[EU_Flyer]

Hello everyone

I have a Star Alliance Gold card with Aegean. I’ve been flying with Turkish Airlines medium and long haul recently a lot in economy and found that the *G doesn’t do much other than get me into a lounge and luggage. Priority boarding is hit and miss (more miss). Requests for seating is also unreliable. No upgrades ever. Service can be great but also very very bad.

I recently flew with Lufthansa and Austrian over the weekend (after a long absence) and was amazed at the difference. Seats were blocked next to me on each flight, one upgrade on LH on a flight with empty seats in Y and on Austrian, the purser came and personally welcomed / thanked me for flying Austrian. Was pleasantly shocked and has made me question Turkish with whom I do 20+ flights a year.

Anyone else have Star Gold experience to share on these and other alliances? Keen to manage my expectations.

Thanks very much in advance.

A.

[LuganoPirate]

Hi Alex, concerning LH and Austrian I fully agree with you, though despite being Star Gold Senator I’ve never been upgraded. Indeed when in Economy I’ve always had the seat next to me empty, unless the flight was completely full.

Travelling Aegean recently, I found everything was OK, priority boarding, extra baggage etc, except the flight was operated by Olympic, even though it was Aegean metal and Aegean crew (go figure) so we had to use the Olympic lounge instead of the nicer Star Alliance Business lounge!

[K1ngston]

Alex you are right it depends on the airline. I have SQ KFG and to be 100% honest I dont think I am fully recognised by SQ, I have never been upgraded and as they have their PPS programme, Gold is I have always felt an annoyance for them! Even in Changi they have created another lounge so not allowed in the BC Lounge

My experience with Turkish is that they tried their hardest to make seats available and recognised my status so I guess its hit and miss and to your point differs on every airline

[seasonedtraveller]

My original Star Gold was with BMI (around 2000 I think) although I had a Gold DC card some time prior to that. Maybe just nostalgia but I used to love the service from MAN to ORD in ‘C’ but that’s another story…….
Before that it was a Sabena ‘Travelclub’ card which was, I think, Sabena’s top tier?

I was frequently upgraded with Sabena and i distinctly recall my wife and I both getting that ‘bing’ as we were boarding for IST

These days my Star is with SAS and I normally qualify at Diamond level which is double Gold requirements.
Trouble is that the Diamond card causes awful issue’s with the likes of United, SQ, Thai and Air India who’s systems and staff do not recognise it.

After 2 years of issues (lounge, check in, status not recognised, boarding priority, miles missing etc) the problem appears to be the prefix of the membership number.

Gold level begins EBG
Diamond is EBD.
I have found that adding my correct number – EBD1234567 causes all the issues and this can be resolved by inputting EBG1234567 instead.

Ive reported this to SAS Eurobonus a couple of times but it falls on deaf ears.

Anyway, I’ve been Gold or Diamond with SAS for 8 years and have never been upgraded by SAS or any other Star carrier for that matter and in fact, i was recently refused lounge access in DUS because despite booking LH, it was a Eurowings flight.

Well, that was long and rambling (can you tell I’m on holiday?) but I agree, Star is certainly not seamless.
ST

[EU_Flyer]

Thanks all for your very interesting input ;=)

I guess I was spoilt recently on LH and OS which made me wonder what the ‘norm’ was.

Must say though, flew SQ from SYD – IST (via SIN) in February in economy. Due to my Gold card, they let me fly forward on an earlier flight from SYD-SIN for free, blocked a 3 seat section on both the A380 SYD-SIN (which was about 80% full) and 777 SIN-IST (which was about 20% full – seriously!) and I was able to sleep very nicely on both sectors. That said, I’d had surgery and they probably felt sorry for me but the SQ service in Sydney was excellent. Singapore was another story and the Krisflyer Gold lounge is sub-par I dodn’t use it any more and instead use Priority Pass to access SATS next door which has showers and good food and toilets(!!).

[EU_Flyer]

[quote quote=824084]
Travelling Aegean recently, I found everything was OK, priority boarding, extra baggage etc, except the flight was operated by Olympic, even though it was Aegean metal and Aegean crew (go figure) so we had to use the Olympic lounge instead of the nicer Star Alliance Business lounge!

[/quote]

I totally understand your frustration. Aegean deliberately code all their domestic flights Olympic (but they’re often operated by Aegean with A3 crew – especially to the big islands). One of the reasons is that, given OA are not Star Alliance, they don’t have to provide lounge access to Star Gold card holders. In Athens, they sometimes allow access to the Aegean lounge (for non A3 Golds) but the very nicely newly refurbished Lufthansa lounge next door rejects you despite the flight being operated by Aegean (but with an OA flight number). This is understandable as the LH lounge can barely fit 30 people.

It’s also frustrating for miles accrual.

[LuganoPirate]

Thanks for the explanation Alex_F. It is annoying as I’d hoped my son would then have completed his 2 flights with Aegean as I’d signed him up as it will be easier to get Silver for him than with *A. That is now dashed.

What is wrong is you book on the Aegean website. Pay Aegean and get a ticket issued by them. Fly on their metal with their crew and magically it’s Olympic so you get nothing.

I did try to use the LH lounge on the way back and it was full. We ended up wandering round the airport instead!

[EU_Flyer]

[quote quote=824278] It is annoying as I’d hoped my son would then have completed his 2 flights with Aegean as I’d signed him up as it will be easier to get Silver for him than with *A. That is now dashed.

What is wrong is you book on the Aegean website. Pay Aegean and get a ticket issued by them. Fly on their metal with their crew and magically it’s Olympic so you get nothing.

[/quote]

If it’s any consolation, the 2 qualifying flights to attain Aegean Miles & Bonus Silver can be on either OA or A3. Aegean make attaining Silver and Gold quite easy if you fly them a few times a year.

As for booking with the A3 site and getting OA, it’s frustrating indeed unless you are a Miles & Bonus member where you get the miles irrespective. That said, being A3 FF I rarely get miles flying Lufthansa or Austrian unless it’s a higher fare bracket. I guess they reward their own.

[LuganoPirate]

Thanks for that Alex, I didn’t know I could claim. Though I signed my son up for Aegean Star Alliance I didn’t bother to claim the miles as it was an Olympic flight. I’ll now submit the claim.

[EU_Flyer]

[quote quote=824504]Thanks for that Alex, I didn’t know I could claim. Though I signed my son up for Aegean Star Alliance I didn’t bother to claim the miles as it was an Olympic flight. I’ll now submit the claim.

[/quote]

My pleasure! FYI Olympic Air are now a fully owned subsidiary of Aegean Airlines after the former nearly went under when Marfin (their previous owner – post denationalisation) downsized during the Greek economic crisis. The two airlines effectivelty operate as one. Olympic’s FF program was merged into Aegean’s Miles & Bonus.

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