ITA Airways, now Volare is forced to change its skin or else "points will run away"
Since ITA sent the email yesterday announcing the signing of the partnership agreement with Flying Blue, the program [...]
KLM
ITA Airways
Air France
SkyTeam
Since ITA sent the email yesterday that announced the signing of the partnership agreement with Flying Blue, the Air France KLM loyalty program, my mail box, whatsapp and social profiles are "flooded" with messages from readers making calculations, questions and projections of point usage.
The reason for all this turmoil
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For months, if not years, I have been writing that Flying Blue is the best loyalty program For serial accumulators of Italian points and miles, Until yesterday, there were two shortcomings: there is no personal credit card that allows accumulation of points in Italy (ed. there is the Mooncard for business expenses) and there was no possibility of accumulating FB points with ITA Airways flights.
So now all passengers who fly ITA Airways on a regular basis will be able to (re)start entering the Franco-Dutch loyalty card for flights operated by the Italian national airline, and vice versa those flying Air France KLM will be able to freely choose to accumulate Volare points, qualifying and non-qualifying, with the Italian FF.
Two communicating vessels that for years allowed each other's loyal passengers to accumulate points, take advantage of benefits, and gain privileges and that with the end of Alitalia/Millemiglia had yet to be restored.
From today you will be assured of being able to enter the lounges of ITA with an Air France or KLM ticket, and so will ITA passengers in lounges in Paris, Amsterdam and the rest of the world.
Because now Volare is "forced" to change
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You could get up to 600€ compensation per person
Until now, Volare has played in a different league from all other frequent flyers, or rather it was a closed league where it was impossible to compare with other companies. A first crack opened when it was announced that the possibility of converting Membership Rewards points into Volare points and a second when the new ITA/American Express co-branded credit cards.
Now that the agreement with Skyteam's most important carrier for Italian passengers has also arrived the wall is about to come down, and everyone will be able to have a face-to-face confrontation, just like in the supermarket, On which program to use in ROI key.
If with 10€ at supermarket A I buy 10 apples and at supermarket B the same apples cost twice as much or half as much, the good housewife will decide precisely where to shop. The same happens in the world of frequent flyers, where, however, these shifts can mean that one company gains and one loses, and not a little.
What are the critical issues of the Volare program
I have written several pieces in the past where I explained what were weaknesses and strengths of the program made in ITAly, and now more than ever, these critical issues are likely to cost the Italian company dearly especially at this uncertain stage with the sale to Lufthansa yet to materialize and the transition to Star Alliance still nebulous.
The main problem is the lack of the award chart, only ITA Airways in the aviation world has made this choice. Probably dictated by the vision of former #1 Lazzerini which Was convinced of his vision, but that the facts show that no one in the world "predicts" this trend, on the contrary. The paradox is that you can now detach real ITA award tickets, but only by using points from other loyalty programs.
If until yesterday few Italian FFs had points in the loyalty program of Virgin Atlantic to book ITA award flights, this is not the case with Air France and so many will be able to book an award ticket, for example from New York to Rome with only 9.27€ + 72k FB points.
And here the second problem opens up, the value of the points And what can be done with equal points. If I wanted to book the award ticket on here today I could, for example, transfer 108k MR points into the Flying Blue program and get the 72k points needed to which add less than 10€ in fees.
However, if I wanted to make the same reservation using Volare points. in addition to 108k membership rewards points I should also shell out over 2900 cash. This is because Volare points have a fixed value of 5 euros for every 1,000 points, and what's more, being a one-way flight, the price is even higher than for a round-trip ticket.
It is obvious that in this situation a FF is unlikely to accumulate points from the Italian loyalty program instead of the French one, and this will cost money to ITA's coffers because points are also sold and bought between companies.
Similarly. it is unthinkable that the loyal ITA customer cannot use accumulated points to fly aboard Air France or KLM, or to other partner companies.
No more points expiring
The first change ITA must make to the Volare program, however, is a much simpler and inexpensive one.
He needs to change his approach on the points deadline. In Italy, loyalty programs are considered prize contests and therefore regulated by appropriate regulations, however, nowhere does it say that you must always let the consumer expire points. It happens at the supermarket, at the gas station, and of course with FF points as well.
I'm not saying copy the Americans (no deadline), but it would take very little to have an approach similar to that of Air France (if you fly renew points) or Lufthansa (if you have the status, or the credit card the points don't expire), would also go well with an approach Emirates or Singapore type i.e. with points expiring 36months after being accumulated.
Already this would be a better program, instead today we all live with the nightmare October 15, 2024, collection end date and potential "expiration" of accumulated points, even those from a flight made on October 2, 2024.
What is the risk to Volare (and ITA)
Loyalty programs make money, lots of it, and are worth billions of dollars in airline budgets. Air France KLM has just mortgaged Flying Blue for more than $1.5bn.
As is well known, ITA Airways' budget is far from break-even, but last year Volare Loyalty spa, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Italian airline, generated a profit of more than 660k euros against just under 7.8M in sales. A demonstration that, although just starting out, Italian FF is making a profit and contributing positively to the company's cash flow.
However, if there is no change of course the more experienced FFs, Those most concerned with the value of points and consequently those even more likely to spend where points can also be obtained, might migrate to Flying Blue their transactions in hotel chains, car rentals, shopping and other similar activities with enormous harm to the program.
In conclusion
Volare is slowly maturing, of course sooner or later it will have to start from scratch or almost with the transition to Star Alliance, but in the meantime things are improving day by day. Now, however, it needs a coupon and fine tuning to improve the performance of the machine and start running like all other FF programs.
