anandrag

Swiss? They won't survive for long and there route structure is nothing compared to BA's long reach in AsiaPac. I don't think any other airline could fill the void if BA were to leave. Perhaps LH could in terms of route network but 1. they won't leave * and 2. their onboard service is pretty average

anandrag

Horrid... even in BC and FC!

anandrag

VS is fantastic but Richard Branson would rather go out of business than join AA in an alliance! Also, SQ owns 20% of VS and would never allow VS to join 1W with SQ part of *

hfly

Francophile......

Try reading the actual Qualiflyer board. As bad as this may sound, the profile of many trip report writers is someone who doesn't travel outside of the US very much and would believe that SR offered a great product. If you were actually to read the last few years of actual comments from people who fly weekly in and through Europe, you would see that SR has become synonymous with TOILET over the last few years (one of the many reasons that the airline is BUST and does not exist anymore).

For that matter there was a certain person who believed the same as you did and encouraged people to invest in SR (also to get 5000 qualiflyer miles). Well, the history is there, the people who did so lost their money.

Now, when I speak I speak from experience, and many of my comments can be found on the boards. 2001-- no SR flights. 2000 --- 10 SR flights. 1999 --- 21 SR flights. 1998 appx 20. 1997 appx 18. Previous decade to 1997, anywhere between 4-16 per year.

Notice the peaks and then decrease?? I was flying to basically the same places and my flight frequency has been increasing appx 15% per year for 5 years, yet I abandoned SR. Why?? Because they began to stink (although they were great for the infrequent leisure traveller). Scratch a bit deeper and you will find that
it was fliers like me that abandoned the airline wholesale, and we know what to expect from an airline. SR no longer offered it.

Snoopy

hfly

I agree with you. I was a Swissair Travel Club Member and then got so mad with them over a couple of incidents, the lack of a good entertainment system in C-class on their MD-11's that I gave up and went over to LH. I am now a Senator there and haven't flown Swissair for ages. My TC membership just lapsed...oops I should update my profile.

Seriously though, I thought that SR had become arrogant and snooty and had lost that caring and reliable image.

Guy Betsy

Actually SQ owns 49% of VS.

LH738

If BA leaves OW there's certainly a hole In Europe. Neither Virgin nor Swiss have a big network (in Europe).

The other question is about the remaining carriers in OW. Will they stay in OW? QF works very good with BA. Will they follow BA? And what about CX, LA?

NM

Remember that BA owns 22.5% of QF, so it would be interesting, especially with the way QF and AA have been working closely recently, including announced move from TBI at LAX to the AA terminal, and non-stop AKL-DFW flights taking QF right to the heart of AA teritory.

QantasAllTheWay

It seems from the financial rumours on the weekend and this week that BA will not sell its 21.5% stake in QF. However, that doesnt necessarily mean that QF would automatically follow BA if it left.

However, i dont think it would make sense for BA to leave. Whether or not it can amalgamate with AA (which now looks unlikely), you cant even compare the OW benefits they get as opposed to an alliance with NW/KLM. None of those airlines would feed PAX into BAs network like QF, AA, LA and also CX to some extent. It would be terrible to see BA leave for obvious reasons, but i really dont think they will.

writetorich

I discovered something intresting, to me at least.
The reason that AA / BA do ont allow miles over the Atlanic- either North or South has to do with U.K. regulators. It is not because of objections by either of the respective airlines.

Also Lanchile earns miles , includingh identical routes that AA serves.

Hagbard Viking

This is the excuse we have been hearing for quite some time. However, I don't really know what to believe. For example, depending on your country of residence, AAdvantage mileage earning on BA (non-Atlantic) flights in coach, is restricted to certain fare classes (most restricted for UK residents, most liberal for US residents). I doubt very much those rules are due to UK regulators, so there is something else going on as well between AA and BA.

And while on the subject, flights on CX in discounted coach don't earn AA miles, while the same fare classes earn miles with Qualiflyer. Quite amazing that oneworld partner AA has a worse FF deal with CX than QG. I think the "one" in oneworld is an overestimate, 0.7 or 0.8 would be more relevant...

QantasAllTheWay

Also with QF FF you dont get points for a whole lot of discounted economy seats with CX. But i also know that in *A for example, AN FF could not get points for some discounted fares with SQ. So it seems like the norm in alliances.

Im pretty much against that - if its an alliance you should be getting points for all travel within the alliance, even if its at .7 for discount!

SFOJFK

Here's the answer I got from Randy during one of his chats:

http://www.flyertalk.com/transcripts/011702.html