Sale of ITA Airways to Lufthansa, how life changes for Italian frequent flyers
The sale of ITA Airways to the Lufthansa Group is now in the home stretch and once the sale is [...]
Swiss
Lufthansa
ITA Airways
Eurowings
Brussels Airlines
Austrian Airlines
Air Dolomiti
Star Alliance
SkyTeam
The sale of ITA Airways to Lufthansa Group is now in the home stretch and once the divestment is underway so many habits will change for Italian frequent flyers. I personally don't I have never hidden my preference for the Star Alliance over Skyteam, but what is about to begin is a different revolution than the one I was hoping for when people were talking about MSC as a strong partner and LH as an industrial partner.
Goodbye Flying, it will all be passed in Miles&More
In this article:
Lufthansa, Austrian and Swiss queues.
All of the companies in the Lufthansa group have one loyalty program: Miles&More, a single model for accumulating points and obtaining status, program that will undergo a total makeover starting in 2024. Farewell then to Fly the new loyalty program launched only in October 2021. Difficult and not very logical to think that LH will keep the current frequent flyer program, unless they wait for the final purchase, while at this stage the majority of shares will remain in the hands of the Italian government.
In the case of farewell to the Volare statuses, it is presumable to think that current enrollees are granted equivalent levels in Miles&More, but I doubt that current ITA Airways executives will be awarded the HON level, the highest and most exclusive in the Lufthansa program.
Just as it did when in early 2022 LH had launched the offer of Status Match to former Alitalia, Plus users will be assigned the Frequent Traveller level, while Premium and Executive users will be assigned the Senator card.
The reason is easy to understand the exclusivity of the HON level requires much more effort than is required today to obtain the executive card.
From 2024 Miles&More will also introduce "lifetime" statuses for the first time it is therefore likely, but I would not be surprised if not, that the executive forever will be awarded the new Senator Lifetime.
Goodbye Paris, Amsterdam, JFK
The biggest change, however, will be related to coincidences, today thanks to the Skyteam alliance, ITA Airways' strong partners have always brought to Paris, Amsterdam and New York JFK the homes of Air France, KLM and Delta.
With the sale of ITA Airways to the German group and the transition to the Star Alliance routes will transit Frankfurt, Munich, Zurich, Vienna i.e., the hubs of LH carriers, but also Istanbul with Turkish Airlines and especially United operating mainly from Newark EWR for connections to the U.S. network.
The farewell to JFK could be diluted. Today ITA Airways operates up to four flights a day over JFK, three from Rome in the peak season and one from Milan Malpensa. It is safe to assume that at least one of the Rome flights will be diverted to the New Jersey stopover to allow continuing passengers to board UA connections.
Access to Lufthansa's first class
The First Class cabin on board Lufthansa's 747/8.
Lufthansa's first class, and also that of Swiss, to date were practically off limits to Italian reward travelers, with the move within the German group instead will open up a great opportunity, hitherto unknown, namely that of using the points accumulated with ITA Airways to book one of the most exclusive cabins in commercial aviation.
Many more interesting partners in Star Alliance
Needless to deny it Skyteam has always been the most "boring" of alliances and Millemiglia/Volare points the least generous in terms of experiences. In contrast by switching to the alliance that features some carriers such as Singapore Airlines, All Nippon Airlines not to mention Air Canada and its fantastic Aeroplan loyalty program, one of the most generous in the world.
Much more competition to benefit travelers
What is certain is that Air France and KLM will not sit idly by, quite the contrary. Passengers to and from Italy will surely be affected by aggressive fares and marketing actions by the other airlines. Not only by the two Skyteam carriers, but it is also likely by British Airways and Iberia who will try to take advantage of a, likely, initial bewilderment on the part of Italian passengers.
