NZ_Flyer

My key bits of feedback I included:
- Elite needs to be differentiated more (increase longhaul and shorthaul RU's for Elite without taking off Gold, block first few rows of FF seating/Space+ for Elite selection, work on a plan for separate lounges or lounge spaces, think of some better benefits than hotel and car rental vouchers - like free hotel chain status)
- SP and APD earn needs to be better (gave the QF example for both)
- Don't try and "enhance" current benefits without anything extra

kyanar

I don't think IAH is a corner case tbh. A lot of the Australian economy is the oil and gas exploration sector, and Southern Texas really is the O&G capital. I think you'll find a significant percentage of every flight to IAH is populated with transfers from ex-Aus flights, usually employees and partners of BHP/Chevron/BP and the like.

With JQ meddling more in the NZ market, I think this is eventually going to have to change. QF is well resourced to keep smashing their bloody nose against a wall for quite a while before it starts to bite, and I don't think they're expecting to come out of it like Ansett. NZ may have to do something to make the regional offerings more compelling.

ClanJ

This has been an interesting thread to follow. As an Elite but soon to soft land to gold I have not received the survey. But no surprise as my spend with AIRNZ in the last 18/24 months in real dollars is $500.I suspect that likde the Elite Gift saga the whole exercise is around changes to the programme which are already decided probably will not be good. In context to Elites and being being regionally based in my inner circle I will be the 5th Elite to drop out as it has just got to hard. Instead I have focused on price for my trips and qualifying as A3 gold. Sure have learned a lot and have some observations

1. A3 tier qualification can only be earned by flying. Miles earned from ancillary stuff such as CC, hotel bookings credit to the account and can be used for flight redemption's..
(As some posters have said the AIRNZ FFP should be based on flights for tier qualification. I agree reward the loyalty to the airline not the CC.)

2. As A3 Gold can purchase both tier miles if short (25% of the requal) and reward miles which can be used for redemption's (one up in another variation I would suggest)
(AIRNZ could do something similar such as once silver achieved then a % of tier miles could be purchased for gold and similar for gold to elite and of course requal), No need for the CC bit.thus reward for loyalty to the airline.

3.The CC piece is IMHO a farce. As I am still an air points member my annual CC earn in terms of Air Dollars covers my for domestic flights thus pay no real dollars.
(Again AIRNZ should move to flight based tier qualification and get rid of the ancillary stuff.)

4. Because of the flight based earn have flown enough miles to gain a business class redemption on Thai one way AKL/LHR with A3 (2 x AIRNZ RUs?) and a TT with AIRNZ (Elite short haul?)
(If AIRNZ had a flight based FFP then the flexibility for loyalty could bcome an option).

Just as an aside because I am no longer hooked to AIRNZ and can use any *A carrier out of NZ my spend has dropped around 30% compared to what I used to pay with AIRNZ. Also have found can do things differently. Have just booked a one way HLZ/MEL via Wellington with Singapore depart 1100 on ground on MEL 1530. for $213 (full service). No 2-3 drive to AKL, no exorbitant parking fess, no 2-3 hour check in which makes the option cost effective in time and dollars. Also discovered can do HLZ to anywhere in Europe and points in-between return with them as well. Whats not to like about is basically door to door.

freemark

kiwifrequentflyer

Let's survey all Australians who fly, and see how many of them want to regularly fly to IAH.

Very, very few.

For those very, very few, Air NZ is a good program, since they are forced to fly it regularly for work purposes to go to IAH, so might as well signup.

For every single other Australian who doesn't want to fly a route that Air NZ flies to exclusively... the program is a bad one for them.

It may be a surprisingly large amount of Australian business travel that wants to go to IAH. But that is easily the minority of general Australian travel. Even business travel to/from the USA. It's one single location.

Yes it is a corner case. The question being asked was is it a good program for Australians in general. Unless you have some reason to be flying Air NZ because it's the most direct route to a specific Star Alliance hub you need to be flying into like IAH, the answer is no.

poopbunny

Here is another prediction.

When NZ overhauls the program again, to be likely, harder.

QF will do another round of status match promotion.

For those on the margins of status, if benefits of status matter..food for thought.

It worked for me, I was trading a banked year and threshold gift for status in another alliance. It was a no brainer since those thresholds had risen and the concept of NZ's roulette SP earn from flying, at least in my mind, introduced uncertainty.

It took some tough love from NZ to free me from the "Stockholm Syndrome"

sbiddle

I simply don't know how you can say "very, very few".

The real world reality is that at present 7 days a week there are approximately 100 connecting Australian passengers on NZ28 - some days it will be more, other days it will be less than that ~30% loading.

Loadings to ORD of Australian passengers are exceeding that 30% figure, on some days quite significantly.

The Americas is a key market for NZ through traffic from Australia and those numbers are significant, and why we've seen increases in the number of widebody 789 and 777 services to and from Australia.

oranjemakker

my feedback was similar. Was very clear that all the shopping emails IMO were basically junk mail

oranjemakker

Very interesting, what is the earning like on A3 for domestic flights in NZ?

And can you select premium seating (space plus) as Star Alliance Gold?

