Loganair launches the Clan Loganair loyalty scheme – is it worth a look?

Loganair, the airline which operates flights to the Highlands and Islands of Scotland, primarily from Glasgow, Inverness and Edinburgh, has launched its own loyalty programme.

The airline is probably best known for its service from Glasgow to Barra, where the plane lands on the beach and the flight times are adjusted to the tide table – see photo below.  Loganair will also be flying from Carlisle Lake District Airport from next month, to Dublin, Belfast City and London Southend.

Clan Loganair launched late last year and looks very straightforward.

You earn the same amount of points for each leg and need a certain amount of points to redeem for a flight to anywhere on the network.

Now, is it worth joining Clan Loganair given that Loganair and BA have a codeshare deal?  Potentially yes.

Whilst many Loganair flights have a British Airways flight code, and earn Avios and tier points, you can only book them if you are connecting to or from a BA service.  Any stand-alone Loganair flight you book cannot be under the BA code and so you cannot earn anything in British Airways Executive Club.

What do I collect?

You cannot collect Avios with Clan Loganair.  Clan Loganair has its own points currency: Clan Points.

How do I collect points?

As the chart below shows you earn either 250 or 800 points per segment depending on whether you book a Fly/Fly Flex or Fly Flex + rate.

It couldn’t be easier.  All routes earn the same number of points, and all routes cost the same number of points to redeem.  Trips which involves a change of plane count as two flights each way, although flights where the plane makes a stop on the way to pick up or drop off passengers only count as one.

Travel agent bookings do qualify to earn points.  Click to enlarge:

You can retro-claim points for any Loganair flights taken since 16th October 2017.

How do I spend points?

You need 4,000 Clan Points for a one way ticket and 8,000 Clan Points for a return ticket to anywhere on the Loganair network.  This means that you need 16 return flights in Fly or Fly Flex or five return flights in Fly Flex+ to earn a reward flight.

On this site you can check availability for redemption flights.  Tick “Redeem Clan Points”.

Taxes and charges are still payable.

How much are my points worth?

There is no easy answer to this.  What I can say is that, because Loganair generally operates niche routes without any direct competition, flights can be expensive.

Whilst redeeming airline miles for economy flights is usually a bad deal as the taxes and charges make up a very high part of the ticket price, this is not always the case here.

What happens when I book a Loganair codeshare with BA?

If you book a Loganair flight via ba.com you will not earn Loganair Clan points. You will, however, earn your usual Avios.

These are the current Loganair flights with a BA flight number:

Loganair flights from Inverness, Aberdeen, Edinburgh and Glasgow to the Highlands and Islands

Loganair flights from Glasgow, Inverness and, erm, Norwich to Manchester

It is worth noting that you cannot book these flights on a stand-alone basis with a BA flight number. They need to connect to another British Airways operated or coded flight. If you try to book Edinburgh to Sumburgh on ba.com, it tries to sell you Edinburgh – Heathrow, Heathrow – Aberdeen, Aberdeen – Sumburgh!

You cannot spend Avios on Loganair flights, even the codeshares.

Conclusion

If you don’t use Loganair often and can book your flight on BA, it makes more sense to do so and collect Avios.

However, if you fly Loganair a lot and are able to redeem your points for one of the more pricey routes, it’s worth signing up to Clan Loganair.  The sign-up page is here.