Standby Airpoints Upgrades gone after May 30th [Now July 12th].

[serfty]

AIR NEW ZEALAND CHANGING THE WAY AIRPOINTS DOLLARS™ UPGRADES ARE REQUESTED AND ONEUP™ ENHANCED TO INCLUDE GDS BOOKED CUSTOMERS

For travel from 30 May 2012, customers who are booked via a GDS, on flights where there are premium cabins, will be eligible to make bids for upgrades using Air New Zealand’s OneUp™ programme. At the same time Airpoints Stand-by and Confirmed upgrades will be replaced by OneUp™.

OneUp™ is an offer-based upgrade system that allows customers to choose how much they are prepared to pay for an upgrade and make an offer on that basis. OneUp™ offers can be made for a ‘single class’ upgrade, i.e. from Economy to Premium Economy or from Premium Economy to Business. To be eligible, the upgrade offer needs to be submitted to Air New Zealand at least seven days prior to flight departure. Customers can choose whether to pay with Airpoints Dollars™, debit card, credit card or Travelcard.

Airpoints members who book through a travel agent will be able to request a OneUp™ upgrade via myairnz.co.nz or as a travel agent you can make an offer on their behalf using an online form which is currently under development. This online form will be available at airnzagent.co.nz by 30 May2012.

Recognition upgrades are not affected by this change and can be requested as they are today. Likewise, Airpoints Standby and Confirmed Upgrade requests received prior to 30 May 2012 for travel after 30 May 2012 will not be affected and will be treated as they are today.[/I]

Exit strategy anyone? We have repeatedly stated that the only value of Airpoints is upgrades. Now they have taken the one and only good thing about Airpoints away. It doesn't mention how it will affect Gold Elite members but in any case, this is our worst nightmare. Time to say good bye to NZ. ...

This means the end of set price Airpoints upgrades - they'll now go to the "highest" bidder with a set reserve.

AirNZ has been slowly but surely gutting Airpoints - with this announcement goes the only thing keeping me interested in GE.

I don't like a pig in a poke ... so it'll be a 25 months long bye bye GE for me.

Using Any Seat Rewards and booking well in advance of travel (same as I have been doing with AirNZ) out I can travel in Business, say, AKL-MEL-LAX on QF for a nett 60,000 QFF points and NZD330.

Lets say an

is worth 100 QFF points (~

60) so that's cheaper the the current Standby Upgrade rate.

I'll also earn over 20% of WP status requalification.

I can gain AirNZ *G for under US$1000 worth of travel without setting foot on an AirNZ aircraft - none of those pesky 810 SP's on "NZ Flights".

 

[dk4]

OneUp™ is an offer-based upgrade system that allows customers to choose how much they are prepared to pay for an upgrade and make an offer on that basis... Customers can choose whether to pay with Airpoints Dollars™, debit card, credit card or Travelcard.

The way I read that, Airpoints Dollars won't be the only currency required to bid for upgrades either?

IMO this move, on top of "seats to suit" demonstrates that Air NZ has little confidence in its loyalty program to generate increases in yield or volume.

Hmmm, Tasman/Pacific Works Deluxe and bid for Long Haul upgrades in cash, they seem to be targeting a specific market segment (for increased yield) which they don't see as being served well by other airlines.

 

[anat0l]

Geez... and people thought that QF had the worst upgrade system in the world.

Where did this communication come from?

I'm sure this will do wonders from a revenue point of view. That's probably also what keeps NZ J seats very rare on *A redemptions, especially on its flagship AKL/LAX/LHR route.

AirNZ has been slowly but surely gutting Airpoints - with this announcement goes the only thing keeping me interested in GE.

I don't like a pig in a poke ... so it'll be a 25 months long bye bye GE for me.

You seemed to be passionately interested when NZ announced the ability to bank excess status points, or GE years. Surely you must have at least 1 in the kitty by now.

Plus those Christmas gifts always seem to bring a shine to people.


Oh, and by the way you may like to correct the thread title People might think this thread is about NZ stopping its ability to wait at the airport and go on a standby list to score an upgrade.

 

[serfty]

Geez... and people thought that QF had the worst upgrade system in the world.

Where did this communication come from? ...

