quinzinho

It's a very, very sad state of affairs at MH.
The most basic of services a full service carrier is supposed to provide is nowadays out of the question at Malaysia Airlines.

This time I'm talking about making a simple flight redemption.
After having tried twice on their Enrich portal, gotten my miles deducted once while flight confirmation wasn't made, and having to claim it back I was still without my desired flight booking.

Then I decided to try a partner redemption via phone. This was followed by a new chapter of having to suffer MH incompetence whereby of course the first 5-6 or so preferred flight options are all unavailable, and when you've finally found a round trip fare which is supposedly available, MH' famous IT failures take over and their system cannot produce a miles quote for the fare... It took more than 30 minutes eventually to get it and when finally quoted, it was - of course - even worse than their own flight redemption which is completely unbookable since their website simply does not work.

Really: WHY, Malaysia Airlines, would I opt to remain a loyal customer?
- Your flight timing statistics are appalling
- Your IT is third world standard at best
- Your Enrich program is an insult to clients and has been stripped of everything which is nice
- Your cabins are dilapidated
- You do not seem to have any grasp of expected service level by loyal customers
- You do not even serve alcoholic drinks in business class (!) on flights <3 hours, nor in your domestic lounge
- You do not bother to reply to complaints on e-mail

Think it's clear for me. By this year I'll reach OWE and I'm going to shop around and will jump ship.

Rant over.

zsc

Not going to deny the above, have experienced some (especially the shoddy IT and the poor frequent flyer program), but I'm just going to say that some other FFPs are not as great as you expect them to be, so would be prudent to keep your expectations in check. If you have the option of getting 4 eligible BA flights, I would suggest giving BAEC a thought. Jumped ship during the recent QRPC devaluation and despite poor longhaul redemptions, it still is a decent program. I spend quite a fair bit of time in MY/UK, so it's a no-brainer for me - perhaps this might be of help to you.

quinzinho

Thanks. Indeed BAEC is an option for me, but even doing a status match to Star Alliance I could consider.

jhneoh

Indeed, I'm from Penang and when I started flying more often recently, from the start I dismissed the possibility of crediting my flights to Enrich. BAEC suits my purposes much better.

d00t

What were partner redemptions you trying to make? OW or non-OW? I would think OW redemptions over the phone should be simple.

Enrich status earning and benefits as Silver/Gold/Plat are either on par or above other OW programs. As zxc says, don't think the grass will be greener on the other side.

quinzinho

Redemtion was KUL-KIX on MH... over the phone the quoted rate was higher than online, so did not accept that.

joer1212

Their website is absolutely atrocious. Can't book an award flight, and can't even search for MH award space because the website gets stuck "searching" forever. Just horrible and unacceptable for a major airline.

quinzinho

I usually get to the part where I selected my award flight, but then ALWAYS the payment for the taxes refuses.. so I end up having to call the call center which sometimes proceeds to quote me a higher redemption amount... Absurd.

d00t

My last experience with the call centre to change an award booking took me 3 hours.
The call centre staff were totally useless.

Similar experience to you in that call centre seemed to only see certain inventory, despite other fare classes being available through their website and via other distribution channels.

Makes me think it's a shady tactic being deployed by MH to extract more cash from people who call.

tchron

talfred

Anyone knows what happened to the Miles only redemption function?

quinzinho

Yes MH changed it. Now you have to go for paying cash, but at checkout there's a slider bar which you can use to "get discount by trading in your miles"... I saw somebody comment that this resulted in even worse redemption rates, which I am afraid is likely the case.

dici

I tried to play the miles and cash on several one-way, the value of the miles is 1 miles = 0.007 to 0.01 USD. It is not worth for short distance redemption, as it falls at 0.007 USD side, but worth more when you try to redeem it for longer flight such as KUL-SYD. But the BA avios still beat it all the way.


One interesting on the miles and cash feature. You can upgrade your class of your ticket after you buy it. Last year I did the miles and cash redemption for one of KUL-KTM roundtrip for my partner. However, due to some circumstances we need the departure to be in business class, so my partner call in and just pay for the fare difference. At least in some way it provide the flexibility and very low miles value. For me, majority of my miles comes from my CC spending, so I just stockpile my CC points and then decide to deposit into which FF acount.

d00t

HKG-KUL
KUL-HKG

Other good options are:
KUL-LHR
LHR-KUL

Although - as it's a redemption booking that won't EARN miles, given KUL/LHR is long haul - if you're in high earning economy or biz class - the LOSS of miles earning from redeeming miles is not worthwhile if you have elite status.

Now, all my credit card points now to go KrisFlyer.
The removal of the "use miles" radio button was a stealth devaluation by ~10% (as far as I can tell based on my experience in redemptions).

Zawnet

Just as it had mysteriously disappeared without any notice or official explanation many weeks ago, the "full" miles redemption (you still need to pay airport taxes etc in cash) has made a silent re-appearance on the MH booking engine!