One of the beauties of  Jet Airways’ JetPrivilege is their frequent flier partnerships across the board with airlines in almost all parts of the world. This gives access to airlines which are not a part of the Jet Airways direct network and an opportunity to Earn and Burn on these airlines. Over a period of time, this helped them amass members who would use an International airline for travel but want to earn miles in India.

One of the great benefits of this alliance was their partnership with American Airlines and Delta in the US. American has been a long standing partner of Jet Airways, however, Delta discontinued ties with them in 2012 and then a few years later restored their ties. This came on the back of Delta and Jet Airways having a more strategic partnership where Jet Airways provides Indian feed through till Europe (London/Amsterdam/Paris) and Delta/ Virgin Atlantic/ KLM/ Air France pick it up from there to bring pax to the US, amongst other destinations. Last week, the American and JetPrivilege partnership was announced to be discontinued next year onwards.

Now, clearly Jet Airways is moving closer and closer to the KLM/AF/Delta partnerships. Their new CEO is from Delta. I and many other people expect a JV to be made between KLM/AF/Delta and Jet Airways. But there is also discussion about Delta buying into Jet Airways now.

And clearly this partnership is moving closer and the way is being paved for this. JetPrivilege has quietly slipped a note to all members about their discontinuation of a partnership with 4 Star Alliance members for earn and burn. This would be:

• Austrian Airlines & Swiss Airlines: September 30, 2017
• Turkish Airlines: October 31, 2017
• Lufthansa: December 31, 2017

Now, clearly, this has got a lot to do with getting closer with KLM/ Air France. You see, JetPrivilege has already cut ties with United a while ago, and now with American, which is a direct competition to their Delta partnership. Into Europe and beyond, they provided a lot of options in Turkish, Austrian, Swiss and Lufthansa, and now they are essentially sticking it out for their friends in KLM/Air France.

If you would like to make a redemption booking on these carriers, the time is now to get started for these carriers will square off their books with Jet Airways/JetPrivilege by the end of the year.

Bottomline

Essentially, JetPrivilege is consolidating in favour of their partners in the west. But don’t worry if you still want to earn miles on an Indian program for these airlines, since all the 4 carriers are a part of Star Alliance and you could look at putting your miles on Air India if you would like to have miles on an Indian carrier. And if you want to bank your miles on JetPrivilege, it should be for a flight before the dates mentioned above.

What are your views on the changes to the JetPrivilege program coming up?