Barry’s SAS million point challenge – homeward bound on Airline 16 (China Eastern)

Rob writes: In October, SAS announced the million points challenge – here’s our article. If you could fly 15 of the SkyTeam alliance carriers by the end of 2024, you would receive 1 million bonus SAS EuroBonus points.

It was not a competition – everyone who hit the target would get the points.

A number of HfP readers took up the challenge. One of them was Barry Collins, who you may have seen discussing the challenge in The Times – click here (paywall, or click here for a non-paywall version). Barry is also featured in the Financial Times this weekend, in FT Money.

Barry is sharing his trip with HfP readers. Part 1 and Part 2 looked at ‘why’ and ‘how’ (click to read). Airline 1 was Air Europa. Airline 2 was Air France. Airline 3 was TAROM. Airline 4 was KLM. Airline 5 was SAS. Airline 6 was Virgin Atlantic. Airline 7 was Delta. Airline 8 was Aeromexico. Airline 9 was Saudia. Airline 10 was Garuda Indonesia. Airline 11 was Vietnam Airlines. Airline 12 was China Airlines. Airline 13 was Xiamen Airlines. Airline 14 was Korean Air. Airline 15 was Kenya Airways.

We rejoin Barry in Bangkok. To make up for earlier errors buying non-qualifying tickets, he had to rearrange his trip to include the obscure Kenya Airways ‘fifth freedom’ flight from Guangzhou to Bangkok. This got him his 14th qualifying flight, since Delta was disqualified. He now has a new flight home on China Eastern, his 15th qualifying flight.

Over to Barry ….

Bangkok to Shanghai, China Eastern

I parted company from my new challenge friends as they were all staying in Bangkok or catching a different connecting flight.

The transfer desk had the same issue I had found at the start of all this in Paris – the staff did not know the code for SAS to be able to correctly add my EuroBonus account to the booking. In Paris, this meant nothing to me. However, simply through experience, I now know the two letter identifier they are looking for is SK. I give them this info, my account magically updates on their computer and they print both of my final boarding passes.

I walk along the industrial looking concourse as directed to the 24 hour ‘Miracle Lounge’ and show my boarding pass. The lady tells me I am in the wrong place, and that there is a second miracle just down the way. I tell her one more and they’ll make her a saint. Despite being possibly the cleverest thing I’ve ever said, the joke doesn’t land. I can feel my wife’s eyes rolling silently from thousands of miles away.

I find the correct lounge and am given a code for the WiFi. It turns out I have a miracle of my own – my Kenya Airways economy flex code matches up to the list on the SAS website! The Christmas music playing over the PA system takes me to Hans Gruber telling Theo that it is the time of miracles.

After the lows of the last couple of days, I am feeling great – just one more airline to tick off, and (assuming the TAROM flight ever gets credited) I am done!

I am also completely exhausted. It is nearly 1am and my biggest fear now would be falling asleep in the comfy chair in the lounge and missing my China Eastern flight. I head to to the gate early, just to be sure.

Safely on board another boring and very standard A320, I don’t care that there is no seat back entertainment or anywhere to charge my phone. I just want the flight to take off so I can get my points.

As soon as we are safely in the air, I relax and drift off to the sound of Murray Head playing on repeat in my mind. I wake up briefly for a stretch and find it’s another plane where we all watch the same film at the same time. I definitely need to bring the kids to China! A glorious sunrise comes over the horizon as we land to welcome the last day of my challenge.

Shanghai to Heathrow, China Eastern

This is my 4th time transiting through China via four different airports. This is a different one in Shanghai from the other day – PVG vs SHA. As with all other Chinese airports, a temperature scanner needed to be passed through and the free WiFi didn’t work.

The China Eastern lounge was small but virtually empty, as was the massive terminal building at peak(?) hours of 9am. Maybe they’re planning to grow into it? A final Asian meal of fried rice for breakfast, then off to the gate to be greeted with the first sight of rain I’ve had on any of my trips. At least I’ll be eased back into the UK weather gently now.

