Avianca "Lifemiles" - Questions and Discussion

[prozac]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Just did a dummy SQ J SYD-MUC for dates Jan26 all way to April 16. Search returned all Sold Out. Do I need to have credit in the system to get a result? Perhaps I need to book SD-SIN/SIN-MUC. Confused.

 

[bcworld]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Just did a dummy SQ J SYD-MUC for dates Jan26 all way to April 16. Search returned all Sold Out. Do I need to have credit in the system to get a result? Perhaps I need to book SD-SIN/SIN-MUC. Confused.

I don't think availability is very good on SIN-MUC or SIN-FRA. CDG or LHR, no problems.

You will only be able to book this itin (SQ SYD-EU) 14 days or less before departure though so no point checking past mid Feb.

 

[zainman]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

SQ long haul 'premium' product is available via LM. Suites and long haul first are not. some regional first class is available (but only on selected routes)

Isn't the SQ F/suites product restricted to Krisflyer members only?

 

[bcworld]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Isn't the SQ F/suites product restricted to Krisflyer members only?

As he said, some intra Asia F is available...SIN-BOM is probably the longest F flight you'll find.

 

[dajop]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

I wonder why, suspect yield is looking closely at that market given the dynamic shifts in trends over the past year, it possible that traffic has been trending to much towards award use.

Yes interesting. Maybe saving inventory for their own members? Seems to be good of Saver award access in J between SIN & Aust, using KF miles.

 

[Kangol]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

SQ long haul 'premium' product is available via LM. Suites and long haul first are not. some regional first class is available (but only on selected routes)

Oh, so the best you can get is J on an A380 (that is my guess by your word "premium"), keeps the F offerings *exclusive* I guess.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Oh, so the best you can get is J on an A380 (that is my guess by your word "premium"), keeps the F offerings *exclusive* I guess.

for star alliance rewards, 'premium' traditionally meant A380, 77W and other aircraft which have the 'premium' cabin fittings of wide full flat beds, as opposed to the offering on 'regional' aircraft.

star alliance rewards are generally excluded on 'premium' aircraft, but allowed on 'regional'. there are some exceptions, notably LM which allows redemption on premium aircraft as well as regional aircraft.

Even then, First class is only sometimes available on some shorter 'regional' routes (such as CGK, BOM, DEL etc). I haven't seen it available ex MEL for for example for a long time. Suites are excluded.

 

[HWilliams]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Got word back from my parents about their TG J trip and it didn't go too well. Apparently on 2 of the 4 flights one of the two seats had a broken chair which made it quite uncomfortable when sitting (you couldn't recline properly) and one piece of luggage was lost on the way back home (but was promptly sent out the next day by courier). Staff were nice but not really helpful regarding the chair and essentially it was a matter of just 'deal with it'. Made the flight very uncomfortable. Luckily it was LM rates, they would have been infuriated paying normal rates and having broken chairs...

 

[quokka77]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

A little off topic and also cross posted on flyer talk... Has anyone run into trouble booking award for family members and not flying (eg denied boarding due to failure to produce original cc?). I booked BNE-BKK-FCO FCO-BKK-SYD for my parents-in-law, with miles from my wife's account and paid with my credit card. Anyone been asked to produce original cc with award booking? All sectors are on Thai in J.

 

[dalereardon]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Not LM but I recently booked a trip using Avios for my wife and I from HKT to HKG on DragonAir in J using my credit card. I wanted to cancel that card prior to the trip so rang up BA and asked what could be done.

They said to bring the credit card statement with me showing that the charge had gone on my card and I was the cardholder.

Interestingly the BA Avios terms say that only have to produce the CC card if the cardholder is one of the passengers.

Dale.

 

[gpl007]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

A little off topic and also cross posted on flyer talk... Has anyone run into trouble booking award for family members and not flying (eg denied boarding due to failure to produce original cc?). I booked BNE-BKK-FCO FCO-BKK-SYD for my parents-in-law, with miles from my wife's account and paid with my credit card. Anyone been asked to produce original cc with award booking? All sectors are on Thai in J.

I booked SYD-BKK-FRA-NCE and PRG-FRA-BKK-SYD for my girlfriend, mix of TG and LH, all in J. She had no problems on any of the flights, just treated as a normal J PAX.

Incidentally, I flew back to SYD on the same flights but in F. I had thought that we wouldn't have access to the F lounge in FRA as we were ticketed by TG, but they took us in no problems which was great. The F service at the airports is great, and the TG A380 FRA-BKK was very good. However, the old 747 F cabin on the flight BKK-SYD is pretty coughpy. I'd be VERY disappointed if I was a full paying F PAX on that route!!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

I booked SYD-BKK-FRA-NCE and PRG-FRA-BKK-SYD for my girlfriend, mix of TG and LH, all in J. She had no problems on any of the flights, just treated as a normal J PAX.

Incidentally, I flew back to SYD on the same flights but in F. I had thought that we wouldn't have access to the F lounge in FRA as we were ticketed by TG, but they took us in no problems which was great. The F service at the airports is great, and the TG A380 FRA-BKK was very good. However, the old 747 F cabin on the flight BKK-SYD is pretty coughpy. I'd be VERY disappointed if I was a full paying F PAX on that route!!

interesting! which F lounge did you get to use?

 

[gpl007]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

interesting! which F lounge did you get to use?

