Air France-KLM Flying Blue is one of the most useful loyalty programs out there for redeeming points. Flying Blue has access to more long haul award availability on Air France-KLM than other programs, and the points are easy to rack up, thanks to Flying Blue partnering with major transferable points currencies.
Anyway, there’s an interesting development when it comes to Flying Blue’s award pricing, which people will certainly have mixed feelings about.
In this post:
Flying Blue Platinum members get better award pricing
While the Flying Blue program has consistent entry level award pricing, award costs are dynamic beyond that. In general, we’ve seen a decrease in saver level Flying Blue award availability over time, especially on transatlantic flights in business class, presumably reflecting the amount of demand, plus the underlying economics.
Along those lines, as of late, it would appear that Flying Blue is now offering better award pricing for Platinum members of its program than for Gold members and non-elite members. As an example, take a look at a search for business class awards from Miami to Madrid, using the calendar feature.
When I’m logged into my Flying Blue Platinum account, I see six dates with the lowest award pricing, of just 60,000 miles per seat.
Meanwhile if I do exactly the same search with a non-elite account, the cheapest award cost is 98,500 miles.
As of now, it seems like what’s happening is that Platinum members are simply getting access to more saver level award availability. Meanwhile if saver level awards aren’t available, then pricing is the same, regardless of elite status. I’m seeing this across a wide variety of markets, so this isn’t just some isolated thing. In some markets, I see saver level award availability almost every day for Platinum members, with little saver level availability for other members.
It remains to be seen if this is a permanent change, or just a trial. Nothing official has been announced, but if this does become a long term perk, I imagine that Flying Blue will promote this. For what it’s worth, I am seeing this across a large variety of routes, so this isn’t just something that I’m seeing in one market.
This is a sensible but controversial change
Of course as a consumer, I love when airlines have wide open saver level award availability, including in premium cabins on long haul flights. I mean, who doesn’t? As far as I’m concerned, every seat should be available as a saver award… as long as I don’t have to report to shareholders. 😉
But as I’ve written about before, the miles & points world has changed a lot over the years, and airlines have gotten savvier. Flying Blue is presumably dealing with the same issue that so many programs are — how do you best allocate a limited amount of award availability?
We’ve seen airlines increasingly make award space available to their own members rather than to members of partner frequent flyer programs. It seems the latest trend is limiting some award availability to elite members.
Ultimately Europe is Flying Blue’s biggest market, and for years, loyal Air France-KLM customers in Europe have been complaining about the lack of saver level award space, and about how much harder it is to earn miles in Europe than in the United States.
With that in mind, I think this is a reasonable direction for an airline to take:
- It’s a way to reward those who increasingly engage with the Flying Blue program
- It’s an incentive for others to engage more in the program, beyond just making a one-time points transfer
Admittedly I should acknowledge that I’m a Flying Blue Platinum member, and I put the effort in to earn the status. So yes, I’ll probably benefit from this. At the same time, I think this ultimately just makes good business sense, for the way the industry has evolved.
If you have a very limited number of long haul business class awards, should those go primarily to someone who flies Air France-KLM every week for work, and wants to take their family on vacation? Or should it go to someone who applied for a credit card in the US with a huge bonus, has never flown Air France-KLM before, and just found some seats through an online search tool?
There’s of course no right or wrong answer here, but I think we can all see the reasonable commercial justification for this.
Bottom line
Air France-KLM now seems to be offering more award space to Flying Blue Platinum members than to others, including for long haul business class flights. It remains to be seen if this is a permanent change, or just a trial.
While everyone won’t be a fan of this policy, I think it’s logical enough. There are a limited number of award seats that airlines are going to open up (especially in premium cabins on long haul flights), and the question comes down to how those should be allocated.
We’ve increasingly seen airlines limit award seats to members of their own program rather than to members of other programs, and it feels like the evolution of that is to start limiting award space based on elite status.
What do you make of Flying Blue making more award space available for elite members?
Ben, il not sure why this is at all « controversial ». Miles and more has done this forever. As an AF Ultimate it means that I travel and spend (!) a lot with AF; not collecting miles in credit cards…why shouldn’t I have the best availability to spend my miles? Don’t I deserve it?? I think it’s completely logical that those who actually spend real money on real tickets and actually flying have the best conditions...
