Collect Flying Blue miles or use Accor hotels? You can double dip

It is now over a year since Accor Live Limitless, the loyalty scheme for Novotel, Ibis, Mercure, Sofitel etc, and Flying Blue, the loyalty scheme for Air France and KLM, launched their partnership.

It is a genuine improvement and EVERYONE benefits.  Despite this, it has a very low profile and I think many HfP readers are not even aware it exists.

This is a clear win for anyone who either flies on Air France KLM or stays in Accor hotels.  You are going to be better off.

You can find full details, and register, on the Accor website here.

How does it work?

This is going to get a little complicated, so let’s start with a simple overview:

Yes, as it shows:

When you stay at Accor hotels, you will earn 1 Flying Blue airline mile per €1 – on top of the Accor points you would usually earn

When you fly with Air France or KLM, you will earn 1 Accor hotel point per €2 – on top of the Flying Blue miles you would usually earn

You can only be better off by registering for this offer.  As far as I can tell, there is no downside.

There is a tiny bit of small print on the Accor offer.  Stays at their low end brands (Adagio, Adagio Access, ibis, ibis Styles and Mama Shelter) earn miles at lower rates.

You can also transfer Flying Blue miles into Accor points

You have always been able to transfer Accor points into Flying Blue at the rate of:

2,000 Accor points = 1,000 Flying Blue miles

However, you can now transfer the other way too:

4,000 Flying Blue miles = 1,000 Accor points

Don’t get too excited about this.  Accor points have a fixed value of 2 Eurocents each.  There is no ‘reward chart’ – the points cost for a night is simply the cash price in Euro multiplied by 50.  Our full article on what we think Accor Live Limitless points are worth is here.

This means that you are swapping 4,000 Flying Blue miles for a €20 Accor hotel discount.  This is just 0.5 Eurocents per mile, which is VERY poor.

Sign up even if you have ZERO interest in the other scheme

Why?  Because:

in the worse case scenario, an Accor guest can take the Flying Blue miles earned and convert them back into more Accor points

…. and a Flying Blue frequent flyer can take the Accor points earned and convert them back into more Flying Blue miles

There is a sign-up offer too

Once you have linked your two accounts:

You receive 1 Accor status night and 5 Flying Blue XP status points on your next Accor stay

and

You receive 1 Accor status night and 5 Flying Blue XP status points on your next Air France or KLM flight

Again, the ability to get these sign up bonuses means that any Accor or Flying Blue member who is chasing status should sign up for this, irrespective of their interest in the other partner.

Here is the page to register your accounts, which need to be linked – click here.

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How to earn Flying Blue miles from UK credit cards (October 2021)

Air France and KLM do not have a UK Flying Blue credit card.  However, you can earn Flying Blue miles by converting Membership Rewards points earned from selected UK American Express cards.  These are:

• American Express Preferred Rewards Gold (review here, apply here) – sign-up bonus of 30,000 Membership Rewards points converts into 30,000 Flying Blue miles. This card is FREE for your first year and also comes with two free airport lounge passes. 30,000 points is a special offer which expires on 9th November 2021.

• The Platinum Card from American Express (review here, apply here) – sign-up bonus of 60,000 Membership Rewards points converts into 60,000 Flying Blue miles. 60,000 points is a special offer which expires on 2nd November 2021.

• American Express Rewards credit card (review here, apply here) – sign-up bonus of 5,000 Membership Rewards points converts into 5,000 Flying Blue miles. This card is FREE for life.

Membership Rewards points convert at 1:1 into Flying Blue miles which is an attractive rate.  The cards above all earn 1 Membership Rewards point per £1 spent on your card, which converts to 1 Flying Blue mile. The Gold card earns double points (2 per £1) on all flights you charge to it.