KF Elite Silver
 

Just qualified for KFES for the first time.

Are there any unpublished benefits?

eg: Better seat selection during booking, more FF ticket availability, etc?

Thanks

Chucksta

Not that I know of but the published benefits look like crap.

Even the 25% tier bonus is only for full fares.
Receive a 25% tier bonus on the actual number of miles flown on Singapore Airlines, SilkAir or Virgin Atlantic when you credit the miles to your KrisFlyer account. All Singapore Airlines and SilkAir booking classes except for Economy Class tickets issued in G, K, N, Q, T and V booking classes are eligible for this bonus.

CX Silver gets lounge access, priority baggage, and better seat selections.

I thought that's part of the listed benefit. May not exactly more FF ticket availaibilty, but you will have higher priority compare to the regular member.

But your rank is the lowest, I think it will go like Solitaire, PPS, Gold and then Silver. Not sure if *A Gold will come between Gold and Silver.

to me even KF Gold does not give much other than priority wait list, KF (but not Silver Kris) lounge access (and *A lounge), and priority luggage tag and checkin (may not necessary priority boarding).

Silver is virtually useless except for the 25% miles bonus on SQ metal, on some booking classes. And even those bonus miles do NOT count as status miles, so it's not like you are going to get Gold any easier.

Overall, KrisFlyer is a very poor and substandard FFP unless you spend a lot in Singapore using a credit card and generate miles this way. And if you have a family and travel together often, then even if you fly SQ you are better off crediting all flights to Virgin Australia's Velocity scheme that allows for family pooling of miles (and STATUS credits too!).

KF is the worst entry level of all the established airlines... i only credit it via spending and never via flights... actually OW is better than *A in terms of FFP benefits, with the mid tier OWS gives you plenty of benefits.

I agree that KF is probably the worst ffp to get into. It's outdated and offers absolutely NOTHING decent apart from regular *G benefits that every other carrier in the alliance has to offer as well. Silver level is a complete joke.

As for OW, the main benefit missing is the extra luggage, where you need to have quite high status (OW Emerald) to get across the alliance.

But even living in SIN, there are many better OW choices for flights instead of SQ. BA easily beats SQ on flights to SYD, and flying to Europe AY (Finnair) is a great choice too.

Depend on where you are flying.....

Try to fly SIN-CGK (or in fact any where in SE Asia) on OW. You can only fly CX on SIN-BKK.

If you are thinking to fly MH, you won't be able to credit to CX on most of the promotion fares. The sub class which earn miles (50%) is very high.

If you are flying to Europe, N. Asia, N. America and perhaps Aussie, OW may have better choice.


But again you are comparing OW against SQ (not *A). From what I observe so far, posting cross airlines is much easier on *A rather than OW.

I do not really agree. Its somewhere in the middle, but KF is good if you redeem on SQ, bad if you arent planning that because you have no way to spend alternatively. The Gold benefits are in line with the *standard and there are not many *FFP offering more (the SEN level at MM has a much higher entry level, therfore they need to throw in a few more perks).

The silver level is like on most *FFP almost uniformly a joke, but so it is on Skyteam (not familiar with OW, but i reckon its not much different).

OW makes sense for certain flight pattern ex-SIN, but as soon as someone has a lot of regional travelling to do, its useless. Not all of us clock in enough miles to reach status on two different programmes.

I find that MH is easy to earn status by sectors if you travel around the region in their network frequently. Prices are very affordable as well.

Of course the status is nothing much to shout about though.

KF is awful if you do not generate miles via credit cards. Miles & More SEN (*G) status requires more miles, that's true, but you get HEAPS more in return. Not to mention that you only need to rack up the required miles in one of the membership years (yup, once you qualify you get status for 2+ years).

I would disagree that Silver is bad across the board. SQ Silver is exceptionally bad... simply because it gives you no perks at all.

LH Silver:
- business class check-in on LH and other Miles&More airlines (Austrian+LOT+Swiss)
- extra luggage on LH and other Miles&More airlines
- lounge access on LH and other Miles&More airlines

SQ Silver:
- nothing
- nothing
- nothing

Even Silver on Finnair gives you better check-in, extra luggage & lounge access when flying with them.

That's true, CX Silver is solid as well.

The Lounge access is rather limited and includes only LH owned Lounges (Okay if your base is Germany, almost useless elsewhere). LH has cut back the lounges where FTLs have access and due to the fact that more and more intra-European connections are shifted from LH and 4U, its a pretty useless Status.

As a several years OW emerald (BA Gold) I agree that now being based in Singapore it is useful for longer range travel, but for travel in the region it is virtually useless unless travelling to KUL. And in that case, for flights like SIN-KUL or BKK-KUL, I hate to say it but TG and SQ are just a much nicer experience than MH, so even as OWE starting yo weigh up which to go with. My colleagues laugh at me when I pick the MH option...
With my current travel pattern all short haul in the region, am slowly building up towards KF gold based on a painful number of sin-BKK and the likes. Just got to silver - which I realise is useless.
All I can say is I would trade in my OWE status any day right at the moment for KF gold, the benefits for someone travelling short haul from SIN are much greater...
But previously, commuting mainly between LON and SIN I preferred OWE... So it depends on your situation I guess....

You still get faster check-in and extra luggage with LH Silver. With SQ Silver you get nothing.

Even the 25% on both carriers isn't the same. With LH the bonus also counts towards status miles, on SQ it does not.

Basically SQ Silver is complete rubbish, and the worst silver status that I have seen so far.

You don't really need KF Gold but any *A status.

In recent times I discovered another alternative to KF and *G even, namely Virgin Australia's Velocity ffp:

http://www.velocityfrequentflyer.com/content/

You might be able to rack up miles and status rather quickly here, especially if you do some family travel as they allow you to pool miles. This is also the ONLY ffp I have come across that also allows you to pool... STATUS credits. :)