Ben, il not sure why this is at all « controversial ». Miles and more has done this forever. As an AF Ultimate it means that I travel and spend (!) a lot with AF; not collecting miles in credit cards…why shouldn’t I have the best availability to spend my miles? Don’t I deserve it?? I think it’s completely logical that those who actually spend real money on real tickets and actually flying have the best conditions and perks. That’s what loyalty programs are (were?) about.
AF does all sorts of screwy pricing. For example, search for an economy seat and look at the prices that pop up next to it for Premium and Business.
Now search for the same flight but directly in Business. Very often that ticket os a few hundred euros more than it was if you'd originally seat jed for an Eco one.
Same with Plat upgrades. As a Plat I was recently offered a €1300 upgrade...
AF does all sorts of screwy pricing. For example, search for an economy seat and look at the prices that pop up next to it for Premium and Business.
Now search for the same flight but directly in Business. Very often that ticket os a few hundred euros more than it was if you'd originally seat jed for an Eco one.
Same with Plat upgrades. As a Plat I was recently offered a €1300 upgrade from Premium to Business Full flexible fare). A standard Flying Blue member with identical tickets will be able to get the same upgrade for €400.
The FB logic is that Plat members don't care about cost. It's very very irritating and I wonder if it's even legal for them be doing this dual pricing.
Recently took an AF biz, a non-stop flight from RUH to CDG which launched this May. To be short, it was quite disappointing on both aspects - aircraft comfortableness (A359) & cabin service. Will be back to QR or EY next time even with a stopover.
I've always said that FB Plat isn't that useful of a status relative to other *A or OW carriers - no upgrades, no F lounges, limited ST benefits. (Yeah yeah you get the privilege of burning 350k miles each way on LP, I know.)
However, IF this sticks around and actually provides a meaningful amount of availability, that would be a fairly competitive perk compared to other programs.
Skyteam benefits aren't bad, the free bags on light fares are a game-changer when you're doing short flights and don't want to pay nearly as much as the ticket cost for checking a bag in. Platinum also comes with access to a sophisticated priority helpline and a few AFKL-specific benefits. It's definitely at least as good as *G. OWE benefits may look better due to the first class lounge access, but that's a bit of...
Skyteam benefits aren't bad, the free bags on light fares are a game-changer when you're doing short flights and don't want to pay nearly as much as the ticket cost for checking a bag in. Platinum also comes with access to a sophisticated priority helpline and a few AFKL-specific benefits. It's definitely at least as good as *G. OWE benefits may look better due to the first class lounge access, but that's a bit of a gimmick as there are very few of those lounges out there, and the likes of BA and QR send elites to lounges which aren't intended for F passengers.
I would hope FB Plat is at least as good as *G seeing as how it's a higher status. FB Gold would be an apples-to-apples comparison, and I don't think it comes out ahead there.
What about economy ? Are those gated too?
Selfishly and as a Platinum member, I'm thrilled to see this! I just tested as well and the pricing looks identical for platinum and any other level of status, but availability for saver level is much greater for plat.
I'm also quite happy to see that there is a ton of saver availability between NYC and Europe, it had really dried up for a while but I'm seeing a lot more availability in the...
Selfishly and as a Platinum member, I'm thrilled to see this! I just tested as well and the pricing looks identical for platinum and any other level of status, but availability for saver level is much greater for plat.
I'm also quite happy to see that there is a ton of saver availability between NYC and Europe, it had really dried up for a while but I'm seeing a lot more availability in the next few months than before (could be due to the decrease in travel to the US too).
Not really sure if this is a new thing. I used to be an AMS-based FlyingBlue Platinum and noticed that often times awards weren't available, but then became available when my status increased. I'm no longer active in the FB program, but this makes sense and I agree it's a nice way to reward actual flyers with the airline vs. those who just transfer miles in occasionally.
Singapore Airlines should follow these as well. It will help their PPS solitaire members get better redemption. Hopefully this change will be across the top airlines specifically SQ and AF
There is a wrong answer, and you just provided it. Getting pretty sick of your pattern of serving as an apologist for every airline’s points devaluations. Basically, if it provides higher return for shareholders, it’s justified - WTF? Especially egregious when you stand to personally benefit substantially from a policy change that negatively affects the vast majority of North Americans flying on Air France. Damn glad I recently found a pair of the now-nonexistent 60k...
There is a wrong answer, and you just provided it. Getting pretty sick of your pattern of serving as an apologist for every airline’s points devaluations. Basically, if it provides higher return for shareholders, it’s justified - WTF? Especially egregious when you stand to personally benefit substantially from a policy change that negatively affects the vast majority of North Americans flying on Air France. Damn glad I recently found a pair of the now-nonexistent 60k awards and zeroed-out my Flying Blue account.
