[AMcWhirter]

Indeed sparkyflier – For pilot training purposes AF for a time operated its A380 into Heathrow and later its A350.

I am sure airlines will gain traffic from Eurostar’s problems at St Pancras. On the other hand many must have switched from air to rail … especially those flying out of Schiphol.

Travel blogger Paul Lucas recently returned CDG-LHR with AF because he said it was “twice the price” of Eurostar.

I’m flying back from Paris to London today, solely because Eurostar was twice the price. My flight is also oversold in economy. @Eurostar’s pricing policy really is not helping matters 😱

— Paul Lucas (@paul_winginit) September 6, 2022

[MarcusGB]

Flying Blue certainly have codeshare agreements with other Airlines, such as Malaysia, where you earn membership points and miles for flying Malaysia Airlines on some domestic, and say KUL- OZ flights. Etihad flights ex AMS to AUH, Bangkok Airways also. You can book MH and earn for yr Flying Blue account.
Equally with Qantas, and some flights ex Europe to Oz, used to include Qantas Codeshare flights also, that you earned miles and status XP’s with Flying Blue last year.

VS Currently have reward flights on Air NZ, Singapore, KLM, AF, and others, so i presume these will get integrated more or removed as part of another Alliance?

I have about 120,000 miles in a Virgin account, so what will happen with these? Can they be integrated, and do i get a Gold VS Account with my KLM/ AF Platinum, therefore Elite Plus, or will they remain separate.

Certainly KLM also used to run a 10am flight LHR-AMS that was a 767, but now many of their flights are 100 seater Embraer’s, or 192’s.
I imagine this is keeping some valuable slots, but when a few flights in just a couple of hours, is that not just to keep the slots than putting on higher capacity 738/9’s as they used too?

The Embraer also offers a Lower cost “CityHopper” service, not really much of a Business class product as choosing a 737 service.
However the LCY – AMS services, hiked in pricing recently, from LCY. But they have up to 9 flights a day, however, between 10am-4pm weekdays, there is nothing.
LCY also have no flights from Afternoon Sat to Sunday PM as it currently closes, so will the last 12pm Sat KLM flight, until 13.45 Sunday, have some additional KLM links, as this is a huge gap. AF have not flown to CDG from LCY for a long time, since Cityjet was sold on, then melted away.
LCY is tempting, as it dos not have the delays of LHR, or the capacity limits going forwards or delays, especially for travelling with connections / Medium or Long Haul.

I still have found SQ, EY, EVA and other Airlines Business class fares, staring from AMS for half the price from LHR to various places in Asia, not including the extortionate UK Departure taxes rip off!

Many questions to be answered yet, and see which hubs grow, with staff shortages or Government restrictions as at LHR/ AMS…

Be interesting to hear from the Flying Blue side about the integration.

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Tom Otley, AMcWhirter

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