One year on. Where did we all go?
 

The 20th of April 2012 was the day when bmi passed from Lufthansa to IAG and the integration process got under way. A mere six months and change later the bmi mainline operation would be gone taking with it wonderful memories of cheese toasties, diamond club doors, those dreaded 'important news about your flight' emails and a certain wallpaper pattern that we all knew and loved.

So where did we all end up and how are we finding it? My travel circumstances have changed a fair bit lately and I've been very grateful for the year of free status since my normal pattern of shuttle flights hasn't been happening this year. BA shuttles have been fine (and thankfully I've so far avoided any weather related debacles). Haven't tried Little Red yet but certainly intend to. I'm crediting to the Executive Club but my annual mileage total is nowhere near what it was in the days of quad mile bonuses and the beloved bmiPEDIA.

Other than that I did a fair amount of flying on Vueling (who I really liked but who only give a Lufthansa mean level of Iberia plus miles), a little on Air France (not nearly as bad as I'd been led to expect) and Ryanair (just as bad as I expected but if you expect it you can survive) which left me wondering whether to keep playing this status game). Certainly keeping BA silver beyond 2014 would be a big ask since I'm unlikely to be able to leave Europe. Sure the lounges are nice but even at an average of 30 domestic shuttles a year I'm not sure I can justify the added expense.

So how about you guys? :)

One year on. Where did we all go?
 

I've mostly flown BA with a few flights on EI (upcoming) and AA. So pretty much stuck to Oneworld. I've enjoyed a free upgrade from J to F already on BA (NYE flight!).

Funnily enough I flew ALOT with KL and AF in the initial few months. Racked up a tonne of points and quite enjoyed the J experience on KL (mostly between AMS and DXB).

I haven't flown star alliance since the Demise of bmi despite having status across 3 airlines. I let all my AC free upgrades go to waste.

Think ill mostly be with BA from here on out though.

I moved everything to BA. I had to move to BA when bmi stopped flying to Glasgow. I took some bmi flights from EDI initially but that wasn't an option in the long run, so I moved to BA. Fortunately, my company had an agreement with BA that gave me Silver status immediately.

I used to be a big fan of Star Alliance and was worried about moving to BA and OW. Now I'm glad I did since I'm very satisfied.

There are many things I like about BA and BAEC. As someone who has to fly on cheap economy tickets for work, I really like the 100% bonus for Silver members regardless of ticket class. I'm also very happy with the service provided by BA, both on board and in their lounges.

OW has good connections all around the globe and it seems to get even better (e.g. the LAN/TAM merger in South America).

I have no plans to move back to Star Alliance when I move to a city where this is an option.

Good spot with the anniversary! Seems incredible that it's a full year since things changed so dramatically.

I have reasonable stashes of BAEC and M&M miles. In the case of BA, I hope to make them last a long time by spending on Upgrade using Avios (T class to J, naturally) and the new, region-friendly Reward Flight Savers. But I've come to the conclusion that I don't particularly like LHR as an airport for getting into and getting out of - and let's face it, these are pretty basic requirements!

Although still interested in miles - I'm quite serious when I say I'd rather not fly at all than go long-haul Y - I've decided that I'm tired of the status game. From now on I intend to choose destinations purely on their own merit and fly whatever airline or alliance makes sense for each trip. A Priority Pass will take care of lounge access. Still have two gold cards and one silver across the three alliances, but can see it all going over the next few years and am not remotely worried.

In short, expect to see me almost anywhere!

In BMI days I always flown *A.

Now I mostly fly the airlines I like, regardless of alliances and FFP

So EK, CX,AA and SQ are getting all my business.Some EY too,but tend to limit this as it's a very disorganized operation.And I hate the champagne they serve ;)

Intra-EU - just take what is cheapest and have better times for me. Flown FR today :D

Also aiming to get back AA EXP this year, so I don't have to pay for US domestic F all the time.

BA Gold card has been used very few times to enter a lounge, and that's it. Will never put a single mile into it, because of surcharges BA makes you pay to redeem awards. AA is so much more convenient.

