strikerbird

Hi all,

As everyone knows, SAS has suspended their flights to China since February until at least of March 2020, if not longer. I had multiple trips arranged to fly to China in the coming period. My flights are cancelled currently, and it would result in my losing my gold status. Do you think SAS will make an exception to allow me to maintain my Gold status 2020/2021?

Sincerely,

SB

CPH-Flyer

I doubt it. It is only a small part of the long haul flights that are cancelled. But asking can never hurt.

highupinthesky

I strongly doubt there will be any exception, specially because you can ask them to reroute you through HKG or NRT if you still want to go. This way you will actually earn more points than if you flew direct to PEK or PVG.

As your flights has been canceled, the normal cancellation rerouting rules apply, but you can also volunteer to follow the temp. volunteer cancellation/change rules.

GUWonder

For lots of big employers, HKG travel now increasingly gets treated much the same as for PEK/PVG travels: “work from home for 14 days”. If the airline thinks status qualification/retention waivers make sense for its business, maybe it will. But the airlines seem to think most all of us are easily replaced customers in the current environment or will return anyway and cozying up to Asian travel may not be as much of a publicly marketable game in Europe as say cozying up to “parental leave” related waivers.

fassy

I think you should write to EuroBonus. The problem is not missing Gold this year, the problem is the gap it creates for the "Gold For Life" problem.

highupinthesky

I honestly can't see that OP has a claim here. SK has only canceled the direct flights. It's still possible to be rerouted through HKG or NRT if you have to go and want to fly SK metal. SK is still selling the flights to PEK and PVG through HKG although they are sold out on most days, but that doesn't mean they are not available for involuntary rerouting.

GUWonder

Even if SAS were to respond and claim to grant a waiver to the person asking, the problem is that in practice it may eventually turn out not to be a waiver to the requirement to have ten consecutive years of qualifying for EBG/EBD status from SAS and Wideroe flights’ points. In other words, I would consider this to be a kind of situation where SAS may mess up and mislead the customer.

fassy

Well, this is one of the cases where SK could actually, with minimal effort delight their loyal customers. But pretty sure, they won't.

highupinthesky

I really can't see why they should do this as you still can get to the destination on routes where you will earn the same or more points and with a travel time only a few hours longer.

fassy

A lot of companies won't go to China now and all pending trips are canceled for the moment PERIOD. Doesn't matter if you could in theory fly from Scandinavia or Europe to wherever and then take a donkey ride through Mongolia to your final destination China.

As I said, could be a low hanging fruit to show some customer service gesture winning them back some loyalty in the long run.

Often1

That is a different issue.

OP wants to know if he can obtain some form of status waiver as a customer service gesture when it is entirely possible to be rerouted so as to fly between origin & destination.

If, on the other hand, OP cancels because his employer requires it, that is a labor matter between OP and his employer.

I would point out that under the circumstances, an employer's decision in this regard is hardly unreasonable and that OP should expect to be quarantined at his first arrival point outside China on return.

highupinthesky

What about trips canceled to Iran after they shot down a plane from Ukraine? Should they also be ground for a waiver? I'm pretty sure we can find a lot of similar situations.

fassy

Not sure what all this hostility is about? I'm just saying, SAS could,with minimal effort, delight their loyal customers by helping them out here. Not too many people would be in the same situation like strikerbird as we all know the EuroBonus qualification year isn't fixed to the calendar year but spread out across the year. So only people where the qualification period ends in Feb or March, perhaps April 2020 and missing Gold due to cancelled trips would have a problem. So, it would be both manageable effort and not really expensive for SK to go the extra mile here.

Well, and I'm not aware of too many crisis of the same magnitude which made a lot of the major carriers not fly to country with a huge economy and heavy business travel. Sure, there is the one or other odd country (or region, like the Ebola regions), but seriously.... how many people fly regularly to the Iran or Ebola territory on business and have been grounded for months? Compare that to the current China situation...

herwig

I would ask SAS to rebook the flight - like in my case - to an alternative carrier (Air China most likely) or via HKG (as they are still offering on their website). As an EBG I would simply insist to get a re-booking based on your original ticket and you could also asked for a retro-credit of your original booking after you have taken the flight.
It leaves of course the question whether you still desire to travel to China at this point in time. When monitoring the numbers of new infections - they are clearly going down. Still you need to be prepared for restrictions in local travel and increased health concerns in all of China. The productivity of a business trip at the moment might therefore be rather low, but it will most likely change in the next 1-3 weeks. I assume that most people (except for those living in Hubei and potentially Zhejiang province) will be back to regular work and business life will recover very fast.

kauppias

when has SK EVER gone the extra mile?

my experience with SK has been opposite of cudtomer friendly 😂

they insisted that I had gifted my EBD Gold gift card allready even though their dates did not match up. they refused to make it right so they lost a EBD customer over a gift gold card instead of going the extra mile 😁

the rules by SK are the rules, I have not seen any bending 🧐 its a pity they are so stringent but I doubt we will wee any waivers of EBG requirments unless other airlines first do so... just my humble opinion