Krisflyer partners with Shangri-la to offer reciprocal benefits

Singapore Airlines and Shangri-la have launched the Infinite Journeys partnership which provides mutual recognition of each other’s elite members.

This tie up presents some interesting opportunities-

If you’re a Krisflyer Elite Member

PPS Club and KrisFlyer Elite Gold members will get Golden Circle Jade tier membership (sorry, no love for Krisflyer Elite Silver) when they complete one night at any Shangri-la hotel and resort, Kerry, Trades or Hotel Jen.

Jade is the mid-tier membership within Golden Circle. Some of the “benefits” listed in the table below are pretty fei (pre-registration for easy check-in! You’re really spoiling me), but the good stuff would be

• Priority check-in
• Complimentary daily buffet breakfast
• Room upgrades
• Early check in and late check out (11am/4pm)
• Bonus GC points (25%)
• Choice of a welcome gift

	Gold	Jade	Diamond
Pre-registration for easy check-in
Priority check-in and check-out at an exclusively designated area
Priority check-in and check-out at Horizon / Traders Club Lounge or in-room check-in, where available
Partner stays free in the same room and enjoys applicable complimentary breakfast benefit ^
Complimentary daily buffet breakfast served at Café Restaurant or designated restaurant
Complimentary daily buffet breakfast served at Café Restaurant, Horizon / Traders Club Lounge, where available
Upgrade to the next best room category, if the reserved room type is not available at check-in
Complimentary access to Horizon / Traders Club Lounge, where available
Partner enjoys complimentary access to Horizon / Traders Club Lounge, where available ^
Concierge services for non-staying guests
Priority waitlist for room reservations
Guaranteed room availability for reservations made 72 hours prior to arrival *
Guaranteed room availability for reservations made 48 hours prior to arrival *
Guaranteed bed type at time of reservation
Early check-in / late check-out – 11am / 4pm **
Early check-in / late check-out – 8am / 6pm **
Complimentary pressing for one suit upon arrival
Complimentary use of selected resort facilities #
Bonus GC Award Points

I can’t remember the last time I stayed at a Shangri-la property so I can’t speak to the quality or how useful elite membership is. But if you’re a heavy user of Shangri-la hotels for whatever reason I imagine this would be a nice advantage to have.

If you’re a Shangri-la Golden Circle Elite Member

You automatically get Krisflyer Elite Silver status, plus a fast track to Krisflyer Elite Gold when you hit a certain number of flights within 4 months of registration

• If you’re a GC Jade- 3 flights
• If you’re a GC Diamond- 1 flight

A read of the T&C tells me that these flights do not include award bookings, codeshares or those in the G booking code (group fares).

Krisflyer Elite Silver doesn’t have any real substantial benefits beyond the 25% mileage bonus when you book certain classes of tickets, discounted service fees for things like cancelling award tickets or changing redemption nomineses and some vague priority on award ticket redemptions, so it’s not surprisingly that SQ is pretty willing to give it away.

More interesting is the fast track to Gold option. SQ has historically been very tight-fisted about status, and although PPS fast tracks are still off the cards ,they’ve recently taken steps in making Gold more accessible. You’ll remember that the Krisflyer Ascend card gives you Krisflyer Elite Gold when you spend S$15,000 on SQ/MI tickets within 12 months of approval. Getting Gold with one flight is a pretty sweet deal, it must be said.

Points conversion

With this tie up you can now move points between GC and Krisflyer. I’m not a fan. GC points can be redeemed for award nights or vouchers. I forget how much value per point you get for award nights at Shangri-la, but if you go for vouchers, 1,000 GC points get you a US$100 F&B voucher (value of 10 cents per GC point)

Giving up 12 miles for 1 point seems ridiculously poor value. 12 miles, valued at a conservative value of 2-3 cents each would be 24-36 Singapore cents, yielding you 10 US cents (14 Singapore cents) of value. Come on guys, really?

The reverse conversion is even more confusing. 1 GC point yields 1.25 miles. 14 cents of value for 2.5-4 cents of value?

There is no reason why you would want to take them up on this conversion. Don’t do it.

Does this partnership create any other opportunities?

The American Express Platinum card gives complimentary Golden Circle Jade membership. So if you have this card you can wrangle a quick route to Krisflyer Elite Gold (whee) through the three flights within 4 months challenge.

It seems that Golden Circle denies status matches, so I don’t think you can leverage other hotel membership to get a fast track Krisflyer Gold status.

As I said, I can’t remember the last time I stayed in a Shangri-la property so this tie up doesn’t present much value for me. But if your company has a contract with Shangri-la this is definitely something you might want to look into.