Air France and Flying Blue (SkyTeam alliance)
To date I have resisted adding Air France and Flying Blue to this website. However, you will now find information on it below, and on the Other points page.
My principal reason for omitting Flying Blue was that there was plenty to focus on with KMiles, Miles & More, Nectar etc, and it has a pretty dreadful reputation.
However, a few developments have led to me reassessing that. These are as follows:
1) Air France is to substantially increase its flights to Malta
After its introduction of direct flights to Toulouse last year, Air France is to increase this service by 50% from 2 x weekly to 3 x weekly. Although this is not spectacular, it is a good sign considering the number of network cuts Air France is making elsewhere.
In addition, through their “low cost carrier” subsidiaries, Transavia and Transavia France (although please note that you cannot earn Flying Blue points with Transavia: indeed Transavia has no frequent flyer programme, so I will only be featuring their special offers and low fares, of which there should be a few!), Air France will this summer finally break the monopoly held by Air Malta on the following two key routes:
Paris – Transavia France will be operating 2 x weekly from Orly every Monday and Thursday with some pretty decent prices starting at €49/109 all-in (one way/return) on certain dates.
Amsterdam – Transavia will be operating 2 x weekly from Amsterdam Schiphol every Monday and Friday. Interestingly, Transavia is currently only listing full fares for the route priced at €100-130 each way. So its pricing is currently on a rough par with Air Malta. That said, given that Air Malta flights range from €86-260 one way to Amsterdam, this alternative could potentially cost slightly more or save you substantially: the benefits of competition! I will of course keep you updated on special offers.
2) Flying Blue status match
If you have a Gold card issued by any other airline (in the case of Air Malta this would be Diamond tier status), you can now get yourself Gold status, straightaway, in Flying Blue.
You can apply for the status match here.
Edit: it now appears that you need a Danish address to benefit from this status match.
For general sign up to the programme, you can join Flying Blue via the link on this page.