Whoops, meant to say the Lufthansa F lounge. Well one of them anyway, I think there are a couple in different parts of the airport? Frankfurt airport is big and rather confusing I found.

We were only there for a short time so we really just sat and had a drink and something to eat, but there were beds I think and some nice facilities over all.

The Thai F lounge in BKK is pretty nice, especially if they put you in one of the little rooms with your own TV and couches.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

Whoops, meant to say the Lufthansa F lounge. Well one of them anyway, I think there are a couple in different parts of the airport? Frankfurt airport is big and rather confusing I found.

We were only there for a short time so we really just sat and had a drink and something to eat, but there were beds I think and some nice facilities over all.

The Thai F lounge in BKK is pretty nice, especially if they put you in one of the little rooms with your own TV and couches.

i appreciate it was the Lufthansa First lounge you were referring to - but that's the interesting part!

as a star alliance F pax you should have had access to the Lufthansa senator lounges. Lufthansa F lounges are off limits to star alliance (OS/LX/LH excepted).

the difference between the F class and senator lounges is shown in this article here from the boarding area blog: http://boardingarea.com/onemileatat...-first-class-lounge-senator-lounge-frankfurt/

So if this is a change in lounge admittance that is interesting. hence the question about which LH F lounge you were able to enter.

 

[RB]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

I booked SYD-BKK-FRA-NCE and PRG-FRA-BKK-SYD for my girlfriend, mix of TG and LH, all in J. She had no problems on any of the flights, just treated as a normal J PAX.

Incidentally, I flew back to SYD on the same flights but in F. I had thought that we wouldn't have access to the F lounge in FRA as we were ticketed by TG, but they took us in no problems which was great. The F service at the airports is great, and the TG A380 FRA-BKK was very good. However, the old 747 F cabin on the flight BKK-SYD is pretty coughpy. I'd be VERY disappointed if I was a full paying F PAX on that route!!

How many seats were on the 747 that you flew? Can you outline what you found particularly coughpy?

 

[gpl007]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

i appreciate it was the Lufthansa First lounge you were referring to - but that's the interesting part!

as a star alliance F pax you should have had access to the Lufthansa senator lounges. Lufthansa F lounges are off limits to star alliance (OS/LX/LH excepted).

the difference between the F class and senator lounges is shown in this article here from the boarding area blog: Chasing the Sun: Lufthansa First Class Lounge & Senator Lounge Frankfurt - One Mile at a Time - One Mile at a Time

So if this is a change in lounge admittance that is interesting. hence the question about which LH F lounge you were able to enter.

It was a few months ago now and the memory is a little fragile; I did a lot of travel in 3 months!

Perhaps it was indeed the Senator Lounge. I just remember that we initially saw the Business Lounge and went to go in there, only to be directed across the way to another lounge which I assumed was F. I didn't realise there were 3 levels.

Probably best to assume I made a mistake rather than a change of policy :-/

 

[gpl007]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

How many seats were on the 747 that you flew? Can you outline what you found particularly coughpy?

There were 10 seats, so it wasn't the really old configuration. I went on a couple of their older 747s with this config.

The seats converted to full lie flat beds which were fairly comfortable but the seats and all the materials in the cabin were worn and shabby. Perhaps the most annoying thing was that there wasn't a lot of privacy between seats, if the person to my left put her reading light on it completely illuminated my seat. I could see and hear everyone in the cabin it seemed. I'm probably being a bit harsh, but I felt there was a big leap from those old fit outs to the A380 and newer 747s.

I actually went on another TG 747 that had a newer fit out, basically the same as the A380. I got upgraded from J to F on a 1 hr flight from BKK to HKT!

My impression was that they fly their oldest 747's on the SYD-BKK-SYD route. I flew J from SYD-BKK on the oldest plane in their fleet I think!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

There were 10 seats, so it wasn't the really old configuration. I went on a couple of their older 747s with this config.

The seats converted to full lie flat beds which were fairly comfortable but the seats and all the materials in the cabin were worn and shabby. Perhaps the most annoying thing was that there wasn't a lot of privacy between seats, if the person to my left put her reading light on it completely illuminated my seat. I could see and hear everyone in the cabin it seemed. I'm probably being a bit harsh, but I felt there was a big leap from those old fit outs to the A380 and newer 747s.

I actually went on another TG 747 that had a newer fit out, basically the same as the A380. I got upgraded from J to F on a 1 hr flight from BKK to HKT!

My impression was that they fly their oldest 747's on the SYD-BKK-SYD route. I flew J from SYD-BKK on the oldest plane in their fleet I think!

i think it might actually be the other way around TGs oldest 747s have the newest configuration but i might have got that mixed up!

Agree re privacy. Best seats to try and avoid that are like row 1, or 3DG.

but that being said - i don't much care for the TG A380 configuration. Prefer the 747 (any config). They could have done so much better on the A380

 

[bcworld]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

i think it might actually be the other way around TGs oldest 747s have the newest configuration but i might have got that mixed up!

It used to be that the newest 747s had the 14F config...now the newest 747s do have the 9F config...which seems to make a lot more sense!

 

[MEL_Traveller]

re: Avianca "Life Miles" - New FF program in *A

It used to be that the newest 747s had the 14F config...now the newest 747s do have the 9F config...which seems to make a lot more sense!

yes that's it! got a little confused which way around it was!