In air India, I heard we can book for ourselves with points after 1 revenue flight and book for others after 5 revenue flights
Someone who has better experience with flying returns can confirm this
-
Hey there! Welcome to TFC! View fewer ads on the website just by signing up on TF Community.
Club Vistara Air India Integration Announced
- Thread starter bhavyegoel
- Start date
Someone who has better experience with flying returns can confirm this
This is mentioned in anather thread
Requesting Mods to merge that one with this one if relevant https://www.technofino.in/community/threads/air-india-flying-returns-revamp.24443/
travel2live
TF Buzz
Even I have Axis VS but still short of some spend to reach the premium economy ticket. How much time they are taking for transfer and any clue if the milestone calculator will start from zero or the spend done on VS will be carried to VI
I have an Axis vistara infinite card with active CV Gold status, also my IDFC vistara card is up renewal next month. What does the public suggest here, shall I continue with the renewal or close the card?
Last edited:
pprakash11
TF Prestige
Once you achive AXIS sends voucher within 2-3 days
Definitely it will start from zero.
Generally speaking, it is a terrible idea to merge Vistara with Air India so soon. Vistara had built a premium brand and reputation for itself and nothing will be gained by killing the brand. Tata should have kept it seperate at least in appearances even if the same set of people operated the flights and did crew duties. I understand that there are savings from not having 2 sets of check in counters etc and that could have been solved by using the same counters but the brand and the livery on the aircraft should have been kept seperate. They could have considered a merger after 5 to 10 years if necessary.
Totally agree with this
Technically Air India is the premium airline and Air india express is budget. How can they keep vistara as premium again?
Are you sure. I recently booked tickets 4 weeks in advance without any surge in requirement.
Share details .
I think they've had to change course plenty of times since they started the merger. I don't think this was the initial plan, let alone this soon! It was planned for mid 2025!
There's certainly pressure from one of the parties to get this done as soon as possible even if it's detrimental just because of the financials.
I thought employees (excluding Vistara) were really eager for the privatization of the airline, and then you had the mass hiring from Air India and poaching pilots from Akasa Air and GoAir. I get the GoAir pilots leaving specially if they have been going without pay, but seems they still managed to hire a lot of pilots in this market.
Now it seems most of the employees are revolting or unhappy. It reflects in the quality of the service and also you can see all the ongoing related events like the mass sick leave that happened recently which resulted in over 100+ cancelled flights, many got fired and but not long after they ended up getting reinstated. You can imagine the s*** show that is going on in Air India.
And I haven't seen much of an improvement in the airline other than the equipment and branding is finally getting some DUE maintenance and upgrades. Their planes used to be so old, dirty, worn off, ... They still are but at least they are cleaning them and fixing them up a little bit so they don't look dirtier than a toilet.
I still somehow had a bad experience to Hong Kong and from Abu Dhabi recently both had cockroaches roaming around the cabin, in both the bathroom was a mess, and in one the bathroom washbasin cover was missing so they just put some duct tape and poked some holes in it! The cleanliness, service and equipment are nothing to talk about! Both flights were in business class and absolute garbage, just with more space and quiet. And I'm someone who doesn't usually splurge on that, both happened to be "cheap" upgrades.
Earlier one they had a bidding system for upgrades, and you could bid the bare minimum and get the upgrade. If I remember correctly I scored a few Pune-Delhi for between 3k-5k, they could be worth that! Now they have fixed pricing which is like 10k-12k for the same route.
Even last year I had an award redemption in business class to Japan on Asiana Airlines, but they switched my long leg to Air India and there were no other options within 2-3 days other than Air India. It wasn't bad, but it's really overshadowed on everything by any almost any other airline. Even AirAsia Malaysia is a better airline than Air India is, their lie flat seats are better than Air India business class.
I believe I've flown with above 40 different airlines by now. Air India, SpiceJet, Spirit Air are the ones that I rate the worst! That and the old American Airlines planes they keep flying to central and south America before COVID hit. They even had the CRT monitors every few rows for people to watch movies, I used to feel like I'm in an airplane in a museum or one of these historical plane shows, and the service wasn't great but their loyalty program was great and they would easily give away points for any dumb thing or feedback.
Last edited:
I have a doubt regarding the following point.
CV Points and Tier Points balance – On the day of migration, the CV Points balance and the Tier Points available in your account will be transferred to the Flying Returns program at a 1:1 ratio. The points will remain valid for at least one year from the date of migration, even if they are due to expire sooner.
CV points have 3 years of validity, will it be cut down to 1 year?
To give you an example,
a) if the merger happens on 1 Jan 2025, here it is mentioned as 1 year, so 1 Jan 2026.
b) But right now, if my CV points have expiry till 1 Jan 2027,
which of these will be considered after the merger?
CV Points and Tier Points balance – On the day of migration, the CV Points balance and the Tier Points available in your account will be transferred to the Flying Returns program at a 1:1 ratio. The points will remain valid for at least one year from the date of migration, even if they are due to expire sooner.
CV points have 3 years of validity, will it be cut down to 1 year?
To give you an example,
a) if the merger happens on 1 Jan 2025, here it is mentioned as 1 year, so 1 Jan 2026.
b) But right now, if my CV points have expiry till 1 Jan 2027,
which of these will be considered after the merger?
Lets say merger date is 1 Jan 2025 - so all your CV points which had expiry before 1 Jan 2026 will get extended to 1 Jan 2026 and rest would remain the same also FR T&C is good that points are conditionally evergreen.
Vistara points will be converted into Air India miles @1:1.
Which means that Vistara miles which are worth 90 Paisa on average, will be devalued to Air India miles which are worth 50 paisa on average.
So this is a big financial loss, almost 44% for all Vistara card holders.--Axis, IDFC and SBI.
Only advantage is the miles validity & free ticket vouchers will be extended by 1 year.
No, I buy revenue tickets on Traveledge to get 24% return
Even if you finish all your Vistara miles before the merger, the miles earned in future on all Vistara cards will have 44% less value.
That is significant and huge!
CARDBITRAGE
TF Ace
True & not true.
True for premium economy & business redemptions. Not true for the economy.
The only thing to be mindful of going forward is the availability of saver fares.
And how do you turn that 24% return in points to 24% return in value?
Btw Traveledge is usually grossly overpriced. So the real points return is much lower than that.
Last edited:
