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STAR ALLIANCE MEMBER REVIEWS, COMMENTS AND OPINIONS |
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STAR ALLIANCE member review : 12 January 2010 by J Hang (USA)
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Member Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Gold | Product Consistency: | 2.0 |
Airport facilities: | 3.0 |
It appears that award redemption and upgrades are much more generous with the foreign carriers
than the US carriers, with the exception of Singapore Airlines. Also, be warned that United
apparently is trying to push its FFs into its own award inventory rather than allowing them to
redeem through partner airlines. On several occasions, I tried to book F in NH or OZ and was
told by UA that there isn't inventory when NH and OZ told me that there are actually inventory
available for UA FFs. This is extremely annoying. Though, I looked in FF programs for most
of the SA partners, and UA is probably one of the most generous when comes to awarding FFs
with status. Also, I can't agree more with the previous post that the lack of consistency is
irritating.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 3 November 2009 by James Halley (Thailand)
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Member Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Gold | Product Consistency: | 5.0 |
Airport facilities: | 5.0 |
Update on my 2008 posting. Out of the blue the two carriers now co-operate and I can transit
airside in BKK from and to CNX. Now the journey feels seamless!
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 3 June 2009 by Joakim Holmstrom (Sweden)
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Member Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Gold | Product Consistency: |
5.0 |
Airport facilities: | 5.0 |
Star is the best alliance. Their cooperation is good and the One Roof terminals (ARN T5/MUC
T2/CDG T1 etc.) is good in service. Short time between changes and you can always ask crew for
help.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 29 August 2008 by James Halley (Thailand)
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Member Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Gold | Product Consistency: | 4.0 |
Airport facilities: | 5.0 |
Why cant Singapore Airlines and thai cooperate? A recent advertisement spoke of the outstanding
alliance cooperation at Bangkok airport. Nothng could be further from the truth. I flying on
domestically within Thailand. TG will not issue a boarding pass in trnasit if you arrive on SQ. so
immigration has to be done with the masses in Bangkok, despite the special immigration desks for
transit passengers. they blame immigration whom i have actually had stamp my passport only for TG to
have it revoked. I fly TG a lot but I do find this lack of cooperation with SQ annoying. Having two
major regional players doesnt work well, obviously.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 28 August 2008 by A Arndt (USA)
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Member Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
3.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
The Star Alliance Network provides an amazing assortment of destinations through its member
airlines. While consistency amongst products and mileage accrual varies and sometimes seems unfair,
they have a suberb product that definitely exceeds all other alliances. Lounges and upgrades (I have
heard some complaints about advance upgrades, while I have found upgrading at checkin has for me at
least been so far at a 100% success rate) are always consistant. The one problem I have found is
that, where more situational at certain airports, ie. Chicago O'Hare and LAX, where airlines aren't
consolidated within one terminal that baggage has to be reclaimed and rechecked with alliance
carrier instead of bagged checked to final destination, which is common in the consolidated
facilities. This besides the consistancy of product between airlines and mileage accrual seems to be
my only sticking point, otherwise Star far exceeds Oneworld and Skyteam by leaps and bounds.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 1 May 2008 by N Matias (Luxembourg)
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Member Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
Booked flight from LUX-YYZ with Austrian returning on Swiss. As my flight from YYZ to ZRH is
operated by Air Canada for Swiss, I cannot upgrade although the booking class would allow it and I
have more than enough credit. What's the use of choosing to fly star alliance then?
