Lufthansa's Miles & More program

Im trying to understand the miles and more program that lufthansa offers and i just cant get to understanding this whole program. The website has too much content to read. Everything is in terms of "miles" and i cant get myself to understand how u spend these miles. Is it on discounts in cash or flight upgrades or what???
I know alot of TTers use this card. How does it work? Does it really have a lot of benefits or problems with it?
is it worth it ??

You can spend your miles on lots of things really. Flights obviously, but also hotel nights, books (on www.buch.de), magazine subscriptions, miscellaneous "stuff", the list is endless.

Here you go.

thats the website that had tooo much of content that i was fed up of reading so just wanted to know from members if its worth it!

They don't offer cash refunds. If you want to assess the value of your miles, one way to estimate is to look at the "exchange-rate" for purchases on www.buch.de: You need to cash 300 Miles to get 1 Euro worth of books/music/DVDs etc.

It really depends on how frequently you fly Lufthansa. If you regularly do long-haul trips (i.e. to Asia or the US), I'd say it's definitely worth it. If you do the odd trip to London once every 6 months, then it's hard to collect enough miles to actually use them for something.

yep i fly to India twice a year but i just learnt from the website that miles will be awarded only if u buy your ticket from Europe and not from India. Thats why i put up this thread so that u really are aware of the benefits..
though i get a gist of it ,I still have to understand this program..
But its free to register for it anyway right? so there is nothing to loose?

yes, but I don't think they send you the actual card until you have like 2500 miles from etix purchases. or something like that - can't remember. They are part of the Star Alliance though, which is nice, so I can also use/get credit for on my United frequent flyer program.

it's free, just get one
i've got one, i hardly ever use it, but i've had a couple of free flights with it

No, there's nothing to lose. I am registered, but I do what tom_a says - fly to London every six months. So I don't get very many miles. But I'm saving up for a teddy bear.

When I still lived in Bkk and Singapore it I collected quite some miles over the year (FRA-BKK and back once a year)...I got at least one round-trip a year for free (usually short trips...like Munich-London...but well woth it). Although i do not quite understand that you should only get it when booking from Europe...I never had any problems getting my miles and I always booked from Asia. As far as I know it does not depend on where you book but what airline you take.

anyone know more about that??

Yes it depends on the airline. It must be part of Star Alliance, so if you fly Thai you should get miles wherever you book.

It costs nothing to register so go for it.
Whether it pays off or not depends upon how much you fly. As a "normal" member (with a blue card) you lose miles after 3 years: i.e. if you fly today then the miles you earn from that flight will be lost at the end of September 2008 so you'd need to get enough together to spend them on something worthwhile first.

My experience is that unless you fly a lot on business and grab those miles too (which of course you will tax won't you ) then there's not a lot to be gained. But then if you regularly fly to Asia and back anyway then woohoo...

The number of miles you get credited depends on how much you pay for your ticket. Even for economy, they have three different types of booking categories. For the lowest-price ones (S, W), they only credit you 50 % of the miles that you fly. For the most expensive ones, they credit you 150 %.

For example, Munich->Delhi and back is roughly 7,400 miles. So if you go for the cheapest economy ticket, they give you 3,700 miles. If you go on a slightly more expensive economy ticket (H, M, Q, V), you get 7,400 miles, etc.

For details, check this page:

http://portal.miles-and-more.com/online/po...&nodeid=1227079

You get the card right after signing up...you dont need any start capital... just sign up, nothing to loose...just one more card in the purse

I think Butterbean is right, you only get a "real" membership card once you've earned your first 2,500 miles. But this has nothing to do with your membership itself. I guess they just want to save money on the cards and not issue one to people that never fly anywhere anyway.

I already had Aeroplan from flying in Canada. Air Canada is also Star Alliance...as is Lufthansa. I recently flew Lufthansa and sent in my stuff to collect the points with Aeroplan...got some letter back stating the following:

'Under our agreement with Lufthansa, members are allowed to claim mileage for all regular scheduled flights. Please note, charter flights, code share flights operated by any Lufthansa code share partner other than Star Alliance airlines, and Lufthana's train service are not eligible for mileage accumulation. Accumulation on non-North-Atlantic flights in Economy class earns 50% of actual miles flown.'

Now I was claiming a flight from MUC-LHR towards my Aeroplan...which means I did not get full credit. So it isn't always beneficial with member flights.

