SkyTeam partner Flying Blue – offering 50% Bonus Miles

I belong to the Flying Blue airline points loyalty scheme. It started when I took a couple of European flights on Air France and KLM, and didn’t have anywhere to credit them. I don’t like letting points accumulate in the ether, so I joined the program.

More recently, I have credited Garuda flights to the program. I only have entry level ‘Ivory’ status, so its only the 40,000 odd points I have that I need to worry about.  The scheme is mainly associated with Air France, KLM, and also includes Air Cailin – based in  Noumea, New Caledonia. However, there are a few other members of the program, including HOP!, Kenya Airways, Tarom, and Transavia.

These are not airlines that you may have come across. Here is a brief summary of their nature and destinations:

• HOP! – Low-Cost Airline – a collection of subsidiaries of Air France servicing 50 mainly regional French cities, and some destinations in Europe
• Kenya Airways – is the ‘privatised’ (the government is still one of its major shareholders) airline of Kenya. It has destinations in Asia, Africa, and Europe – but seems to be going through a few changes at the moment, including a new CEO, proposed plane purchases, and the cancellation of some routes, as well as the opening of others
• Tarom – is a Romanian government based airline, servicing its base country as well as Europe, Africa, and the Middle East. It also seems to be changing its CEO.
• Transavia – is a Dutch low-cost airline, owned by KLM. It services Europe, North Africa, the UAE, Israel, and Turkey

Air Cailin directly flies to Japan, New Zealand, Australia and several other Pacific islands, like Fiji, Vanuatu, and Tahiti. So that might be quite useful considering that Air France and KLM and the other members of Flying Blue don’t have actual flights to Australia.

They are currently offering a promotion that will give you 50% more miles when you purchase them as part of the offer. I received the offer via email, and I am not sure whether it is a general offer, or targetted, however you can access the offer here.

Is it worth it?

Always a difficult question to answer. The cost is pretty stable across various amounts of miles. For example:

• 2,000 Miles + 1,000 bonus miles (minimum offered) = €55 Euro (~AU$83.50 / US$65.00)
• 20,000 Miles + 10,000 bonus miles =€550 Euro (~AU$835 / US$650.00)
• 100,000 Miles + 50,000 bonus miles (maximum offered) =€2,750 Euro (~AU$4,173 / US$3,249.00)

That works out at €0.055 Euro per point, or ~AU$0.08, or US$0.06

So is this a good deal? Well, of course, it depends on how you value the points. The Points Guy (as of October 4 – the most recent I could find)  values Flying Blue points at US$0.013. And of course Flying Blue most recently had a promotion that offered 100% bonus miles.

My view

I’m not buying them. Paying 8¢ (AU) per mile for something that is worth 2¢(AU) is not a good deal. On the face of it, it’s not value for money for me – although if you need to top up miles for a particular award it might be for you.