What devaluation? The awards are still there, it's not like AFKL is saving any money / not offering value here. It's just that larger share of these awards will go to elite flyers who bring money to AFKL throughout the year, instead of people who transfered some credit card points and will never be seen on AFKL again.
The irony is that those 60k N. American redemptions still offer decent value, something that definitely can't be said for the 85k saver awards to the Caribbean or West Africa.
Good, we need more availability for actual frequent fliers rather than have awards taken by the credit card junkies. I prefer programs that don't allow transfers at all (even though it means I can't transfer mine either), but this is the second best thing after that.
Definitely the right way to go.
Sounds like a good reason not to bother earning any more miles with KLM. I likely won't ever hit elite status, so pricing will always be high. So, instead of a bunch of my business, they aim to have none.
How do they have "a bunch of your business" if you have no status with them? Flying Blue Silver is ridiculously easy to attain.
This used to be the case with flyingblue in the past so this is just a reversion to that.
The principle makes sense, the threshold is absurdly high. Most of my flying is with Star Alliance so *G has always been a priority, but I'm a fan of the entry-level SkyTeam Elite status which can save money (free baggage) and hassle (business class check in) when travelling on cheap short haul tickets. Last autumn I soft landed on FB Silver (I had reached gold without aiming for it as a result of having flown...
The principle makes sense, the threshold is absurdly high. Most of my flying is with Star Alliance so *G has always been a priority, but I'm a fan of the entry-level SkyTeam Elite status which can save money (free baggage) and hassle (business class check in) when travelling on cheap short haul tickets. Last autumn I soft landed on FB Silver (I had reached gold without aiming for it as a result of having flown a couple of keenly-priced long hauls in business) and thought I would try to keep it. Then they increased the price of many/most long haul business class awards by a staggering 70% overnight and without warning (and no, Ben, that's not what everyone else does!), so I am going to be ending the membership year with 10 XPs.
I don't think that the increased award availability would entice me to maintain silver, but surely there must be people who would see it as a worthwhile endeavour. Those who are platinum already enjoy a good value proposition when it comes to status benefits, and anyone who has been badly stung by the devaluation (thankfully I wasn't, only had 30k miles or so) wouldn't be attracted by something that won't mitigate the risk of further enormous devaluations going forward, so I think that this isn't something that would drive any changes in consumer behaviour and it's mostly done to make Mr Lipsey and his colleagues feel good.
Silver is ridiculosly easy to get, one longhaul return in business essentially gets you there if a feeder is involved. Offering this benefit on such low level would go against the point of introducing it in the first place.
Honestly, all status levels on Flying Blue apart from Ulti are easier to earn than equivalent statuses on the competing carriers. And FB Silver is already much more valuable than *S or OWR with the benefits...
Silver is ridiculosly easy to get, one longhaul return in business essentially gets you there if a feeder is involved. Offering this benefit on such low level would go against the point of introducing it in the first place.
Honestly, all status levels on Flying Blue apart from Ulti are easier to earn than equivalent statuses on the competing carriers. And FB Silver is already much more valuable than *S or OWR with the benefits it provides (e.g. free bag, on all fares).
You're correct, but that's the business model - the status is quite easy to get, but the miles tend to be less valuable than those of others (even after the recent IB devaluation, you can fly them all the way to Argentina in business class for ca. 60k Avios - the cheapest FB ticket is 85k and redeeming on AR/UX will set you back 115k each way).
In that context, setting a low bar...
You're correct, but that's the business model - the status is quite easy to get, but the miles tend to be less valuable than those of others (even after the recent IB devaluation, you can fly them all the way to Argentina in business class for ca. 60k Avios - the cheapest FB ticket is 85k and redeeming on AR/UX will set you back 115k each way).
In that context, setting a low bar for the extra availability makes sense as it makes things harder for the credit card churner while making the programme more useful for those who are engaged with it even if they're predominantly leisure and/or short haul flyers who could never realistically aspire to obtaining platinum.
Makes sense. Reward the customers who spend/fly with you the most. This is the case with Lufthansa Miles&More. Senators and HONs have endless award availability not just with the LH group but with partner airlines too.