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 30 April 2008 by T Larsen (Denmark)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
5.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
As a frequent traveller it is of great importance that the recognition of status works throughout
the network. This week I experienced it at the newest member, Turkish Airlines. Although flying
domestic economy class, check in at business class counters, access to lounge and separate security
check was perfect. On a round-the-world-trip I have also experience excellent ground service in
airports such as Los Angeles, Tahiti, Cook Islands, Auckland, Dunedin, Sydney and Singapore.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 30 April 2008 by Steven Curfs (Luxembourg)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
Personally I believe this alliance to be the best one around these days - ease of use of all
websites and consistency of service and status recognition. It is however very difficult if not
impossible to use miles for flight awards if that does not happen with the cardholder's original
carrier (in my case LH). As I fly mostly from/to LUX, this means I have to use Luxair, and whilst
operating code-share flights with LH, award-booking in any class is nearly impossible. Even if
booking with LH, direct routes are more the exception than the rule, weird stop-over routes via
Dusseldorf, Warsaw or Stuttgart are routine.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 30 January 2008 by A Davidson (Canada)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
1.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
As an Air Canada Aeroplan member since the early '80s, I am extremely disappointed in their apparent
lack of ability to credit missing miles for flights taken with one of their Star Alliance Partners
in June of 2007. Have submitted documentation three times over the past few months, made numerous
telephone calls to their office with waiting times of 30+ minutes on each occassion and still no
satisfaction!
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 24 January 2008 by Daryl Ward (Germany)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
2.0 |
Airport facilities: |
5.0 |
The new upgrade system to allow upgrades over the full Star Alliance network is a disaster. I have
travelled in expensive ticket classes (M with Singapore Airlines and Q with Air New Zealand) - not
the "heavily discounted" classes that are excluded from upgrades - booking classes that accrue 100%
miles. So far I have been unable to upgrade a single flight using my Lufthansa miles. It seems to
be almost impossible to book a flight that is eligible for upgrading - and even if this is done the
upgrade seats are not always available. It is also not possible to confirm the upgrade before
buying a ticket with a partner airline.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 13 January 2008 by Nuno Monteiro (Portugal)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
5.0 |
I used to travel quite a lot between Newark and Lisbon or Porto, and after becoming a frequent flyer
from TAP Portugal (Victoria Program) in 2001 (back then Qualiflyer in venture with Swissair), I was
able to get many upgrades to business class, not only with TAP, but also with Lufthansa, when the
plane is full, which was always nice. Now I travel quite a lot between Germany and Porto with
Lufthansa or few times with TAP, and I do accumulate the same milages that I would with TAP, so for
me the program works very well. The Business Lounge at Lisbon Airport is ok, I guess, needs a big improvement if they want to
compete with one in Porto, which is amazing. The one in Newark, depending on the gates you depart,
you either go to the SAS Lounge, very good and comfortable or the Lufthansa lounge, which is quite
nice. In Frankfurt, the Lufthansa Lounge is enormous and it has everything that is needed to wait
for a flight. With other airlines belonging to Star Alliance nothing to complaining. One flight from New York to
Frankfurt and return was good, with priority for have a Silver card and the flights with United
Airlines in United Sates and the one from Washington Dulles to Munich and return were also good.
South African Airways also gave me priority to do the check-in in Johannesburg and Cape Town with
the possibility to use their lounge in Johannesburg, while waiting for the flight to Cape Town. SAS,
also no problem at all. The ticketing also works very well when booking through Star Alliance.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 13 January 2008 by Mike Simpson (New Zealand)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
5.0 |
I find that Star Alliance network works extremely well. within New zealand I have access to all
the Air NZ Koru Lounges. I agree with the comments about Air Canada they seem to not recognise tier status and often have to remind
them of the Star Alliance entitlements before they grant me access to the lounge. However I
rarely travel economy so the gold status is wasted except when travelling with Lufthansa.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 30 December 2007 by Lawrence Nkemdirim (Canada)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
5.0 |
Airport facilities: |
3.0 |
Some members of the Star Alliance are drastically reducing benefits to their best customers. Air
Canada, for example has done the following over the last three years: (1) raised the mileage
required for threshold upgrade certificates from 15, 000 to 20,000; (2) Withdrawn eligibility for
upgrade to Business Class with System-wide certificates with any fare other than full economy fare.
