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Home » Trip Reports » SAS Million Mile Challenge » First Big Mistake Of Trip? Air Europa Express Vs. Air Europa
Air EuropaSAS Million Mile Challenge

First Big Mistake Of Trip? Air Europa Express Vs. Air Europa

Matthew Klint Posted onNovember 23, 2024December 19, 2024 31 Comments

I’m live-blogging my SAS EuroBonus SkyTeam Million Mile challenge this week. Click here for background and route information.


a plane with stairs going up to it

19 December 2024 UPDATE: Air Europa Express does count…just make sure you book a qualifying fare class.


Ok, it apears I goofed, though logicaly I cannot see how SAS can reasonably distinguish between Air Europa and Air Euoropa Express.

Air Europa Express –  Is It SkyTeam? Same As Air Europa?

My light from from Malga (AGP) to Madrid (MAD) was operated by Air Europa Express.

Unfortunately, SAS has sent mixed messages concerning whether Air Europa Express flights will credit. First, the promotion rules are vague…essentially stating that SAS has the right to make all final determinations about which flights count toward the promotion and which flights do not. Second, I’v heard that SAS has at least one EuroBonus Diamond that Air Europa Express lights will count while it has told others that they will not count.

My understanding is that Air Europa Express is part of Air Europa, period. The branding is identical, the SkyTeam logo appears on boarding passes (and so did my Sky Priority designation once my SAS Eurobonus Gold number was added), and the flight attendants onboard my flight referred to the flight simply as Air Europa.

I considered it like Delta Connection or Air France Hop! Yes, these flights are operated by different aircraft, but they are all part of the same carrier network, elite benefits are recognized, they are sold on the same website, and therefore flying Air Europa Express should be like flying Air Europa, right?

Of course, it’s not you I have to convince, just SAS.

But this does create a problem…I chose to avoid Bangkok and Kenya Airways on this trip. If it turns out that Air Europe Express does not count or “may” not count (because I cannot leave it to chance), I will need to go to Europe again…ugh…because I cannot leave to chance traveling to South America to fly on Aerolineas Argentinas when SAS had made clear that Aerolineas Argentinas are not properly crediting and likely won’t for the remainder of 2024.

And on that note, both my SAS lights were operated by SAS Connect. Is SAS going to tell me that SAS Connect is not really part of SAS?

Ugh, I’m mad at myself…this could have been avoided by flying on Vueling from Malaga to Barcelona, then taking an early flight from Barcelona to Madrid on Air Europa “mainline.” But in my defense, the OTA I purchased this itinerary from did not specify that it was operated by Air Europa Express…nor did the boarding pass.

Let’s see how this unfolds…

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About Author

Matthew Klint

Matthew is an avid traveler who calls Los Angeles home. Each year he travels more than 200,000 miles by air and has visited more than 135 countries. Working both in the aviation industry and as a travel consultant, Matthew has been featured in major media outlets around the world and uses his Live and Let's Fly blog to share the latest news in the airline industry, commentary on frequent flyer programs, and detailed reports of his worldwide travel.

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31 Comments

  1. NedsKid Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 10:08 am

    SAS is pretty strict on their interpretation of rules. A friend of mine who is a Eurobonus Diamond is going round and round with them…. she had a SAN-SFO-CPH ticket sold by SAS where SAN-SFO on AS was delayed due to weather causing a misconnect. Same PNR. SAS refuses to refund the upgrade fee paid for SFO-CPH (only coach next day) because they say she “voluntarily” missed the flight due to the fact their system doesn’t show the Alaska flight was late. They expect Alaska to refund the upgrade on SAS (sold by/paid thru SAS). They are pretty dense to deal with. “Upgrades are non-refundable unless it’s our fault.”

  2. Santastico Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 10:15 am

    Unfortunately, SAS will do whatever they can to NOT credit you the million points. They might use this nonsense to void your challenge.

    • NedsKid Reply
      November 23, 2024 at 10:48 am

      They’ll wait to make the final ruling until it’s impossible to make alternate plans to complete the challenge.

  3. Alert Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 10:29 am

    This was a so-so minor ticket-points mistake with no lasting problems , compared to headline news in UK .

    A far more serious mistake was the decision of the foolish British and Australian women to go to Laos to party , and who died because of methanol in their alcoholic drinks . Laos does not have a proper healthcare infrastructure , and they needed to be sent to Thailand for emergency care . To no avail , sadly .

