Well, if your wife/gf is expecting a baby, you could ask for "Maintaining your status when you take a baby break http://www.miles-and-more.com/online/portal/mam/de/programm/how_it_works?l=en&nodeid=499159", that would give you another year ;)

I am sure LH will instruct their lounge dragons to enfore the "*G lounge access only on international itineraries" policy...

How do you understand the UA / Hon Circle miles section? The wording is quite confusing, at least to me. Is the non-qualification of UA flights as of now as it says on the "enhancement" page, or as of April 1, as it says on the M&M start page?

Looking back to the beginning
 

Okay,

lets have a look how M&M’s development was in the past. From my point of view, to judge about the new enhancement, one should look also at the beginning of M&M.


01/1993
introduction of LH Miles and More in Germany for the mass of Travellers.
There was no EQM, only RDM could have earned.

Mimimun Miles on domestic flights and flights to Austria Switzerland , Belgium, Nether-lands, Luxembourg, East Europe were
Y: 500
C: 1000

Minimum Miles on European and international flights
Y 1000
C 2000
F 3000

(additional you got an extra RDM if you flew to Canada / USA -> Y + 2500 / C + 5000 / F +7500)


11/1994
introduction of Status (no segments, 50000 EQM for FTL / 150000 EQM for SEN); EQM could only earned on LH flights.

BTW, I just read the old brochure, you were able to enter the RCC if you flew UA as FTL in this time. I was not aware of this fact.

Also a change in the earning scheme, now only domestic flights and flights to Austria, Swit-zerland, Luxemboug, earn
Y: 500
C: 1000

All other countries earn mim. Y 1000 / C 2000


09/1997

Now, You got 1000 EQM/ RDM for domestic Y segments and 2000 EQM / RDM for domes-tic C segments. Also the qualifying by segments (EQS) were introduced


09/1998
You were able to earn EQS / EQM on all Star Alliance flights.

To me, this both changes were a real improvement, especially as this was the time, I began to collect miles really instead of only three or four flights in the years since I joined M&M in April 93. And in this time, M&M was all we now look back, dreaming of the good old days. But we should also be aware of the time before.


02/1999
introduction of LH Visa
Since 2002 all miles of LH VISA card holders did not expire anymore.


04/2003
Changing the earning scheme, you only got 500 mls on cheap Y tickets (L/T) and no EQS.


08/2004
Earning scheme was heavily changed (we all know, how), but every flight earned an EQS again.

Hon was introduced

Honestly, the best time was between 1997 / 1998 and August 2004. LH has mad a decision, they focus on the business traveller, not on the normal leisure traveller with four flights in cheap Y fares. Personally, I doubt the lounges will really get less crowded in peak time (which I try to avoid, which is quite easy, as the fares in off-peak are cheaper) as you can buy business lounges access by buing an US Club Pass (with add-on) or a RCC membership for app. 500 US$. If lounge access is the only thing you need, this could be one possibility or a Priority Pass. I think, FTL should still be reachable for me, though I am a leisure flyer. But having two or three International trips, this should still be possible.

LC is – as written – focusing on the business traveller or the hard core leisure traveller (aka Flyertalker).

Jan

P.S.
I hope I do not forget a major change in my little M&M history.

Do you think, we should really do this... Sen is Sen as long as you got it. If you make it with C it's better for your comfort but that's it. BTW. I also requalifed for Sen and will do in future.

Yes it is. Already (or still) on the mainpage. www.miles-and-more.de

Actually I don't think that'll gonna work that way. As far as I know at least UA just counts UA flights but not LH. Not sure about US and AC. But I think you can't make it that way. And if it would be still possible they'll find a way to fix this 'problem'. Please correct me if I am totally wrong.

Take care totti

Thank you for this post FLYGVA. Very helpful in this discussion.

As you can read on the m&m homepage UA miles will count for hon till 4/1/06 both, in english and german version. Also segments will be counted till that time, so everybody who wants to go for FTL or Sen by segments should start flying frequently in the next 3 month. :D

Perhaps LH could scap lounge access alltogether and hand out a certain amount of access vouchers per year. Perhaps 2 lounge vouchers after re-qualifying for SEN. This would bring it in line with the eVouchers. :D

The changes basically don't affect me. I am however dreading what they will think of next ??