First with a text from BundyBear yesterday afternoon, then there's this rather extensive thread on FT started yesterday: Airpoints Upgrades Gone! - FlyerTalk Forums

...
You seemed to be passionately interested when NZ announced the ability to bank excess status points, or GE years. Surely you must have at least 1 in the kitty by now. ...

... I don't like a pig in a poke ... so it'll be a 25 months long bye bye GE for me.
...

It was the only reason I pursued the required 810 SP's on NZ marketed and operated flights this last year. I have already requalified 'til June '13 and have bookings to earn a banked year by May. So that's *GE until June '14 - there's the 25 months. I will have a further year of *G 'til Jun 2015.

...
Plus those Christmas gifts always seem to bring a shine to people. ...

Still have my headphones still wrapped and unopened from Christmas.

...
Oh, and by the way you may like to correct the thread title People might think this thread is about NZ stopping its ability to wait at the airport and go on a standby list to score an upgrade.

Dang auto correct:-| -fixed!

 

[serfty]

Well there's been some backtracking today, but in relation to Gold Elite members only. It's a partial restoration - GE won't be able to use

's to upgrade from Economy to BP.

At lest it seems recognition upgrades with still be able to be used to go from Economy to BP.

We have received a lot of feedback over the past 24 hours relating to the changes to our upgrade programme. Much has been positive, but we have also received negative feedback, particularly from our Gold Elite members and we want to move quickly and address those concerns.

The primary driver of the change has been to gain greater achievement of upgrade requests throughout the year. We get inundated with upgrade requests at certain times of the year and at other times of the year seats remain vacant because demand for upgrades is very low. We currently fulfil over 70,000 standby upgrade requests per year, with the majority being allocated to our Gold Elite members, and this delivers many tens of millions of dollars of product value to those members.

Under our new OneUp proposal we expected that Gold Elite offers were more likely to be successful in achieving an upgrade, even when that offer was significantly lower than an offer from a Gold, Silver or Jade member, due to the enhanced premium applied to Gold Elite offers. However, we have received sufficient feedback from our Gold Elite members who would prefer to retain the status quo rather than participate in the benefits of the new OneUp offer process. So, for clarity:

Recognition Upgrades
These are the majority of the upgrade requests we receive from our Gold Elite members. We suspect in our correspondence yesterday many of you were frustrated with our changes around Standby Upgrades and therefore didn't read through the whole email to register that there is no change to your Recognition Upgrades. Your entitlement and confirmation of these upgrades will continue exactly as they do today.

Standby Upgrades
This is certainly where the feedback was most vocal! Based on the sentiments coming through we will revert back to the familiar fixed rate scheme for Standby Upgrades for Gold Elite members only. The rates will remain the same as today. It should be noted that these rates have remained fixed since 2008 despite the cost of fuel doubling in the past three years and will need to be reviewed at some time in the future. We hope you will appreciate that these are very competitive upgrade rates relative to other airlines.

This means that as a Gold Elite member, you can continue to redeem your Recognition Upgrades and request Standby Upgrades as you do today. We'll be allowing for these requests from Gold Elite members before we review the number of seats that we make available for OneUp.

However, we will be retaining the ability to only upgrade to one service class cabin higher than the original booked service class for all Airpoints™ members.

As Gold Elites you are obviously high value customers to us in commercial terms and we particularly value those who have supported our continuing efforts to innovate and adapt our business to remain competitive and meet changing needs. Thanks to those who have participated in our trials and provided constructive feedback to help us refine these new innovations.

Initiatives such as Space Plus on domestic and trans-Tasman, Gold Elite partner cards, banked years at Gold Elite, status point roll-over, priority opportunities to events like wine tastings, new product visits and events, improvements to our lounge product, additional baggage allowance and now this upgrade framework have all benefited from input from Gold Elite customers who have engaged with us and helped influence the design and we welcome this continuing feedback. To others who may have not yet had the opportunity to contact us, but were uncomfortable with these changes, our apologies that we did not get the design exactly right in the first iteration and we hope these changes address the majority of your concerns.

 

[serfty]

Air New Zealand have lost me.

Turns out this is not really backtracking - an examination of the "fine print" inciates that these re-introduced 'standby upgrades ' for GE will only be discerned after all other request, including one-up, are processed.

I don't spend as much money as some in maintaining Gold Elite status; but it is not insignificant.

