daumueller

everyone with status has had their status extended into 2022 at least. This means we all have status in 2021. i don’t see the issue with LH (who unlike other airlines for now have 2 year status validity!) waiting into 2021 to see how the Situation evolves?

YuropFlyer

Flying in 2021 will DEFINITELY be less. Let's assume a VERY positive scenario, in which the vaccines across the world are working well, and they're able to distribute them quickly, AND 80% of the general population actually gets their shots by summer.

That would still mean the first half year will have travel around as much as "summer 2020" at it's best. Corporate travel/travel for projects will still remain low all year long. Travel for pleasure might eventually pick up once borders are opened again, but I can assure you that a travel rate ANYWHERE close to pre-pandemic levels won't be happening before 2022.

2021 will be a year where things might chance quickly, and yes, we hopefully all will enjoy worry-less holidays in summer (unlikely but possible), autumn (possibly) and winter (likely) - but that means, most pax will not fly as much as they used to. Sure there will always BE some cases where some pax will fly more or the same as they did in the past, but across the FTL/SEN/HON board, and I don't mean FT here but the whole 1 million+ of Frequent Flyers at LH group, many status pax will fly less.

And this leads me to the following impression: If LH doesn't extend status past Feb2022, for those that will take some flights in 2021, but not enough to retain status, will they really pick LH group? Sure, quite some won't have a choice, but "brand loyality" is a thing, and if LH doesn't "throw the bone", quite some LH status pax might be disappointed. Imagine some poor sod that reached SEN hood in late 2019 - maybe going the extra mile and evening doing a mileage run - to get close to nothing out of his status in 2020 and very little in 2021 - will he stay loyal to LH?

Well, those questions can't be answered (yet), and every individual traveller might react differently.

But saying "well, 2021 is going to be quite normal, so let's see" isn't going to be that great of an idea when many book their holidays well in advance. LH groups should incentive people to book (far) ahead, 300, 330 days out - to get the money "running" and being able to build a stable flight schedule. The earlier they announce "we extend status", the better for their status flyers to decide they'll book ahead.

I agree that deciding right now might will be a BIT early, with the vaccine around and all that - but in LH's shoes, once 2022 travel becomes possible to book (1st Feb 2021), they should have at least an idea what they're going to announce.

Comatose.Captain

I would not be so sure Lufti does not care.

Germany used to be the world's largest exporter. Not any more, but it's still an economy that trades a lot with the rest of the world. Lots of business travel going on. Furthermore, employees in Germany get a generous annual leave. Germans tend to use it for extensive travelling, financial situation permitting.

What am I hitting at? Star Alliance allows each member airline only a certain number of elites relative to its size. If an airline goes above, it has to pay penalty fees to other members. I assume Lufti may have a relatively large fraction of elites. It may not be up to LH to extend elites as it is not financially viable to pay the penalty fees.

Comatose.Captain

Note there are a bunch of reasons why other programs may not face this conundrum.

Obviously, hotel chains don't face this conundrum because they are not part of an alliance. Some airlines may not face the issue because they have a lower proportion of elites. Lastly, airlines for which you can obtain a status via a CC get some breathing room from people cancelling cards during these uncertain times.

oliver2002

First of all, they received a line of credit (at 9% interest) and had to give up 25% of their equity for it. Unsurprisingly, they only used 1/3rd of that line of credit so far, 6.3 bn € is still unused. Not my definition of a handout.
Second of all if LH used that state sponsored liquidity not to keep people employed and the company afloat, but spent part of it on keeping the elites happy the public/tax payers would not be amused.

more4less

Hi oliver2002,

I understand your analysis but the idea of extending the status is to make sure your FF elites keep on flying with LH, and don't “shop” elsewhere.

And we are not happy because other airlines also received tax payers money but did extend the status of their members.

Comatose.Captain

This argument is unconvincing for two reasons.

The first thing is that there is little upfront cost to extending elites. By and large, elites aren't flying right now. Extending elites is a forward-looking play. You want to make sure your elites still love you when flying picks back up in the second or third quarter of 2021. The cost comes in the future when elites use status benefits. Furthermore, as argued abobe, if the number of elites grows too much, other Star Alliance carriers may penalize LH for violating their agreements which put a cap on the number of LH elites. Note that for a typical FF program, each year about 10% of elites lose their status. So if you extend everybody and you get many new elites, that may push you over the cap. But again, there's no upfront cost. Hardly anybody is gonna make elite for the first time in 2020. So this can only become an issue as 2021 (and only if the recovery is particularly swift).

The other thing is that LH did extend about half of its elites by a year. According to your story, there should have been a public outcry. But was there? NO!

lefrid

You can find in-between solutions by granting 50% of your current status in miles like 50k for SEN for example.

Concerto

I had already gone shopping elsewhere long before this mess started and it was totally clear long before Covid that LH doesn't love you or any of its elites. This is why I never bothered making the effort to rise above FTL. And this whole development, or rather lack of it, does not surprise me in the slightest.

From my point of view, in the worst case scenario next year and I can't qualify, then I will just depend on the M&M credit card to keep my miles alive.

LXA350

Looking at the current situation, even if things will get better in 2021 it will likely not be before Q2 or Q3 next year, hence in my view there are only 2 things that would be acceptable from LH to offer to it's elites. Reduce the requalification for existing members by 50% or extend the memberships expiring in Feb 2022 to Feb 2023 and postpone the new Program rules for another year comming into effect as of 01.01.2023.

andywaw

Some of us did manage to requalify and I see no reason why this would mean we are getting nothing?
I suggest M&M should extend the membership by one year to every status holder who owns a status on January 1, 2021, regardless when their status expires.

Concerto

And you honestly reckon that they would consider doing that? This is too much of a good, sensible idea, and might cause some people to think well of them...surely they don't want that?
It really is quite shocking how they have done so little with the elite qualification thing compared to other airline schemes.

Grog

If no one else is willing to give them money and a government has to step in and BUY equity (at a discounted price), this is indeed my definition of a government handout. The line of credit of which you speak is separate from the cash injections, both then and the new one which they are seeking yet again.

If a company uses such injections to merely keep people employed while eroding its known customer base, the public/tax payers should indeed not be amused. If the taxpayer monies are being used to assist in swallowing or destroying competition, the customers shouldn't be amused either.

oliver2002

It seems M&M is waiting till the end of the year to see if any members make it past the finish line so that those can be given the regular two year renewal/extension. Once that window has closed, the one year extension of the remaining elites will be done. The extension of the obvious cases should have started in December. I'm still not clear if the one year extensions will be issued physical cards though. The German SEN/FTL credit cards will probably get it as the credit card expires.

hugolover

Is there any ORC with M&M at the moment?