I qualify for SEN on longhaul, mainly with F or C RTW's. I feel sorry for the poor guys on mainly short-haul or domestic Y travel. This could be a boost for prioritypass!

Prioritypass is useless if flying out of MUC / Terminal 2.

Not anymore. There used to be dinners organised in the past (should you be
close to board meetings) but all the benefits are gone.
In the early nineties airline shares used to be frought with all kinds of benefits,
including being hauled to the locations. But these days they are just money
burning machines.
LH is one of very few exceptions.

While I agree on the second part of your post, this introductory humble opinion
is unfounded (and hence an opinion, I agree):
do you think the SEN lounges are flooded with SENs?
Given how dirt easy it is these days to become a *G with UA, AC, or TG.

I think those idiots - such as I - who stick with M&L get what they deserve.

In the past, Swissair Shareholders got 5k miles per year (not per share).
Under STC rules, as a Swiss TravelClub Silver elite (like FTL) you cannot bring any guest to the lounge neither. Personnaly I'd have loved to bring a guest into the lounge (I'll be FTL in 3 months), so this are bad news :td: !

LH's ignores psychology
 

My opinion: I hate to admit it, but I feel that these "enhancements" do make a lot of sense.

From a business point of view, why would LH give status to people who bring almost no revenue (those who are flying dirt cheap fares most of the time)?

However, I feel that the the decision makers of LH are cold calculators and completely ignore the psychological aspect of earning miles/status.

IMO, an FF program is like fishing, like luring the fish onto the hook.
Sure, the fishing gear will cost you a bit (especially short term), but you'll keep the fat fishes (mid/long term)!

Continuously reducing the perks doesn't make any sense on the long term.

I feel the LH chiefs just don't get that: they prefer looking at their numbers and thinking short term.
It may be a good strategy for them: on the short term they can report increased profit to the shareholders and give their career a boost. Long term you say? They are long gone...

flysurfer you are my favourite nemesis - an oponent of style and
importance!
It just happened much like babies happen. No one really knows how but
we all have our suspicons.
But you are right originally, these programs do not sound seductive. I became
FTL and Premier by mistake in the nineties and then the addiction was triggered.
Originally this is how we start - but due the considerable inertia loyality
pograms bring, one cannot plan these things so well.
Maybe your emphasis was that the overall service of a carrier is more important
to you than its FFP.

[no companios for SENs]
I hope that this will not imply that SENs will no longer be *G then :eek: .
You don't mind the dry crackers in the Bus lounges or you don't mind that
the non-SEN *G folks have to enjoy them ;) ?

[Dr. Weero and Mr. Hyde? :D]
Good one.
Nah - I prefer plain stocks. Derivatives if secured in straddles or bands,
minus their (admittedly small) risks become interest products rather than
capital gain products (direct consequence from the Black-Scholes differential
equation) and hence are not gambly enough :) .
Are you extrpolating a universal monetary law from a singular incident?

[dropping M&L]
Not yet. But I am working on it.
And I made grand progress. By giving away awards to friends and gf, I
overcame the magical threshold and allowed my M&L account to sink below
1M miles
Once I will have confidence that UA is going to survive I shall allow this to
go even further.

Yes, but then so are our shares or whatever instrument we use to invest in the company. ;)

Kidding aside: While FTs really are emotional and knowledgable about their FF program, average FFs often are not. Over in the UA forum, there's a thread about the large amount of Million Milers, UGSs and 1Ks who have NO CLUE about their status, their perks and how to use them. There are 1Ks that haven't discovered upgrade vouchers over several years and keep sitting in Y. This is worse than a HON who doesn't know about the FCT, the HON lounges etc.

Yet, clueless FFs are quite common. This is very good, btw, because if every elite was like a FTer, most if not all of our perks would have vanished by now. So while it's great for us and the airlines to have a lot of uneducated yet local FFs, many of them high-yield customers, this also means that a reduction of perks has no siginificant effect on these folks. They don't know what they are losing, and they don't care.