So I guess my moral is...get the plan and card for where you live and fly most. I talked to them and you cannot transfer points (i.e. transfer my Aeroplan to Miles & More...even though it is same Star Alliance flights) and you have to have individual cards for each person flying (i.e. husband and wife must have own card).

As for Miles & More...Tom joined up on a flight to Crete last September. The forms were in the in-flight magazine...they allow you to get credit for the flight you are already on...you give the form to the flight attendant and they take care of it. It takes a long time to get the actual card but you get a temporary card when you fill the form in. He did get the points from that flight...but you have to remember to give your card number each time you check in for a member flight...and even then you might have to claim your points later. Keep all your boarding passes and ticket crap to send in.

What I do know about Miles & More is that it is also affiliated with Payback (green card you can use at Kaufhof and Obi etc.) and I believe you can do something with points between the two...but don't quote me. Maybe someone knows the score?

You can claim miles up to a month retrospectively if you forget your card or whatever, it's no biggie. Just keep the boarding card for the purpose.

Payback: there does seem to be some connection, such as you get Payback points for receiving your M&M statement online. Where's Pootle when you need him

your payback points only get transferred to your miles & more card once a year and only if you have 1,500 payback points or more.

(i have the paypack lufthansa card). also the last 3 years in the fall, miles & more and payback had this deal if you used your payback card three times within a month and are one of the first 25,000 people to do so, you could win a subscription to focus magazine for a year. i have won two free subscriptions!

i signed up for a miles&more card when i flew to spain a coupla years back. i use the number whenever i fly star alliance partners (i.e united). bad thing is:
(1) miles are invalid after 36 months
(2) i tried to get a rental car with some miles. did everything online, then they said they would call only if nothing worked out. unfortunately sent me a voucher for the car rental AFTER i already was away. they did not specify this.

@boneydebbie -- you're right. their site is chocked full of info. too much. i needed a coupla hours to work through where i needed to go. i've got 10,000 miles to spare. i might get a glamour subscription.

Payback > Miles and more can be found on www.payback.de.

They've now dropped the limits for transferring to 1000 points.

Poots

Our family of four are off to Oz this year courtesy of Miles & More. We did not have quite enough for the fourth person so M&M are lending them to us at no charge!

I am impressed. And excited!

OK, fill out the form for Miles and More, and you take the paper little card that is with it. Send in the form.

Use the paper card when you are checking in, once you get over 2500 miles (usually 1 round trip inside of Europe) they will send you the proper card.

Then when you are checking in, just hand over the card, and they add the miles for your flight to your account. You can check your balance on-line, or via the quarterly statements they send you.

Once you get 30,000 miles, its a free flight inside Europe. for the rest you would have to check. If you do more than 45,000 miles in a year, you upgrade to silver status (like me !), if you do more than 120,000 miles in the year, you get GOLD. This is for all Star Alliance flights.

If flying inside of Europe, you can once you have the card, just book ETIX (Electronic Tickets) which means you do not bother about tickets, and just stuff your card in any Star Alliance machine, and it will give you your ticket for that flight.

I regularly use my free miles for flights back to England. Although its NOT completely free, you still have to pay the taxes.

that's how i went back to texas in may. paid something like €65. not a bad deal though.

withall this i repent for not having this earlier i flew about 8 times to india in the past 2 year.. bad luck.. would have alot of miles on my card by now

Worth knowing that if you can book no longer than 2 weeks in advance, you need only half the miles for many flights i.e. 15000 will get you a return flight in Europe if you travel within 2 weeks of booking. Not a bad deal though you still have to pay the taxes of course.

sweet ass uncle jamal. thats good info. can book with that trick online?

Yep.

You can probably retroactively add them to your account for flights that you took within a certain time; perhaps within the last 12 months.

I did it a couple of years ago and all I had to do was send in the ticket stubs, although nowadays you can probably do it online just by giving the flight number and your name. British Airways does that it like that.

No, still need to send in the ticket stubs, last I saw, and yes, can only do this for the last 12 months ! But the Lufthansa year as such runs from January to December, so am not completely sure how this work.

What I mean by the Lufthansa year, is that all status miles earnt between January and December decide your status (normal, Silver, Gold - really annoyed, missed my gold by 1 flight last year !).

