Matmid: Not worth it compared to others
 

I'm sorry to have to say this but the Matmid Club simply does not offer the returns to make loyal flying worthwhile -- especially compared to other clubs.

Part of this is disguised by the fact that Matmid uses "points" instead of the more common "miles" making comparison more difficult. Other parts, including the benefits, stand out clearly.

I don't know about you, but I like to give an airline as little of my money as possible for a particular flight. Hence, I seek the "deeply discounted" fares. At most airlines, they give you the same miles as regular coach fares. At LY they are worth only half.

Then, to make matters worse, most airlines only require some activity -- including redemptions or partner awards -- once every three years to keep all your miles valid. El Al does not have partner points expire but points for flying disappear after three years.

Let's look at what you get -- and what you have to fly -- from LY on deeply discounted fares and compare that to Alitalia and also to the other SkyTeam members. (For some reason AZ has a much different progam than its fellow SkyTeam partners.)

In making this comparison, keep in mind that you can cut the number of LY round trips in half by buying more expensive coach tickets but you can not do that with the other airlines.

For simplicity's sake, I have made all the round trips TLV-MXP but an equivalent relationship would hold true for any destination in the world.

To get a free r/t to Western Europe, LY requires 18 r/ts (36 r/ts in Biz Class).
AZ requires 9 r/ts (14 in Biz). Other SkyTeam partners require 12 r/ts (18 in Biz). Delta, however, is willing to provide them at the AZ rates if you take your award ticket on El Al!

To get a free r/t to the US, LY requires 28 of those TLV-MXP r/ts (60 in Biz).
AZ requires 15 r/ts (24 in Biz). Other SkyTeam partners want 24 r/ts (36 in Biz).

Requirements for elite status tend to differ a bit between the various SkyTeam members, so I am only going to compare LY, AZ, and DL.

To reach Silver membership with LY, you would need 20 of those r/ts in one year. The equivalent at AZ is Ulisse Club and needs 8 r/ts. DL requires the same as AZ for Silver Medallion.

With LY Silver Medallion you get a 10% bonus in points and the right to buy membership in the King David Club for $300 per year.

With AZ Ulisse Club you get a 25% bonus in miles and the right to use its VIP lounges in Italy. With Delta Silver Medallion you get a 25% bonus in miles and membership in the Crown Room Club would cost $350 (or 60,000 SkyMiles).

To reach Gold membership with LY, you would need 36 r/ts. AZ has no real equivalent but its next level is equal to LY Platinum (see below). With Delta, you need 16 r/ts.

With LY Gold you get free membership in the King David Club and a 25% points bonus. With Delta Gold you can buy membership in the Crown Room Club for $300 (or 50,000 SkyMiles) and get a 100% miles bonus.

To reach Platinum with LY you would need 100 r/ts in a year. With Alitalia's Freccia Atlata you would need 15 r/ts. With Delta's Platinum Medallion you would need 23 r/ts.

With LY Platinum you still get the free King David Club membership but a 50% point bonus. With AZ's Freccia Atlata you get VIP Access in Italy and SkyTeam Elite Plus benefits (see below). With Delta, you currently get free Crown Room Club access (but next year will have to pay $250 or 40,000 miles). You also get SkyTeam Elite Plus benefits.

What are SkyTeam Elite Plus benefits? Firstly, if you are on a intercontinental flight, you get free access to any SkyTeam partner VIP Club for that day, even if flying Coach. So if you fly TLV-CDG-JFK-PBI on a combination of AF and Delta flights, you would be allowed into the SkyTeam VIP rooms at all those airports. (At TLV that is the Dan Lounge.)

Additionally, you can use first class check in when flying on any SkyTeam partner (this is true even if you have the lowest elite status) and, if you get to the DL Gold, or AZ Freccia Atlata, at most U.S. airports you get on a much shorter "VIP" line for the security checks.

Yes, I know there are some other benefits both at LY and SkyTeam members (such as increased baggage allowance) but these tend to balance out.

Oh yes. One more thing: Non-airline partner points/miles. These are much more generous at AZ, and even more at US SkyTeam members, than at LY. It would take a very long time just to explain all the credit card possibilities but suffice it to say that with one Amex credit card (aligned with Starwood Hotels) I got enough miles for a free r/t anywhere in the US by charging a total of $14,000 without even staying at a Starwood!

Thanks for the detailed description. There are plenty of better programs but whether they work for a specific traveller has everything to do with where they are flying to.

In the past year I was on 67 flights. Of those flights 30 were in or out of TLV. Of those 30, 18 involved destinations to the east of TLV. LY is the only option for me for those flights if I want to earn points and gain status that will give me some benefit. While I could book my TLV-BKK flights on TG codeshares the status I would gain with TG wouldn't get me last-minute upgrades for the equivalent of 100 LY Matmid points, lounge access, etc. From those 18 flights (and one return leg from Europe) I'm going to be using 3 LY bonus tickets to take the family to the US this summer. I'll be just shy of the 4th ticket but as I think I may get very close to PLT this year I want to earn the points for the TLV-NYC RT anway.

Of 12 flights to and from Europe only one leg was done on LY and for the rest I put miles on my AAdvantage account. The other 37 legs of onward connections were all attributed to either AAdvantage or TG Royal Orchid depending upon the airline's alliance.