Uhhh...do I really deserve this?

For the record: You picked me. I didn't pick you. :)

The latter. I believe it's fair revenge for the dry cracker treatment I get in UA RCCs, because the UA IFL, which is comperable to an average SEN lounge, is usually off-limits.

You should relocate to Vegas. ;) Of course, my investment in LH is not capped on the upside, and I try to keep my "insurance fee" quite low.

And no, I'm not interested in interest products.

Hm, that sounds funny, like an oxymoron. :)

Now what in the world leads you you believe this was a singular incident? Actually, there have been 5 of these "singular" (double digit % profit in less than a year) incidents with LH alone since May 2004, when I started my little private hedge fund. However, you are correct to assume that LH is one of the weaker (yet safe) and certainly boring (yet safe) investments. Gold, Silver, Palladium and Platin were so much more exciting during the past months, weeks and even recent days. ^

You know, this is so funny! :D Especially the 1M miles part. It's like an alcoholic proudly announcing to the world that he's now down to 5 bottles of Scotch a day...

I think I have never had more than 400,000 miles on my M&M account at any time, usually much less. It's about 250,000 right now. This will change after the STC merger, but still stay under 1M. Only by combining MP, M&M and STC, I'm crossing your "magical threshold", but remember, I got most of these miles by NOT flying. They are basically an investment to fly around non-FF family and friends (I don't have FF family and very few FF friends) in style, yet affordable.

I am not effected by the drop of segment counts.

But I have difficulties to understand, how miles&more does announce such a drop per april-1st and not per january-1st.

If you don't already requalify in just the first three months (jan-1 through march-31 2006), that change is in fact already valid per start of 2006.

weero seems to be typing very fast! That's how he missed those two letters pr that make the difference. I think he meant "a proponent of style and importance!", instead.

Greetingsflysurfer
It was a mere compliment, no offense mate.
And I also decided to pay deference to you by increasing the font size...
Nah - it was fate. The eternal battle against Mayrhuber and his minions
created that constellation.

[RCC = rye cracker club]
Episode 7, "The Revenge of Crackers" premieres hereby.
It so true that the IFLs are SEN lounges :) .
This starts to sound interesting: so it is not are pure derivative which
you are using? Is is a hybrid product such as a convertible?
Maybe not intentionally. But if you design a 'safe' derivative, hereby eliminating
the sigma parameter of the random walk equation, you are left with mu alone.
Which then is nothing than an interest product camouflaged as a capital
gain (or loss) investment.
Common sense and my crystall ball. But then what should I expect from
someone who always ends up on the new C :) . And I also have
friends who always return from Vegas with a profit ... not me though.
At least I have holostic explanation now why you indeed like LH :D !
Haven't followed the other but yes, Gold was a fun game this year, could
not agree more.
I better won't talk then about the status of my MP account :eek: .
You have to see my alcoholism in proportion. That girl already brought
down my LH account SEN account from 1.56M down to 0.99M.
I heard worse comments than yours - worst one was "you are swapping one
addiction for another"..
Guilty as charged nonetheless.
But yes I envy US residents for their opportunities to collect miles for all
kind of reasons. Even if that means that you hand your savings to such
dubious institutions as banks...

Sweet :) .
Even though I would claim that it makes no difference here.
flysurfer is both a proponent and opponent of
style.

I guess this was the definitive answer to his "Dr. Weero and Mr. Hyde"!

Uh....no. Most of my M&M miles are from not flying. And I don't deal with banks regarding mileage. Only credit cards. But until very recently, I wasn't even able to get such a card in the U.S.

Forget FlyerTalk.
This is becoming FlyerStalk!
Maybe I should mail him an autograph? :D

At least, they don't call me Mr. Pillows. Yet.

"No worries, mate." I know. Famous last words down under.

Now that's really scary.

Dude, there's no way you can pwn the Wolf.

But you could design a "M&L video game"

George is gonna sue ya.

Pure derivate. But no cap. Germany has an immense certificate market. Really great.

