Cheap Avios deals on airberlin may be over as the end beckons …..

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• Lady London says:

  7 Jan7 January 14:32

  I had a multi-segment rewards booking made with BMI when Lufthansa owned them.

  The ticket had been issed. The first segment was a Lufthansa operated flight on a Lufthansa flight code. Meaning the entire ticket was the responsibility of Lufthansa.

  Lufthansa sold BMI to IAG (BA’s parent).

  Shortly after that with the rewards booking still unflown, Lufthansa divested itself of the first flight on my multi-flight ticket, as they put all their flights that didn’t go through Munich or Frankfurt to Germanwings.

  The first flight on my ticket got eliminated. This messed up the timings for following flights on the ticket. As each flight was ticketed in a rewards fare class the chance of reward class seats still being available on any replacement flight segment for all the flights affected – longhaul flights around the world – was practically zero. This all happened more than two weeks before the first flight btw.

  Lufthansa didn’t want to know. The ticket was their responsibility, and they owned BMI when it was bought. The result was that I lost 3 flight segments in Europe at the beginning of the ticket and got no replacement and I ended up positioning myself to take the first longhaul segment in order to keep all the rest of the ticket. Lufthansa had a moral obligation to help if they were decent at all. The problem was entirely of their making, and they were also the responsible airline for all the flights on the ticket under the rules. They simply refused to provide substitute flights and preserve the routing so I lost quite a lot of things I had planned to do on the 3 stops lost.

  Long story but I haven’t foot on a Lufthansa flight since. Any Lufthansa segment offered by my various companies’ business travel agencies I told them I did not want to be booked on any Lufthansa flights and told them why. So I wouldn’t trust Lufthansa to honour anything at all you arrange with Air Berlin. Not even if it’s their responsibility. supposed to.

• DS says:

  7 Jan7 January 15:59

  “The airline is now planning to roll back its European investments, which include a 29 per cent stake in Air Berlin bought in 2011, a 49 per cent stake in Air Serbia acquired in 2013 and a 49 per cent stake in Alitalia acquired this year, according to the publication.”

  Who would take Alitalia off their hands?

  • Rob says:

    7 Jan7 January 16:10

    They had some good ideas for Alitalia but Ryanair etc are decimating its short haul business which may be beyond repair. It is hard to imagine that you can’t run a decent long haul airline with a country of 60 million.

• Sanjay says:

  7 Jan7 January 16:45

  The piece about James Hogan being fired is the only positive! He has been on a drunken spending spree that has finally caught up. His past is not great…drove the Australian carrier into the ground…then did the same at Gulf Air. With Etihad, he had a blank cheque from the government. And while he did build the brand, he has been completely outdone by Emirates. Emirates A380 fleet is enormous…and when Etihad launched 3 of them (to LHR, JFK and SYD), it was such a big thing. Why?

  Spending crazy amounts on fashion shows, football (not only Man City but also in the US in New York and Washington) and their “ambassadors”. He also lined up cushy and high paying jobs to his friends (based on Australian nationality rather than experience). Instead, he should have invested in the service side (not the useless flying nannies and inflight chefs) and building out profitable routes.

  He’s all about glamour and marketing with little substance. Look at him compared to the late Maurice Flanagan and Tim Clark who head(ed) Emirates.

  Let’s see which other airline will want to have him.

  Rant over.

  • the real harry says:

    7 Jan7 January 17:00

    I thought Clark is still there but working out an acceptable retirement date

    Clark has done very well for Emirates, I hope they have made him a multi-millionaire, he deserves it

    • the real harry says:

      7 Jan7 January 17:41

      Actually I happen to know that Clark reads HFP

• Peter Taysum says:

  7 Jan7 January 18:38

  OT Anyone any experience of Hilton honouring status for booking made via BA? I’ve got a suite booked in Mumbai, and am hoping to get late checkout, and points from my Gold status….

  Thanks,
  Peter

• Ian says:

  7 Jan7 January 22:01

  But if AB remains a separate operation code-sharing with LH due to the joint ownership, then maybe LH inventory could be made available for Avios redemptions?

  A guy can dream, right?

• zsalya says:

  8 Jan8 January 04:00

  Based on past similar deals, what is likely to happen to TopBonus miles?
  We have/are approaching enough of them to be valuable, E.g. for a long-haul upgrade.
  We have TXL-DOH-SIN-DOH-TXL in J coming up on QR, currently to be credited to AB.
  With rumours of AB going bankrupt they would become worthless so we would prefer to have credited to BA; if it is taken over as a going concern then hopefully it stays; if completely merged then a 1:1: transfer to Miles&More would not be disappointing.
  I suppose the risk is that it is done as a pre-pack bankruptcy, but maybe those don’t happen in Germany?

  • Rob says:

    8 Jan8 January 10:22

    You would hope they convert to Lufty, could be some good opportunities if they do.

    • tina says:

      10 Jan10 January 23:00

      Rob. How do you transfer ab points to BA please? Thank you!

      • Rob says:

        10 Jan10 January 23:03

        You can’t, but you can redeem them for BA flights as airberlin is a oneworld alliance member. The redemption table for BA flights is on the AB website.

• QF says:

  8 Jan8 January 04:05

  Flew AB for the first time last week MUC-TXL what a terrible experience. No ability to select seats online, hard to get through to a human being on customer service hotline, wouldn’t recognise my OW status and demotivated miserable staff both at the airport and flying.

  They do say first impressions count…

• Andrew Tucker says:

  8 Jan8 January 06:21

  When are we going to hear some good news about avios?

  • Rob says:

    8 Jan8 January 10:21

    It is cyclical, but over the short term you might not see that. I remember life before the Amex 241, before £3 tax AirBerlin redemptions, before Qatar joined oneworld and before Amex gave big bonuses.

    I also remember BA without fuel surcharges and the BMI’s ludicrously cheap Star Alliance redemption chart though – which meant taking 4 mates in Lufty F to New York or Cape Town or Dubai for the weekend (all of which I did, paying for everyone) was easy.

    • Chris says:

      8 Jan8 January 12:02

      Booking Concorde LHR-JFK just 3 weeks before departure and total taxes/fees coming to about £150 to 2 adults.

      That was with an Amex 2 for 1 though (my first one). 160,000 BA Miles.

      • Rob says:

        8 Jan8 January 13:53

        We should also mention ‘life before Reward Flight Saver’. Pre 2011 you paid £100 in taxes for a European redemption.

        Last year Lufthansa wanted £250 in taxes when I tried to redeem London to Salzburg via Germany in Economy. Be grateful for what you have!

        • Fenny says:

          10 Jan10 January 23:47

          And Before Avios, you could fly to NYC on airmiles and not pay any taxes at all. I had enough airmiles for about 3 transatlantic flights when they announced the change. At least it gave me the option of flying over for 3 days to meet Martin Sheen, just to burn the remaining miles.

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