Airlines should offer better benefits to elite members, random point transfer guy shouldn't be treated the same as an actual frequent customer. MR points have killed a lot of the Alaska availability. That's been closed but it still flooded an excessive amount of points in to the system.
"been closed" it literally closed a few hours ago lol
Most of money airlines make is not from flying elite people but from credit cards. "Random" guys are the one who are using credit card and generating money for the airlines which in turn provide more services to elite. So for airlines both are important, hopefully our capitalist economy will decide in the end who will be winner.
I am happy if this is a permanent change, this will certainly separate those who just benefits from shifting credit card or other card miles into the program to those who earn the miles by flying directly with ST. This balances out the price per mile for those loyal to the program and those not, pays a bit more. A win win situation in my opinion.
Lufthansa has been doing this for many years.
Favorite LH M&M Senator Benefit, literally any award if you wanted to. So good.
Well, M&M awards do come at a steep premium...But I agree that this is an easy way to make status more attractive.
Love this, wish more airlines would do this like UA and IN space. The only thing I wish is that those who are apart of the same alliance could do this. For example, Solitaire being able to book IN fares, and diamond medallion on DL being able to purchase saver fares on Flying Blue.
Additionally, I think First Class awards should follow suit like EK, but I know many will disagree.
There's always another side of the coin. Platinum members are just a small minority of those who fly AF/KLM and an even smaller minority of those who transfer their points to Flying Blue, who may choose to fly another airline, credit their miles to another program, or stop transferring their points to Flying Blue.
@ Tony — Totally fair, and it can be hard to figure out where to draw the line. However, I think if someone is specifically transferring points to Flying Blue in order to redeem for saver long haul business class awards, the airline won’t view that loss of business as a huge deal.
@ben - is this for all elite levels (eg: if I have Silver by getting the FB credit card) or just platinum?
Another FB Platinum member says thank you. Looking forward to an expansion of US-based lounge access for US-domestic flights.
pouring one out for the Chile Call Center days (IYKYK)
Is this also applicable to SkyTeam elites (i.e. via Virgin Atlantic) or just 'true' Flying Blue Platinum members?
@ Jacopo — The space is just for Flying Blue Platinum members.
@Lucky - I'm not so sure that's the case. Like you, I saw a ton of availability at 60k in biz when booking a flight from DC to LHR just a week in advance for travel this weekend (I was amazed and it was both AF and KLM)... but also saw availability on Virgin at 72k, which also surprised me
Skyteam is just becoming more and more worthless. If not for Air France?KLM's program, i dont know why anyone would invest in this alliance.
@ Maxell Azaria — I’d say Air France-KLM and Virgin Atlantic have useful programs, but yeah, otherwise not much that’s interesting.
I don't think that's quite true. I use Delta for short-ish domestic trips, and it's important to book round-trip to get good pricing. The last trip I booked on Delta, round-trip was cheaper than one-way. Of course cheaper than two one-ways, but also cheaper than one one-way!
Both good and bad. I think it does reward loyalty and the "elites" will be happy about it.
For the generic award traveler that transfers points and won't have elite status, I think it's definitely not good. That being said, it should only apply to the program's metal and not extend to partner awards. I'm not sure if other airlines would be happy if there were discounted flights on their metal.
In short, good for...
Both good and bad. I think it does reward loyalty and the "elites" will be happy about it.
For the generic award traveler that transfers points and won't have elite status, I think it's definitely not good. That being said, it should only apply to the program's metal and not extend to partner awards. I'm not sure if other airlines would be happy if there were discounted flights on their metal.
In short, good for actual frequent flyers dedicated to one program, bad for credit card churners without status.
Every Delta flight booked through AF or Virgin is discounted when compared to booking directly with SkyMiles.
Sure that's just the program itself being different. You could say that about any two programs.
Not inherently giving difference in treatment based on elite status, which is the topic at hand.
I don't know that we can really say Flying Blue is broadly "useful" so much anymore. Declining availability, no-notice devaluations, healthy surcharges, and increasing restrictions on award redemptions have seriously chipped away at the value of the program even since 2021. Let's call a spade a spade.
@ Brad — I don’t disagree, but isn’t that true of literally every single program? Like, which program hasn’t seen a huge reduction in partner award availability, or devaluations? It’s how the industry is evolving.
@Ben
Frontier miles.
I fly to Bangkok twice a year. May and November. I was one flight away from silver status and they took all my points of me. So even if I fly twice a year every year. I will not get beyond Blue. I have complained about the system. But fell on deaf ears