My wife and I are both silver club or whatever it is they call it. We have had good luck getting upgrades to business when flying back and forth to the US. In situations where the flights are overbooked, the silver members often will be bumped up into business class first, and at the least, they will actually listen to you when you make seating requests.

Oh, and their little lounges, especially in Munich, are good for a few free beers before a long transatlantic...

They do offer retroactive crediting online, but only for flights operated by Lufthansa itself. If you want to get miles on partner airline flights, you need to send in the stubs.

However, I am not sure if they also allow retroactive crediting for new members, or if it only works if you already were a member when you boarded the plane.

woh!! im sure there is more information here than the Luftansa helpdesk itself

Ive registered and all ready to go the extra mile

@ Bonydebbie - It is there, but in about a 100 different places, so TT is def the best way to get the info in one place !

@peper
sure, id enjoy working more on my Thesis than reading that Miles and more webpage on the luftansa website..

Just to confirm that u get a temporary miles and more card but your real Card and PIN comes in only after u have made 3000 miles and more..im still waiting to book an airline home..

Besides that can any one tell me how u have to register with financial services for miles and more..
its said on the website that u earn miles with every euro u spend with the sparkasse master card... i have one and use it forgetting its borrowed money Does it come automatically or do u have to show your miles and more card there too???

i think it comes automatically - though you might want to call them and check. I like lufthansa as an airline, so i usually fly it where possible, but the miles&more website is absolute toss - half the time you can't find what you're looking for and when you can the link to that page is usually down. Best bet is just to call them and get all the info first hand!

I'm not sure about the Luftansa programe as I'm not (yet) living in Munich. However, i'm a member of British Airways' frequent flyer program and I clock up most of my miles by using their non airline partners, such as paying for everything with my Americam Express card, banking with Natwest, shopping at Tescos, hiring a car with Avis or Hertz, staying in various branded hotels, etc. Even if you don't fly very much, the miles can add up fairly quickly especially if you respond to the many bonus miles deals that pop up every now and then.

Star Alliance have a partnership with a lot of other places, such as Hertz, Deutsche Bank, etc. Just have to check if they have an alliance, then present your miles and more card, and then you collect bonus miles.

I regularly do this for car hire, and hotel bookings. It is also possible to apply for a Lufthansa Visa or Mastercard, and for every EURO you spend, you collect another mile.

I am a frequent flyer with Star Alliance, but most of my flights are to Amsterdam, Hamburg and Copenhagen. These are really short flights, and the mileage doesn't add up that fast. Now I've heard from a friend that they not only give you status when you've reached your 35000 miles, but also the number of flights you take can give you frequent flyer status as well. I can't find that anywhere on the website though, does anyone know about this?

My husband is a "Senator" , I´ll see if he knows.

Miles are not the same as Miles ie. there are award miles and status miles. Many of the cheaper flights give no status miles.

Miles & More FAQ

I get my status miles on every flight, but it doesn't go that fast since the miles on these flights are only worth 125 to 1000 miles per flight.

If you go to book a flight on lufthansa.com, once you have your flights selected at the bottom of the screen there is a "mileage calculator". If you click on this it shows you how many miles you will get for this fare class. It also have another part which shows additional status miles for frequest travellers, senators etc.

I'm FTL with Star Alliance since some years.

Up to a year or so ago you reached / retained a certain status level EITHER by achieving a certain sum of status miles OR number of flights.

One or two years ago the "number of flights" was dropped which is why you see nothing on that subject on the Miles & More site.

Does anyone know if you can back-date claims? I.e. Flights you took before you signed up to M&M

Usually yes you can, but you must have the stub given to you when you boarded as this is the only proof you actually took the flight.

Yes you can jfraney. It should last 12 months I think. Check out the lufthansa site for more details.

Shit...so the E-tickets won't be enough then? Have a load still in my inbox...

You could try, but you can book tickets then cancel them and so on but you only get miles for flights you actually take. Just having the ticket isn't enough. Maybe they've got some clever compooter thingy now that can tell them if you took the flight or not but they didn't have that when I last got miles added.

If your flight was with Lufthansa, Austrian Airlines Group, LOT, or Swiss airlines, you can retroactively request the miles credit using an online form. For other Star Alliance airlines, unfortunately you have to send them your ticket and boarding card stubs by post.

For the online request, log into your account at miles-and-more.com and then click the "Mileage request" link.

For LH flights, you need to give the ticket number, flight number, departure & arrival airport codes, and the booking class.