Previously, qualification is triggered by about half the full fare; (3) Raised the mileage
requirement for the award of Special System-wide threshold upgrade certificate from 45, 000 to 75,
000. I suspect that they have eliminated that benefit altogether in the 2008 program; (4) Reduced
the 10,000 Status Mile option in the list of selected benefits to 2,500; (6) imposed expiry dates
on accumulated mileage. The list of reduced benefits goes on and on. It is unfortunate that
customers have no organization capable of challenging the Airline especially in countries like
Canada where there is only one airline offering similar loyalty programs and where the market place
is ineffective in regulating the power of the Airline over such matters.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 23 December 2007 by Quan Shen (Austria)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
5.0 |
Airport facilities: |
5.0 |
On 12.12.07 I tried Shanghai Airlines with surprise as it became one of the member. Now all members
can generate Status miles through the Chinese network. While Star Alliance can offer more connection
possibilities for travellers in within and through China I still consider whether the 2 new carriers
especially Air China can keep their service level up to other members. Air China has not very good
reputation as I heard many times from relatives, friends and business partners. Also Air China for
example has a much lower required mileage programme for star alliance gold equivalent. There are
also a variety of confusions between different frequent flyer programs due to high complexity.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 23 December 2007 by O Johansen (Norway)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
What is happening to the Star Alliance idea? I wish someone could explain the real benefits of using
the airlines of Star Alliance, in addition to getting hold of mileage point on all flights. Recently
I tried to book a flight from Oslo to Jakarta, going there by THAI, and coming home by Lufthansa.
Impossible, because the two Star Alliance airlines have no ticket cooperation, I was told my travel
office. Are the effiency of Star Alliance only for those buying full fare business class tickets...?
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 2 November 2007 by Oddvar Johansen (Norway)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
5.0 |
Star Alliance is great when having one ticket, but if you should have two different tickets on their
network, be aware! My wife travelled from Oslo to Manila. As she was travelling on a THAI bonus
ticket, she had to buy an additional ticket Oslo-Stockholm. She could not buy a throught ticket as
she then would not be able to travel Economy Premium. However, this was not as easy as assumed. THAI
is no longer allowing SAS to enter their reservation-system. That ment she had to check out - and in
again (!) in Stockholm, which was rather complicated! There was no benefint of being a Star Alliance
member at all! This is really going tens of years back in time, and is a drawback to the Star
Alliance service.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 2 November 2007 by Teresa Tyler (UK)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Silver |
Product Consistency: |
4.0 |
Airport facilities: |
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We are fairly new to the Star Alliance scheme but having clocked up a lot of mileage last year on
airlines that all belonged to it, we quickly became frequent fliers. For us the proof of the pudding
was in using some of our miles to buy flights, and this was simplicity itself and worked well. We
are thinking of using some more miles next year to upgrade a flight and will be interested to see if
this works well too.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 18 October 2007 by Peter
Bedson (UK)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
3.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
If you travel a lot you need to do some research on how easy it is to get/maintain gold status as it
varies a lot between the carriers in the alliance. BD seems to be fairly easy to reach gold status
and have a reasonable programme. Some of the carriers will only let you in the business lounge and
not their gold lounge if you are a "foreigner" in terms of your frequent flyer card. Award flights
seem to be a lot easier to book than with One World - maybe because there are more options for
routings especially to the far east/australasia. Downside of the large alliance is that in some
places the lounges get very crowded and at Changi they would only let me take one child into the SQ
Lounge - though I have never had a problem anywhere else.
STAR ALLIANCE member review : 18 October 2007 by Olivier Viles (Australia)
| | Customer Satisfaction : |
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Tier
Status: |
Gold |
Product Consistency: |
3.0 |
Airport facilities: |
4.0 |
I have been flying around the world with star alliance 3 years in a row. Singapore Airlines, EVA and
Air New Zealand are all very good. But especially Lufthansa and United are two airliners that bring
the whole of the alliance down. I also don't like the way United and Singapore Airlines work together. It's almost like flying two
different alliances. For example you can't use either frequent flyer account to use for flights on
the other airline. But then they manage to get my Singapore flights on my united account even when I
have my Singapore number on my boarding pass. But overall it's still the best alliance in the world I reckon.
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