I know, I have been there. And boy, was it expensive...

I agree with you Rudi. But looking back, the most changes were announced in the middle of the year, though they were not as important as the drop of the segments. From my point of view, they decided to do this at this time, as then LX TC and M&M get together.

All segments earned up to 1st April got lost, so if you only have 39 segments, you are just out of luck. If you have earned 40 or even 120 segments, you got the status (again).

Jan

Will behave flysurfer, no more font manipulation

Still can't follow you: large amount of miles from not flying normally one
would get from investments such as funds or mortgages. How do you
avoid banks or bank-like institutions here?

In really dangerous situations, you are supposed to append a "she'll be
right mate" - such as when the ship starts to capsize or wing comes of
a plane..
[the battle of Mayrhuber]
The interesting part got lost in translation. I can now freely phanatsise what
pwn could stand for?
prawn, pawn, Professional Women's Network?
And is the "Wolf" you or a friendly moniker for W.Mayrhuber :) ?
Great idea - with your miles going down the drain while you do not manage
to zap the evil W.M. (wicked monster, no other allusions intended}
and free the beautiful princess LH.
Focus online has some pictures of the monster which we could integrate
into the game...
I know - and no capitals gain tax if hold on to the stuff for a year or more.
[surrogate addictions]
You are right. It might be cheaper and more satisfying to return to my bride
LH instead of maintaining real-life relationships :) .

How did you guys know? I am indeed a Dr. weero.
But I was a bit in Hyde mode recently .. as always when LH announces changes.

Now what kind of fan/stalker are you, not reading all my posts? This has been answered many times on FT. I suggest you do a search. :p

Nah, it's an English expression. So another search would have helped. ;) Like http://www.answers.com/topic/pwn

Yep, that's what I had in mind.

Oh please, I used to work for this outfit once upon a time...

Exactly. Only 4 more months...:)

^ Return your bride and return to your bride LH. :D

Reality is highly overrated, anyway.

I don't think so, as far as it is useless in FRA, too. In fact you can use AA AC but it is landside and you almost 20 min. to get to your gate. If you have somewhat 30+ in T1A you'll even need more time.

So if someone is interessted in loungeexcess I'd better stay with RCC as far as you can also use FLT-lounge and till now you can also bring a guest - but they'll cut it for sure.

For me being one of the US based HON cirlce members it is not fun that UA will no longer count for qualifying... NOt that I love flying UA (I actually hate it) but depending on the routing I have to ...

In the end I think it is only fair, even though LH has a revenue sharing agreement with UA, they needed to curb the MR practice... though to be fair, if they offer revenue sharing code shares they should count. (However, UA only counts 016 tickets AND UA metal for UGS).

I am actually quite happy with the changes... I might fall back to SEN status, one day, and then I would appreciate a higher level of service. Unfortunatley it means kicking out some SEN / FTL....

I am always astonished about the .....ing on the changes in the progrm. Everyone is complaining about crowded lounges, decreasing service, difficult award situation etc...

Now LH is doing something (and extending lounges is not possible as airport space is limited and LH does not own FRA or MUC), and it is the wrong thing.

I think it would help to go back and think what you want from a FFP...

Status privileges (wich automatically means it is elite and not all can have it)
and Awards. For me the awards situation is most important. I uses them of my summer and to fly family and friends. I know others use them for upgrades, but I am not into that... (well mostly paid F anyways).

On the award side LH has a good balance. Again I can copare it best with UA, where oyu basically can always get an ward, but what do you get? A completely diluted F product, bcs 90% of hte passengers up there are non-rev (meaning upgraded) F and the same is in C. So far I always got the award I wanted (sometimes within a 2 day range - sometimes not F on routes that are extremly busy in paid F)... but I really can't complain.

theo nly thing I think LH should change is closing the silly call center in Cape Town, as they are completley in competent.. yes I got them, too one day... But I usually use only one specific Miles and More agent. I have her email address, and I make sure that she is recognized by management for her work (she was one of the few that survived the NYC call center closing and is now a HON agent..).

