Dodge City

Start rant.

Hey, Air NZ. We usually fly from the US to OZ on Qantas. For this trip (and future trips) we would like to fly Air NZ to earn miles on Star Alliance partner CO; however, Air NZ will not give full miles (or may not give any miles) for some or all of the flights. Therefore, even though we are willing to pay more for Air NZ than we would for QF, we will stay with QF. Your policy is a disincentive for us to fly Air NZ.

End rant.

Thai-Kiwi

Mileage earning all depends on fare class, and it seems that you are disappointed that the fare class you'd prefer to pay doesn't have mileage earning to CO. It probably doesn't have mileage earning then for other *A carriers including NZ.

But this is normal airline practice, although there is some variation in the degree of 'stingy-ness' between carriers. But worth a rant.....?

Dodge City

Flying from US, Air NZ seems to be very poor for earning Star Alliance partner miles. Can earn full miles on CO / UA and pay way too much. Air NZ was a possible alternative to QF. If Air NZ monitors this board, wanted to let them know they lose us as customers.

ajnz

Buy a fare which earns miles. They are available.

jjclancy

So you're willing to pay a bit more. How much is way too much?

I agree that unbundling the fare from FF earning is a competitive disadvantage for NZ when (as is frequently true) the pricing difference exceeds any reasonable calculation of the value of the miles/airbucks earned.

NZ_Flyer

It's a very normal practice. Most Star Alliance and Oneworld airlines do the same thing.

Dodge City

Thanks, that is the point.

Currently, best economy fares are:
UA $6,222
CO $4,388
Air NZ with miles (maybe?) $2,033
Air NZ without miles (deal fare) $1,637
DL $1,620
QF $1,370

Aerosett

One thing to note is that low longhaul fares earn Airpoints Dollars in NZ's own program, but not other partner programs.

Sea-Wolf

But there's no way to do that through Air NZ's website (or at least none that I can see). It will always display the cheapest fare and the cheapest fare only. If you want to buy a more flexible or points earning fare there's just no avenue for that except to buy premium economy instead. So you're stuck with stuffing around with travel agents.

Blackcloud

I am finding that using a good travel agent who knows what I want an absolute gem. You will not really get the level of service from Flight Centre etc but from some of the smaller outlets.

KiwiSurfer

The fact NZ doesn't give point on cheap fares pushes me torward airlines that do so -- and this post proves I'm not the only one. Prior to QF/DJ exiting the domestic NZ market, the vast majority of my domestic flights within NZ was on QF/DJ. NZ was an absolute last resort.

Now we're left with the NZ/JQ twins. There is no incentive at all for me to go with NZ so I end up spending more on JQ flights since I go for JQ when the price/timings are on par with NZ.

- James

Kiwi Flyer

No points on JQ unless on flex fare, at which level NZ credits points also.

KiwiSurfer

Correct. If I have to get a flexi fare I go with JQ since QF points are worth more to me than NZ points.

- James

Kiwi Flyer

Fair enough. There are in between fares which earn on NZ but not on JQ

ajnz

It's true there's no way to do it through the website; although at least the US site now shows the booking class before you ticket which does give you some certainty. Of course if it is a significant issue you can always contact the call centre for booking, and maybe get the fee waived. It would be nice if there was a way to do this on-line, and it was discussed in the website issues/problems thread. Perhaps if there was some way for NZ to quantify lost revenue from this problem they might be in more of a hurry to fix it.

Of course, you could just credit to Airpoints and the problem disappears. It's pretty clear from this approach that NZ only cares about their own frequent passenger loyalty and less about partner loyalty, I guess due to the relatively low competition they face. It's not ideal.

Very true. The lack of points-earning (pre-SC earning) on Tasman pushed me from no-status on QF to Gold fairly quickly, because their fares were the same or slightly cheaper, and always earned points. Net result is that I now have two airlines that I always investigate, and I no longer always achieve NZ*E whereas previously I would because my revenue is split. This was, IMHO, a huge mistake for NZ and shows that their loyalty program is broken.

On the domestic side I typically always book flexible tickets anyway so I've never had a big problem with it. It's certainly better than the previous days of no-SCs at all on the cheap fares.