Being top level with both Qantas and AirNZ I do have a choice. I find QF generally works better for me travel-wise, especially with the introduction of S2S by AirNZ. Also, with Qantas travel I have access to better lounges at AKL International, Sydney and Melbourne.

For T-T travel, QF fares have been generally comparable with NZ Works fares. However, I chose to pursue GE.

With that, last year I travelled Trans-Tasman much more on NZ than on Qantas last year (22 v. 4 times).

Last year I travelled on over NZ$7500 worth of "New Zealand" flights - this could easily have been on other airlines if it were not for the need for those 810 SP's for GE requalification.

I also flew internally within NZ 9 times rather than on Jetstar+; I find prices are comparable when the plus is taken into account and booking well in advance (as 99% of my bookings are).

With this change I find no further reason to pursue Gold Elite status; I can go back to row four on Jetconnect trans-tasman 73H'sand not have to pay extra for Food, Beverages, IFE and luggage.

Oh, yes, I'll also go back to earning FF points as well rather than just SP's.

I could just be that I am not the type of passenger that Air NZ is really interested in - if that is the case then so be it.

 

[anat0l]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

Turns out this is not really backtracking - an examination of the "fine print" inciates that these re-introduced 'standby upgrades ' for GE will only be discerned after all other request, including one-up, are processed.

Ouch!

I suppose this 'works' for NZ because it'll take care of their coffers first and foremost.

It does seem strange how this would work. I take it the advantage of being confirmed up to a year out is essentially worthless, unless yield get a clue.

Also, with Qantas travel I have access to better lounges at AKL International, Sydney and Melbourne.

SYD and MEL is hands down better (though NZ is more than adequate). AKL I - I thought the NZ Koru Lounge here is much better than the QF one, unless there have been changes since I was last there.

 

[serfty]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

...
SYD and MEL is hands down better (though NZ is more than adequate). AKL I - I thought the NZ Koru Lounge here is much better than the QF one, unless there have been changes since I was last there.

Having attended the AKL International Koru lounge over 15 times last year I can assure you I find the catering and ambience of the QF AKL First class/Emerald room quite a bit better.

The catering wise NZ lounge is more of a cafeteria these days ... the food options have been drastically attenuated over the last 18 months.

The drinks options are not nearly as good either. There's some tinny tasting sort of sparkling wine for example rather than Champagne.

 

[anat0l]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

To take a step back, it would be interesting to see how the actual results of OneUp has been.

For example, what are the reserves? Are they, by default, the Airpoints price of a standby upgrade? If so, this means the effective cost of upgrades has increased.

If it is less than the current standby price, then there's a chance that bidding the current standby price may make the mark. Although, this is a bit naive - the bidding pool has significantly increased now.


In general, I'm not looking with pleasure on NZ's decision to restrict one-class strictly upgrades, e.g. Y to Y+ or Y+ to J. Might as well call Y+ as Business and J as First.

 

[serfty]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

The reserves are published some where, but it seems about 10% less than the current flat rates.

 

[fftravel]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

I also note that you can't use Oneup to upgrade from Economy to Business. So if you want business cabin you will need to purchase at least premium economy.

 

[zzzhobbes]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

I wonder what going to happen to Star Alliance upgrade requests and if this will affect redeemptions

 

[TonyHancock]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

I was toying with the idea of pursuing status with NZ, but I'm not so sure I want to waste the effort now.

 

[serfty]

Re: Air New Zealand have lost me.

The rollout is delayed six weeks - to 12 July:

OneUp Upgrades - Spending Airpoints*Dollars - Airpoints - Air*New*Zealand - New Zealand Site

Introducing OneUp™ upgrades with Airpoints Dollars from 12 July 2012.

OneUp™
You will have heard we're changing the way you request upgrades with Airpoints Dollars™, we've called it OneUp™. Due to some system changes that we are implementing, rollout of OneUp will now take place on 12 July 2012 rather than 30 May 2012 as originally planned. In the meantime you'll be able to upgrade using our existing Airpoints™ Upgrade system.

From 12 July 2012 to purchase an upgrade using Airpoints Dollars, Airpoints Gold, Silver and Jade members will need to request a OneUp upgrade. Gold Elite members will still be able to request one class Standby Upgrades at current fixed rates.