it is likely that this will see a decrease in the number of miles required.

Change 4: no more Flex awards

As all revenue tickets can now be booked as award tickets, there will no longer be Flex awards.

Change 5: Reduction of miles required for certain European flights

As of 1 June 2018, the number of miles required for certain European destinations has been reduced from 8,500 miles to 6,000 miles.

Change 6: Cash and miles option

As of 1 June 2018 you have the option to pay up to 25% of ticket in Cash for a reward ticket.

And a good article by Ralph, see link (https://insideflyer.nl/nieuwe-award-...n-flying-blue/)

An interesting change seems to be "change 6".
Will it be a la BAEC where awards can be paid in part with cash? If so, it seems strange that you could "pay" up to only 25% in miles, and therefore 75% in cash. This will be more like a straight purchase with a sprinkle of miles.

I find this option cash+miles quite attractive, especially when you have a smallish amount of miles with no opportunity to use them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gajan (Post 29513701)

And a good article by Ralph, see link (https://insideflyer.nl/nieuwe-award-...n-flying-blue/)

And an English translation: https://insideflyer.nl/new-award-tic...t-flying-blue/

Quote:

Originally Posted by brunos (Post 29513759)

As I understand it, it is the opposite; 25% of the miles price can be paid in cash.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gajan (Post 29511050)

Please note that by moving to the new system, there should be no difference in the award availability.

If every ticket will become available by booking with miles, where presently this is not the case, what does the above statement mean?

Is it that the "normal" mileage booking will continue, unchanged, while this "dynamic pricing" is built on top (so that once "normal" award seats are gone, you can consider paying more for the "dynamic" pricing?

The new calculator is missing some routes...

Quote:

Originally Posted by KLflyerRalph (Post 29513768)

As I understand it, it is the opposite; 25% of the miles price can be paid in cash.

thanks, have corrected it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gajan (Post 29511050)

All revenue tickets will be available for purchase with award miles. There is a link between fare in cash and the number of miles required, but this can change as the ticket price increases (i.e. the conversion rate is not fixed).

Thanks Gajan and Jouy31 for sharing this with us.
It doesn't look too bad but what worries me is the part I have bolded in your post.

It’s all looks pretty bad to me. If the miles prices really reflect the cash prices for the same flight, then the whole program is destroyed. It will be like the Flybe one (Rewards4All, and look what happened to it). On the other hand, I stand by my earlier theory that business class miles prices could reduce, relative to economy.

Thanks KLflyerRalph for the article!

Looks pretty bad also to me: while some prices in miles seem to be attractive compared to the current scheme, they are the starting ones i.e. minimum! To be then compared with lowest X, R, V or N fares when it comes to long haul economy for instance (and Z for business). Meaning also we do not know (yet) the highest ones!

Also the fact the zones no longer exist will kill the opportunity to fly award tickets on the most expensive routes (ex-CDG or AMS comes to mind for instance).

DUS-JFK in J starts at 53,000 while CDG-JFK starts 57,500.

The pricing for CDG-SIN is weird: Y starts at 36,000, W is the double at 72,000 :D while J is only 90,000 i.e. 18,000 more than W and 5 times Y.

Intra asia on partner is pretty much catching up to other currencies now. 10k one way flights looks no more, I'm seeing doubled rate pretty much.

Quote:

Originally Posted by bodory (Post 29514437)

Fully agreed with Bodory,
Even if the new quotation seems interesting they are well mentioned as a minimum by the calculator, let's see what will be the maximum and at which frequency we find the minimum.

Warm regards

Quote:

Originally Posted by bodory (Post 29514437)

The pricing for CDG-SIN is weird: Y starts at 36,000, W is the double at 72,000 :D while J is only 90,000 i.e. 18,000 more than W and 5 times Y.

Wonder how do typical money fares compare. It could be that W is relatively expensive on the market with a high comparative demand for W for whatever reason (travel policies of the big customers?)

Definitively AMS and CDG have higher rate.
Other European airports (DUB, BRU, FCO etc...) and even Nice (NCE) are cheaper