Tag1987

Useless:

https://en.aegeanair.com/milesandbonus/how-to-earn/all-airlines/#Air%20New%20Zealand
Notes:
Miles cannot be earned in booking classes: L, G, S, K, P, F, I, R, X, N
*V is not eligible for accrual on Tasman & Pacific Island flights
**W, T are not eligible for accrual on Domestic flights or Tasman & Pacific Island flights

Same issue that Krisflyer has - most *A programs are based on miles and not status credits - which means your domestic earn would be even worse than with NZ.

NZ_Flyer

And unfortunately there-in lies the problem for many of us. I travel domestically for work extensively (1 return flight per week on average) plus quite a bit of personal domestic travel. I probably do 10-12 returns to east coast Australia (mix of work and leisure) and 2-4 long hauls a year in PE (mix of work and leisure). As I travel so much domestically I have to credit NZ because I won't earn anything crediting to anywhere else. I credit enough of my trans-tasman and international to QF to make Gold (sometimes Platinum if I can time a DSC promo well). So then for the rest of my trans-tasman and international I could credit all of it to QF or to another Star Alliance carrier. But if I DON'T credit to NZ then I might not make Elite but if I credit to NZ I'll be guaranteed to get Elite which then allows me to do APD100 upgrades to PE on trans-tasman and confirm upgrades from PE to J for my long-hauls.

So it's a catch-22: do people in my situation just stick with NZ for long haul for the upgrade benefits or credit elsewhere for international flights and potentially earn another *G status and a chunk of miles but lose upgrade benefits?

kiwifrequentflyer

I think we can easily say it is very very few, when you take into account how many Australians travel to the USA every day... and don't go to IAH. Count up all of the flights leaving Australia going to the USA every single day, and you have your numbers. You must also consider how many of that ~30% loading would travel to IAH 2+ a year. Unless you're regularly traveling 2+ times a year, it makes sense to go elsewhere if FFP is the consideration.

So yes it is very much the definition of a corner case. It is a very small percentage of the traffic. I am surprised this is up for debate. You can argue it's a surprisingly large number, sure. But the percentage remains very few. The question was simple: is the Air NZ FFP a good program for them if they have a choice of who to fly with. The answer is very clearly no for most Australians, bar the corner case of the few that travel to IAH multiple times a year. That was the question. The question wasn't do Australians ever need to travel to IAH.

kyanar

You're also missing another important point - that for those connecting domestically in the US, NZ offers exceptional routing opportunities with flights landing at a west coast (LAX), east coast (ORD), and central (IAH) location, with frequent domestic connection on UA, meaning you can get where you're going with a minimum of connections (and due to competition with QF and UA's negotiation of destination subsidies, are generally well priced).

QF can drop you on the west (LAX) or central (DFW), or east coast (JFK) with a stopover - no direct east coast flights available. Not to mention the times of day that NZ flights leave and arrive ex-AU. I see a lot of Australians boarding NZ flights to get to the Americas (I can't speak for Europe, as I've not travelled on an NZ plane to LHR past LAX) so I don't agree with the base point that NZ should disregard Australia as a key source of revenue. Indeed, Qantas has just released their HY results and International revenue is up (profit only dropping as a result of a $200m increase in their fuel bill). I'm keen to see next week what Air NZ says about their results.

kiwifrequentflyer

If you think that for the majority of Australians who fly, that Air NZ is a good FFP for them because Air NZ has some superior routing options to a some cities in one single country in the whole world, you're more than entitled to that. As for me, I will continue to stick to the opinion that it is the minority of Australians who utilize this, and that most fly elsewhere/have direct options already as the world is much bigger than just the USA and those cities, and so thus would benefit much better from Qantas... because again, that was the question I was answering, the question wasn't is it ever superior to fly with Air NZ, or should Air NZ disregard and ignore their Australian market, the question was for most Australians, does it make sense.

And for the Australians it does make sense for, they can't fix why it's so bad for them. It's so bad for them because for the majority of places in the world (except the USA) it's much slower to have to fly via Auckland. So sure they travel for their work on Air NZ because it makes sense. But at the end of the day, when it comes time to cash in their points for leisure, they would probably have preferred to have them banked with Qantas, since if they want to go anywhere else in the world bar those cities, it's just much worse routing. They don't have a choice of course. But they'll have wished they were with Qantas.

This question truly came about not because of the star alliance hubs that Air NZ has the monopoly on, but for TT. If people have to fly TT for work, which FFP would poach them to fly with them - Qantas or Air NZ. That was what this was all in the context of. And from that perspective, the Air NZ FFP is going to have a tough sell poaching anyone except people that have family in Star Alliance USA hubs. Why? Because again: for everywhere else in the world it's superior to connect within Australia for them. The FFP has a huge uphill battle for this very reason alone.

So for the exclusive USA routes, Air NZ's FFP isn't what is poaching them anyway: it's their superior routing. So actually, they could very well neglect this, since they basically have a monopoly, though obviously they aren't entirely neglecting their Australian customers, there is just very little they can do since their hub is in Auckland.

Again, all of this was in the context of poaching Australians via TT through the FFP.

beaglelegal

Received and, as others did, added feedback that they'd left it too late to refit their BP product and they need to do something about the lounge situation. Hoping the 787s will all have WIFI in a reasonable timeframe.