The plane is a big Boeing 777 with what looked like fairly substantial 1-2-1 business class seats up front and 3-4-3 in economy. This was until you got to the back where it tapered into a unique 2-4-2, which is where I found myself by the window.

With no WiFi I have been unable to check my SAS EuroBonus account to see if any of my recent flights have updated. Last time I was able to check there were nine airlines showing.

The French guy from the Kenya Airways flight thinks Roy is wrong about my fare code issue on Delta, and that I WILL get my points for that flight. China Eastern is now technically my 16th SkyTeam airline, so with a bit of luck even if that Delta flight never appears, I should be good for the million points. I’ve already written Delta off in my head, so now it is TAROM and the Air France cock up that is worrying me the most. Annoyingly I won’t find out until January!

This is the longest flight of any I have taken during the challenge, at over 12 hours. Those big business class seats look very appealing right now. They are offering upgrades over the tannoy for £900 each, but after a moment or two of consideration I politely decline. My wife was good with me taking the extra flights needed to cover the Delta error, but I think she’d have something to say if I come home in business class.

The wings on this aeroplane are the first I’ve seen without the curvy up bit at the end. I thought they’d all been upgraded long ago?! Obviously not. A pilot once told me they’re good for fuel consumption and could be retro-fitted to existing wings. I check the wings of all the planes we pass taxiing to the runway, and every single one of them without fail has those bits except ours. It’s funny the things you notice when you spend weeks on end on a plane!

It’s a really long flight at the end of a really long week. I sleep for a good chunk of it, until I’m woken for a final oriental meal of pork noodles. It’ll be all turkey and mince pies in a few hours time.

Another short nap then I finally finish up watching Avatar 2 (average) before we come in to land. Hopefully a million miles richer – however, despite having now travelled on 16 SkyTeam airlines, I’m still not 100% confident I have won. 

There is no parade of dignitaries or marching band to meet me. The SAS and SkyTeam CEOs appear to have other things to do.

It is a very odd feeling. The result of the challenge is out of my hands though, so all I can do is sit back and hope that the SAS IT department sorts itself out and credits my TAROM flight in the next couple of weeks. I am certain that the TAROM ticket is in a qualifying fare class.

As I switch my phone back on, I can see that I now have 11 airlines showing on my SAS EuroBonus account as the Asia flights start to filter through.

Thank you for all of your supportive comments under my articles. I wish you all a Happy New Year, and I will be back with a follow-up article in a couple of weeks (EDIT: click here to read it) when I will know if SAS will be giving me my million points. By that point I should also have got my head around whether taking the challenge was a good idea or not …. 

The full itinerary

As a reminder, here is Barry’s original itinerary together with the changes made along the way:

Trip 1 – Gatwick to Barcelona (easyjet), Madrid to Gatwick (Air Europa) booked as part of a family holiday

Trip 2 – Heathrow to Paris (Air France) – Paris to Bucharest (TAROM) – Bucharest to Amsterdam (KLM) – Amsterdam to Stockholm (SAS) – Stockholm to Heathrow (SAS) 

Trip 3 – Heathrow to Atlanta (Virgin Atlantic) – Atlanta to Mexico City (Delta) – Mexico City to Paris (Aeromexico) – Paris to Heathrow (Air France) 

Trip 4 – Stansted to Istanbul (Pegasus) – Istanbul to Riyadh (Pegasus) – Riyadh to Jeddah (Saudia) Heathrow to Jeddah (British Airways) – Jeddah to Jakarta (Saudia) – Jakarta to Singapore (Garuda) – Singapore to Ho Chi Minh (Vietnam) – Ho Chi Minh to Taipei (China Airlines) – Taipei to Xiamen (Xiamen Airlines) – Xiamen to Shanghai (Xiamen Airlines) – Shanghai to Seoul (Korean) – Seoul to Shanghai (China Eastern) Seoul to Guangzhou (China Southern) – Guangzhou to Bangkok (Kenya Airways) – Bangkok to Shanghai (China Eastern) – Shanghai to Gatwick (China Eastern)