If I were travelling mostly west from Israel I'd most likely be relying heavily on one of the other alliances but since I'm in Israel and travelling east I don't really see many other viable options.

Firstly, I have to admit that while I would like to be in the King David Club the only reason is for First Class check in. Lounge access is less important as I can fork out $20 and be allowed into the Dan Lounge even when flying El Al.

You are right, of course, that there are times when flying LY is the best alternative. Flying west may well be one of those (although, perhaps, with Aeroflot now part of SkyTeam the situation may be a bit different). On Friday, I am taking an LY flight to MXP because the fare was much less than AZ's. I will be going again to MXP on LY in May -- because DL is willing to give me the ticket for less SkyMiles than it would on AZ.

(Ironically, given my 25% bonus for being DL Silver, the award ticket on El Al represents 7.13 r/ts to MXP on deeply discounted fares. I would not have made it to Silver with LY so the same trip would represent 18 r/ts. If I made it to LY Silver, it would still represent 16.36 r/ts.)

The advantage I get by being a Matmid ordinary member is that even on my award ticket I can make advance reservations for slightly better seats and I get 5 kgs extra baggage allowance. (As a DL Silver, if I flew AZ, I would be allowed an extra 10 kgs.)

If you are going to fly LY at all, even once a year, it is worthwhile to have Matmid membership. If you have no better place to put the miles/points then for these flights then credit them to your Matmid account.

But in most cases, you are better off putting them elsewhere.

In reality the situation is really worse than described above. If you flew Swiss, Turkish or SN to JFK and posted to AAdvantage you would get full miles regardless of fare paid. With a ticket "costing" 75000 miles to anywhere in the US you could go to NY or even LA for about 7 RT. If you flew the AA/LX codeshare and had Platinum status (which you could get flying just 1 RT on a challenge) you could do it in under 4 even flying deep discount economy. With the AA/LX codeshare ending it will be a little harder but there are still codeshares through Turkey
There is no way that Matmid comes even close as it takes 14 deep discount RT to go to JFK and even more to LAX
I once spoke to the Matmid office about this and all they did was try to convince me that their plan was the best. How I don't know, but they struck to their version of the facts
As to the King David Club, anyone who is based in Israel could probably apply through his bank for a "Business" Mastercard or American Express card which gives free access to The Dan Lounges for the holder and a guest. The card does not ususally cost more than a regular card. And based on experience I find the Dan Lounges to be better than the KD Club. (Better selection of food and amenities)
I still fly El Al regularly for a number of reasons but it hurts when you see how little you get when being loyal to El AL

For a Delta Silver Medallion, two r/ts to Florida (on deeply discounted flights) will get him a free trip on El Al to Western Europe.

My experience has always been that the Dan Lounges are overcrowded and noisy when compared to the KD lounge.

REALLY?

off to call the bank...
hani

It's for real
That's how I did it. I changed my Gold Mastercard to Gold Mastercard Business and now have free access to the Dan Lounge, which I still say, is in my opinion better than the KD Club

I overwhelmingly prefer the KD lounge.
Especially now that they re did the second floor.

What's more, if you credit them to an AAdvantage account, they also accrue only half points -- and that was Elal's decision, not AA's, as far as I understand how FF programs work.

I didn't know about LY's expiring miles -- that's a real scam!

Yup, if I credit them to DL I also get only half the points -- but at least that way they won't expire.

Dovster and all,

Thank you for your detailed math. it seems pretty obvious that LY isn't going to get us anywhere as quickly as AZ or some others. so is there a program you would suggest for someone who flies 2-3 times a year, to US or Europe? and usually ticket cost is the determining factor, not brand loyalty. or maybe so few points aren't really worth accruing...?

Personally, I would suggest joining the AZ program. You will get miles on it if you fly to the States on Alitalia, Air France, KLM, Delta, CzechAir or Continental. You can choose from the least expensive of all of these and still be able to take advantage of AZ's lowest mileage requirements for award tickets from Israel.

thanks, it sounds like a great idea!
hani

Haniboo, I forgot to mention that it is the club you belong to, not the airline you fly on, which determines how many miles an award ticket will cost you.

Let's say that you belong to AZ's club and I belong to Delta's. We both want award tickets TLV-ATL on Delta's new non-stop.

You would call AZ and be debited 50,000 miles. I would call Delta and be debited 80,000.

You said that you fly to the US and Europe three times a year. Let's assume that you fly in Coach and take deeply discounted fares. Let's also assume you fly TLV-JFK once a year and TLV-MXP twice a year.

You would earn 18074 miles on either AZ or DL or 200 points with El Al.

Because AZ wants only 50,000 miles for an award ticket to the US, you would get it in 2.7 years. As Delta requires 80,000 it would take you 4.4 years.

How many years would it require with El Al? You would never reach it! El Al wants 1400 points for that award ticket and each time you got to 600 points, 200 of them would be three years old and expire.

Okay, let's say that you don't fly on deeply discounted tickets. You pay for discounted fares (after all, nobody pays full fare except in emergencies).

You would get twice the number of points but you would still never qualify for that award ticket -- when you reach 1200 points, 400 of them would disappear.

On deeply discounted tickets the best you could hope for would be a free ticket to Greece, Egypt, Cyprus or Turkey (these cost 500 points). On discounted tickets, you could get to Western Europe (900 points).