Asiana Airlines faced criticism for not having places to use mileage, and is now considering the allocation of mileage-specific flights in the second half of this year. The second half has many peak seasons, making it difficult to secure mileage flights, and this appears to be an effort to promote the consumption of mileage before the integration of Korean Air in 2027.
According to the aviation industry on the 28th, Asiana Airlines is reviewing a plan to add more mileage-specific flights beyond the ones scheduled until June. A mileage-specific flight is one that allows purchasing remaining seats on certain flights with mileage as a priority. The routes and dates for the mileage-specific flights in the second half have not been finalized.
By June, 1,870 seats will be sold on six occasions for flights to New York and Los Angeles. The proportion of seats supplied as mileage-specific flights to the total number of seats is approximately 0.8% for Los Angeles and about 1.7% for New York. An official from Asiana Airlines noted that "these are flights allocated to increase the usual proportion of mileage seats, meaning the number of mileage seats has increased by the number of seats allocated for the specific flights."
Asiana Airlines also plans to increase the proportion of mileage seats on regular flights. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport recommends that mileage seats comprise more than 5% of total seats, allowing airlines to operate at their discretion. Although the mileage seat proportions of major domestic airlines (Full Service Carrier) have not been disclosed, it is believed to be around 10% during peak seasons and 15% during off-peak seasons.
The reason Asiana Airlines has set a policy to expand mileage seats in the second half is that travel demand is expected to be higher than in the first half. During peak travel seasons, it is often difficult to secure mileage seats. For the U.S. Los Angeles route during the summer vacation season in July and August, there are only 51 remaining outbound mileage seats as of the 27th.
In addition, the second half will see a 50% additional surcharge, allowing mileage to be used up more quickly. For the Los Angeles route, mileage seats cost 35,000 miles one way, but during peak season, it requires 52,500 miles.
Asiana Airlines has also normalized the mileage mall, which was not operated normally due to a surge in consumption at the end of last year. Most items, including hotel accommodation vouchers, Everland free pass which had been out of stock following the announcement of the merger with Korean Air, as well as perfumes, golf products, and health supplements, are now being sold normally. Asiana Airlines has stated that it secured items in bulk to reflect customer inconvenience regarding mileage consumption.
In addition, since December of last year, Asiana Airlines sold approximately 38,000 mileage seats through four rounds of the Jeju Happy Mileage promotion. As a result, the mileage provision of Asiana Airlines decreased from 981.4 billion won at the end of the third quarter last year to 960.8 billion won at the end of the year, a reduction of about 2%. It is believed that this figure has decreased further this year.
The reason Asiana Airlines is trying to promote mileage consumption is to alleviate burdens before the integration of mileage with Korean Air. Korean Air plans to submit a mileage integration plan with Asiana Airlines to the Fair Trade Commission by June. There are projections in the market that, since Korean Air's mileage has historically been valued higher than Asiana Airlines' mileage, a one-to-one integration will be challenging.