ralfkrippner

Just received an email by topbonus offering the immediante availability of award bookings on EY for flights Oct 19 to Mar 28, bookings open till Nov. 17.

Bookings only available via a Frankfurt phone number.

Awards mentioned: Gulf states/south and central asia 25.000 miles; Africa/middle east 30.000 miles; Southeast asia and far east 35.000 miles; Australia 50.000 miles.

ralfkrippner

This can be found under the topbonus website https://topbonus.airberlin.com at "Redeem miles" - "Etihad":

Redeem miles with Etihad Airways

Redeem your miles and fly with Etihad Airways from Dusseldorf, Frankfurt and Munich or Zurich and Geneva to heavenly travel destinations in the Middle East, Africa, Asia or Australia. Benefit now from the reduced mile offers:
For 25,000 miles* you can fly to the Gulf states, to South and Central Asia
For 30,000 miles* you can fly to Africa and the Middle East
For 35,000 miles* you can fly to South East Asia and the Far East
For 50,000 miles* you can fly to Australia

Booking period: 19th October 2017 2017 to 17th November 2017
Travel period: 19th October 2017 to 28th March 2018

This is how you book your award flight:
Check the route network of Etihad Airways and the miles needed to book your award flights.
Award flights can only be booked by phone under our special hotline +49 69 15 32 53 484**. You can reach our hotline Mondays through Fridays, from 9am to 5pm and on Saturday, 21 October 2017 from 9am to 5pm.
Call us to find out if your flight is still available and book your award flight.
The corresponding mileage will be deducted from your topbonus account after successfull booking.

*one-way award flight with Etihad Airways in the Economy Class, plus taxes, charges and fuel surcharge. Bookable subject to availability.
**award flights can only be booked under the above-stated telephone number. (German landline calls at local)

ralfkrippner

I wonder if tix will be issued under AB or EY ticket stock...

edited to add: And I hope they won't offer those awards only with extra surcharges added on top of the regular airline surcharges...

ralfkrippner

Also mentioned in the bottom of the email: From mid of next week on the topbonus popup shop will offer Etihad Holidays vouchers. Could be a worthwile offer if as attractively priced as the EY award flights.

Concerto

Really interesting! Now a chance to use up a bunch of TopPesos! Looks like Economy class only though.

ralfkrippner

As reported by first takers now: Eco only, issued on EY stock with regular EY surcharges. So could be a quite OK deal for some.

However I wonder about the intentions. First they let you earn again on EY. Now you can for a short period of time book EY eco awards again. Are these signs that EY wants to keep up topbonus as their german loyalty program?

Let's wait and see...

irishguy28

No!

EY already has its own loyalty programme - for Germany AND for every other country!

ralfkrippner

OK - but why not have two loyalty programs (like EW has Boomerang and M&M)...

What's your idea on the intentions behind this surprising move today?

irishguy28

It's not surprising.

Etihad owns topbonus. Better to allow customers to redeem for flights on your own products -which apparently is restricted only to economy redemptions, i.e. no upgrades, no biz class - than to go around trying to obtain new flight partners for a dying programme. There's no way topbonus miles will ever be redeemable on oneworld again, and it is hard to see the current owners persuading any new airlines to sign up as partners, given that it is the FFP without an airline.

It is good of them to give any customers having a topbonus balance the chance to use them up on something half decent - I can't see the programme lasting much longer. This just seems like part of an orderly wind-down - so kudos to them for allowing people to spend the miles, rather than just disappearing and taking the balances with them.

(Whether every topbonus member wants to redeem for EY-metal flights is another thing).

RolfD

trying to get a hold of someone at the new topbonus number is impossible

Maku

Anyone managed to call them? I've been trying several times now and no-one is picking up the line, just annoying on-hold music.

Jma12

Too bad they only offer in Y. I guess you do get some value when redeem without fuelsurcharge.

Sisyphus1carus

AirBerlin obviously cancelled my two (November) return flights Dusseldorf - Curacao in business class which were booked with TopBonus points. Would TopBonus have actually transferred any points or cash over to AirBerlin for my flights ????????

What I am getting at is.....Do TopBonus still have 'my' points as they didn't actually need to spend them and as such should refund them to my account so I can now use them on Etihad flights ?

Do TopBonmus poinmts transfer over to AirBerlin as the flights are booked (months in advance) or a week before the flight date ? or on the flight date ? or after the flights have been taken ?

Of course TopBonus administratively remove them from the account balance I see online immediately so that I can't spend them several times, but do TopBonus actually do anything with them immediately ?? Have TopBonus still got the value of my points and not spent them on a flight, transferring them ?!

Concerto

I would have thought that our TopBonus accounts might get merged in with Etihad Guest, so that we all become Etihad Guest members (those that aren't already Etihad members). It's not such a bad idea, given that Etihad already owns TopBonus.

kyanar

Within a couple of days of you booking the award flight, the loyalty programs pays for the tickets - in cash - at whatever their agreement states the tickets are worth. TopBonus needs to get real money back from AirBerlin, which given it's bankrupt is unlikely. They'll be an unsecured creditor, quite far down the pecking order.