So to sum it up, I hate losing the UA miles for the HON staus, but I probably will have enough anyway ( and for that I even would consider a mileage run ;)

Cheer up folks any reform has loosers, so hope you are a winner of it..

On this Happy New Year and good luck with the requalifications ...

First of all, let me thank all of you for this great forum!

Besides the m&m improvements regarding status, I realized that they also improved (=cancelled) the reference bonus for the m&m credit card gold (10.000 miles). At least since yesterday I can’t find the link any more and they also updated the application form.

As I wanted to refer three of my colleagues within the next days, I wonder if anyone of you still knows a link that is still working or has the old form as pdf?

Many thanks for your help!

No, Rambuster, not in line with the evouchers, but instead of them...

For me, the lack of an eVoucher every 50K miles and the lack of space in the SEN-Lounges are a reason for not caring anymore for SEN.
And as a "commuter" ZRH-MUC I'm the big looser anyway ;) - so I hope a competitor as Air Berlin, dba or Helvetic will fly this line soon. If I have no convenient advantages with my "main carrier", I choose the cheapest. This could be my futur strategy : Don't care for the colour of the card - save money...

@Rudi: It's absolutely possible being FTL until March 31st, with 40 Segments, but only 10'000miles...

Patrick

Lowering the mileage requirements for SENs and FTLs is definitely helping
to cull the number of elites .. no doubt ..
..
No we love. Everything - the crowded lounges and the killing of our
benefits. It gives us masochistic pleasures.

Why does LH not solve the crowded lounges with the same approach as they
solve the space issue in their Y cabin. The must be a way to herd all the SENs
much closer together than they are now.
Wenn they get the new intra Europe seats with 28" spacing, they could use
the old ones for the SEN lounges. That should quintuple the number of
SENs held in those lounges.
Of course that is just a customer focused move as they now get anatomically
shaped seats rather than unhealthy, fluffy couches.

Ave flysurfer moritura milia ti salutamus
I read all your posts religiously, oh master.
But I still think that the issue is unanswered. Even though you mentioned
your Germany investment 'tricks' a few times. But the US ones are
entirely unknown to me :eek:.
[pwn]
English ... yes.
I kill my friends and colleagues in games regularly and never came across this :( .
No bigamy for weero anymore then.
Give me another 6 months so I see if gf or M&L worsens more rapidly...

But I agree that reality, especially emotional reality is badly overrated these
days.

I like this idea. So we'll get much closer and knowing each other much better... :rolleyes:

But, for sure LH had to do somethink. I just doubt this is the right way.

Gosh. I think I know weero well enough already.

I love this thread! So, I'd like to wish a happy new year to everybody in this forum via this thread!
More miles and less enhancements!
Cheers,
A.

Thanks for the info. :(

The change to HON circle qualification is really disappointing. I fly LH a lot in premium cabins but not enough to requalify for HON just from LH and a little OS.

In the past I've made a real effort to fly LH as much as possible and credit some UA flights also, but now I think I'll probably shift some of my flying to other * partners.

Charles

Happy New Year all fellow geeks on FlyerTalk!
Yes, I do too. Even if it came into existence for an inferior cause.
[31" lounge seats]
Not as well as you will after a Y-lounge meeting in 2007 (for EUR 27.50 for
each SEN or 5000 miles but has to be reserved 2 weeks in advance).
btw I think this 'already' word is becoming awfully popular in American English
even in spots where I would never use it. Such as "do it already!". Wonder if
that is a Teutonism .. already.
I like that! I am sure Aly Mayrhuber and the forty consultants think up a lot
of thingies on how they can 'sell' rip-offs as customer focus.

You see totti there is always a bright side to these things.
And while Wolfgang bags your bunny, we get a chance to meet fellow
FlyerNerds.

I looked up in my milage acount and lufthansa set back the status miles but they didnt set back the status flights!!
At the bottom i can that i need 50000miles to become FTL and 23 Flights in Eco!!
Maybe Lufthansa is so kind to let us collect status flights more than a year so 16 months. Its for maybe for those who just get their status with flights and not with miles!!