highupinthesky

During the strike about a year ago I would say.

If I compare SK customer service with LH, Swiss and Austrian I would rate SK higher that all 3 together

CPH-Flyer

There will never be an official waiver for sure, but writing a nice mail once the qualifying period is about to end might work.

Anyway, the worst that is going to happen is that 5 minutes of typing an email will be lost.

GUWonder

More and more loyalty programs seem to be waiving re-qualification requirements in ways or launching up promotions for extra status credit. It will be interesting to see what Finnair does and if that is what it takes to get SAS to move on this.

Some airlines seem inclined to try to use the extra equipment availability to sort of increase flying to popular warm weather spots away from Asia.

CPH-Flyer

I would imagine that a lot of programs start offering regional waivers, rumours are that some of the hotel chains are already doing this for people located in China. I would imagine airlines would do the same for China, as they will potentially be loosing large amounts of status members. Cathay did it during SARS as well.

Finnair is more exposed on China than SAS is, and if they have a good member base in China, I am sure they will be generous as well but I doubt that Finnair or SAS will be giving general waivers for European members.

Aerospatiale

Did you contact SAS?

Seems like CX are working on something, SQ is also mentioned in the article
https://amp.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/...requent-fliersA Cathay Pacific spokeswoman said: “We understand that the Covid-19 outbreak may have affected their travel plans, and we are exploring different options to help our members achieve and maintain their tier requirements under the circumstances.

“We will communicate to our Marco Polo members as soon as the plans are confirmed.”

highupinthesky

Both memeber of the CX and SQ FFP's are affected A LOT harder than any member of the EB FFP.

I don't see my posts as hostile, but you still haven't answered the question of where to draw the line. IMHO if would have been fair if SK had handed out status waivers during the strike about a year ago. That strike affected a lot more EB members status run than the current cancellation of flights from China.

And what about the outbreak in Italy. I won't be surprised if I Monday morning will receive an e-mail stating that I'll not be allowed to use MXP when traveling to my clients in the Lugano area of Switzerland. Should I be granted a waiver for those canceled flights despite there is an alternative, which is about 1 hour longer on the outbound, but will require a layover in ZRH on the return.

JR67

Not weighing in on the current situation, but last year's strike definitely did not give reason for status waivers. I was booked SK J, and was rebooked United J (Polaris). Same earnings. SK fixed everyone who didn't cancel on their own. I doubt anyone lost status because of the strike. It was one of the few shining examples of SK CS doing what they should....

highupinthesky

The same approach can be used for the canceled flights to China. The only difference is if the PAX decide not to fly at all, whether this is due to personal preference or the employer restricting travel to China. But then again. During the strike there were quite a number of trips which were canceled altogether for various reason.

Zorthos

I had 4 trips to the US, 4 trips to China and 2 trips to Mexico booked this year.

​​​​Judging by how work is reacting to the situation, I'll be lucky if I get 2 US trips. I'm 100% losing my status on everything this year, no SAS, IHG or Hertz

highupinthesky

I'm not sure how long your year is, but if we look at the other epidemic's like SARS and MARS, the travel restrictions only lasted for 2-3 months, and so far I don't know of any company who has restricted travel to US and Mexico. The company I'm working for is normally pretty restrictive, but still allow travel to the northern Italy without restrictions.

Yes it's annoying with the disruptions, but it's not the end of the world.

Zorthos

So the current restrictions are:

No travel to Asia at all.
Mexico: only if you are from NA
US: Request for permission but book easy to cancel flights.
East Europe: nobody in or out
West Europe: W Europe only
UK: Europe only minus Italy

It's a bit disastrous right now, they are estimating huge losses. Automotive by the way.

highupinthesky

There is no doubt there are restrictions and disruptions at the moment, but in a month or two most of those restrictions is likely to be lifted. Also in a couple of months we will hit summer and that will help containing the virus spreed too. Today it's actually a nice spring day with sunshine where I am in DK.

GUWonder

The economic hit to lots of firms and industries will result in companies to put in place additional travel restrictions across the board this year even after the Wuhan coronavirus-relates geographic restrictions are lifted. Many a responsible executive is going to be extra tight-fisted about spending money on travel this financial year when their revenues, profits and margins have taken a hammering in the year already due to the Wuhan virus.

highupinthesky

Travel were back to full level less than 6 months after SARS and MARS, so I doubt there will be any long lasting effects when the epidemic is over. There is a lot of panic at the moment, but it will pass. In more than one media today you could read predictions from "experts" predicting the shares will plummet and we will face a long recession and at the same time read that shares today went up in both DK, US and other countries.

It's hard to predict. Special about the future.

hugolover

E Europe is interesting... Is that to protect the population that is seemingly free of Covid?