fassy

I think the goal should not be to inflate the numbers of elites even more by pooling basic points... lounges are crowded enough as they are.

I know that's quite selfish but that's how I see it.

kauppias

I doubt too many would Bother To do family MRS just for status I would I allready rakentaa my kids on some runs its fun for them

FlyingMoose

I don't think that's selfish at all. An airline should not provide perks which need to be earned for the sake of providing them, its a reward for loyalty and revenue generation.

SAS should pull their act together on their loyalty program, first making sure perks provided are top notch instead of sub par. There is no point in providing 10 perks because it feels like a good number if 9 of them are terrible. Only a very minor portion of EB's self-invited perks, such as C+P tickets are useful while a lot of the essentials are poorly executed.

Make Diamond harder to achieve, 200k or 300k points would be fine as well, and clean up your lounges (provide edible normal food and warm meal options day around, comfortable seats, keep things clean and expand the lounges when they run full). If its to expensive to provide that because of the number of people, then reduce the number of elites. No Silver's in the lounges, and if they end up to crowded still, no golds.

Do things right or don't do them.

livious

I agree that lounge overcrowding is becoming a problem and that something needs to be done. Family pooling of status points will not in this regard. I think it would be difficult to eliminate Gold elites from using the lounge (especially as *A Golds would need to be eliminated as well), so the logical step will be that SAS will increase the thresholds for EBG and EBD. I would normally be okay with this, but I fear that family pooling will skew elites from single business travelers towards families. If I were to guess where SAS earns money, it would be of interest to retain the business travelers as elites instead of the families pooling the status points from their annual vacation.

Ultimately I would prefer that SAS eliminates lounge access for EBS during holidays and also for Plus tickets and does not allow for family pooling of status points...as opposed to hiking threshold (unless the number of elites is not cut back).

livious

True, but there are a few of us FTers that did this before family pooling started... http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/sas-e...s-mr-kids.html Family accounts will only encourage this and it really could make these sort of status runs worthwhile.

nacho

An easy solution would be all the points pooled into the account will be turned into extra points (not status qualifying) - I thought it's the case already. We have already got *G so we are not interested in getting status with SK. Therefore we are only interested in pooling the points together so we can redeem award flights or COOP points for our grocery.

Regarding overcrowding in the lounge - it's not just for elites but tons of Plus pax of all ages, and SK is earning $ from these customers too.

FFlash

I doubt that pooling will creat an elite flooding problem. While some may use that mechanism to earn Gold or Diamond, I doubt it will affect in numbers. Those will be few and their families not flying that often anyway. If they did, they would be elites anyway. I think it will only add few number of people who were close to being elite without pooling, but leverage a family pooling mechanism to get there. And then, those few are definitely now flooding the lounges. I bet there are more *G and guests who make a difference.

nacho

I'm not sure if the lounge is full of *G and guests, as 1 *G can bring in 1 guest. I think it's more likely to be all the Plus and C pax.

Jainzar

Let's don't forget that SK has several own lounges and at some airports there is a seperate Gold lounge. I would be surprised to find there non *G guests that were not guested by a *G. So Plus and C pax without a flashy card are not found there.

And you being close to CPH might see things differently from me with basically ARN T5 lounge experience only. I haven't been at SK's CPH lounges for over two years but I as far as I read here on FT those are the worst ones nowadays.

nacho

My observation at the CPH lounge - I was always upstairs as we are *A but we did check out the downstairs offerings too. Most of the times when we fly on a Friday late afternoon the lounge was packed with primarily business travellers - people who dressed like one and working in the lounge. But then in June early morning it was packed with families with kids (I think this happens when SK lets EBS+ Co. in). The whole lounge was like a circus with kids running around upstairs.

I'm not bothered by this as it's difficult to find a seat either way. I don't believe in some FTers thinking that clans are consuming all their food and drinks, so that there's nothing left.

I have no idea if those Plus or C pax can use the upstairs area at CPH.

studentCPH

Plus and C (and EBS when allowed) will only be allowed in the downstairs lounge in CPH unless they have. they have *G or are guested by one.
As such the kids running around upstairs must have part of a party with *G.

nacho

I guess it must be EBG+ Co. as *G can only guest 1 in.

CPH-Flyer

That's different lounges in the Scandinavian capitals though, you and your guest as *G is not bothered by the flood of Plus and C pax....

nacho

I think that's the case for CPH, but ARN T5 there is only 1 entrance and it's for everyone pretty much. I was in both lounges and the CPH one was more like a zoo (I'm using the terms FTers use here on FT - I don't really mind as we only travel for leisure) than the one in ARN.

The only thing I can imagine that brings all the kids in the upstairs lounge must be EBG as they are the only *G that can bring their families in. So if family pooling creates more EBG, then there will be more people using the lounge - as 1 EBG member can bring a whole clan into the *G lounge.

Jainzar

Also at ARN and OSL they are separated. At ARN as *G you head in the entrance area to the left and the others to the right. And in OSL there is a gated entrance to the Gold lounge in the regular lounge.