Also fly BA sometimes, but usually dread the experience - lottery with old/new F, totally uneatable food and usually mediocre service.

Regards,

El Puerco Volante

Mainly BA. I have dabbled with the Alaska Airlines scheme buying up a LOT of points for a CX redemption that would have been a sitter for something with Diamond Club in the past, but haven't joined any new FFPs in the last year.

I suspect the answer from many of us would be "nowhere" due to the large amount of white space on the BA redemption availability calendars for places we'd want to redeem to in premium cabins...... :(

Wishing that bmi would hurry up with their FFP and credit card :rolleyes:

I beg to differ...

I've managed to redeem 2 J seats to HKG for exactly the dates I wanted and 5 seats to YVR/SEA (out in F, back in J) for a family holiday within a few days of what would be ideal.

And let's not forget the incredible value BA's reward flight savers offer compared to BD redemptions in Europe, especially if you had to connect somewhere....

Depends on where you want to go. West Coast F/J (SFO/LAX) has been woeful since last November when all availability pretty much disappeared. It's no good trying to plan anything when you might have to wait until 1 or 2 days before to actually secure some seats. Willing to bet that LAX will be even worse next winter when the 380 comes online.

I've shifted my UK Dom and most UK-Europe flights from a mix of BA and BD to mostly BA, and I have shifted my crediting of *A flights to A3 and OZ.

I'm keeping my A3 *G topped up occasionally while aiming for lifetime D+ with Oz (yes, lifetime is not to be relied on, but with Oz I think the threshold level makes this worthwhile). I've not redeemed any miles with Oz or A3 yet but both seem OK for availability when I have looked - A3 offers 'flexible' redemptions which looks good.

However, am missing DC earning levels and some of the finer benefits of the DC scheme!

if you are flying a mix of airlines then Amex Plat (in a country where this comes with Priority Pass, or the IEC if your country's Amex Plat offering does not) may be a solution to lounge access.

I have found the BA Gold card quite useful on the few occasions I've flown out of T5. The free changes on RFS have been very good too.

Most of the time though I've been using EI for my flights to and from Ireland. They've really put BA to shame out of BHD, and are (usually) cheaper! Made good use of the Elite bennies.... Not sure what I'll do next year; unlikely to maintain either!

Got my BA Gold card but it's just sitting in my wallet looking pretty, never having been used even once. I've only flown BA twice many years ago, before I knew anything about FlyerTalk or even FFP's, and I don't plan to fly them in the future, unless perhaps I get a customer located in the UK.

Since the demise of Diamond Club, I've just been crediting my flights to OZ's Asiana Club and am now a lifetime *G with them (reaching the 500K status miles mark gets you lifetime Diamond Plus). I went from splitting up my miles between BD, OZ, and TG to strictly OZ now, although my flying was greatly reduced at the same time, so I'm happy with just one FFP, especially being I'm now lifetime after being cheated out of BD lifetime by BA's takeover of BD and not recognizing their responsibility to keep the promise BD made.

Being there's little chance of me ever flying whatever the remnants of BMI are, nor joining whatever FFP they may ever introduce, BD/Diamond Club is just a memory to me. Still have over a million miles though that got transferred to Avios. Not sure how I'm going to use them. Perhaps book some trips for my friends if they're flying on routes where they can be spent. I tried to book a vacation together with a friend using the miles, but availability was so terrible, and having to do multiple transfers and purchasing tickets on some routes meant the cost would have been as much as just buying a direct ticket, and we would have wasted a couple of days of the vacation just waiting around for a transfer flight. If worse comes to worse, I might have to just use them for hotel stays, even though it would mean terrible value for the miles.

Don't forget to keep some minor activity going to keep your Avios alive if you can find use for them

Flying pattern has changed/reduced, but been using BA for the most part. Redemptions for DUB - LHR is nice, but also use Ryanair or whoever suits be best on the hop across/back

A3 is a nice back up to have, however, as I won't retain BA Gold for sure!