    We ought to thank our lucky stars that a so-so ticket-points mistake does not cause us to go to Laos .

    • Dave Edwards Reply
      November 23, 2024 at 11:28 am

      Play 3rd world games get 3rd world prizes.

      I understand they are “adults” but going to these sh#tholes and staying in a sh#thole hostel shows the parents failed by not doing everything possible to convince them it was a bad idea. But the lure of small Asian c#ck must have been too much for these kids.

      • Alert Reply
        November 23, 2024 at 11:54 am

        @Dave … +1 . Also , “stupid is as stupid does” .

      • emercycrite Reply
        November 25, 2024 at 3:15 am

        +1 Dave

  4. Klaus Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 11:40 am

    Hi Matthew,

    How about writing their EuroBonus Social Media Team and/or their press team asking if it will be accepted?

    Viele Grüße
    Klaus

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      November 23, 2024 at 1:51 pm

      I certainly will.

  5. Klaus Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 12:08 pm

    by the way: 10 different airlines will still get you 100k miles 😉

  6. Dan Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 1:25 pm

    https://frequentmiler.com/play-for-a-free-airline-toward-the-sas-eurobonus-millionaire-challenge/
    Maybe this will help?!

  7. simmonad Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 1:32 pm

    I live in Spain and I find the difference between UX and UX Express utterly baffling (Seatmaps shows no real difference).

  8. GUWonder Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 3:12 pm

    I have avoided the Aeromexico literal subsidiary and Air Europa express type arrangements to play it safe and stuck to mainline. But if those type of wholly-owned subsidiary flights or wet-lease flights for mainline or subsidiary credit and provide both bonus points and level points in the SAS account, then excluding them from the promo is going to come across as a hostile, sleazy and cheap maneuver by SAS. I doubt that SAS want that kind of bad PR for a promo for which they want mass market attention, but only time will tell.

    • Mick Reply
      November 23, 2024 at 4:36 pm

      I agree with this. Sure, they’ll want to deny giving away free miles but love blogging of trips to get these miles is surely a massive positive in terms of PR for them. How much does 1m moles cost to them. And how much would bad press hurt them.

      I guess a qn would be how many participants itineraries hinge on this qn (express v mainline). If there are ten people in a similar boat it’s a bigger problem. Noting that if you live in Europe you’re just going to find a cheap mainline flight and get yourself over the line.

  9. JoeMart Reply
    November 23, 2024 at 6:54 pm

    Do you have a date for SAS devaluation of the frequent flyer program?

    • GUWonder Reply
      November 23, 2024 at 7:16 pm

      They have already sort of devalued the program, but a big part of that has to do with the SkyTeam airlines of greatest relevance to SAS customers being much more stingy with releasing award space to partner airline programs than was the case with Star Alliance partners. But that devaluation and its timing was just like I expected it to be: after AF-KL got a lock on SAS, that it would hit with the transition to SkyTeam.

      I would guess that next SAS program devaluations will have to be in the works already as the payment structure and payment levels for partner award travel is worse under new contracts with SkyTeam partners than with the contracts it had with Star Alliance partners for award travel. But maybe they will wait a bit to see what the financial hit turns out to be from this before they put on mileage ticket sales caps and/or revise the partner award travel pricing levels/structure.

      • PM Reply
        November 24, 2024 at 4:08 am

        I think you have correctly identified that the risk here is with partner evaluation. When an airline like DL hands out miles to credit card companies like candy, they’re appealing to a customer demographic which is likely to redeem on their own flights, so the inventory is easy for them to manage without too much of a financial impact. When it comes to this challenge, however, you’re dealing with hardened enthusiasts, if not addicts, who have little interest in hopping around Scandinavia and the Baltics- they will be wanting to spend their miles with Aeroméxico, Garuda, KQ, CI, take Air Europa to the Cono Sur etc. I’m hoping that SAS have budgeted for this, because it can otherwise be a car crash (I have some UK legislation in the back of my mind which I’m prepared to try if things go horribly wrong).

        My hope is that Eurobonus will be eaten up by Flying Blue within the next couple of years, in which case the points from this challenge will be a drop in the ocean.

  10. Mauricio Reply
    November 24, 2024 at 3:01 am

    Air Europa Express is fully part of Air Europa, like Iberia Express to Iberia, Hop to Air France or Cityhopper to KLM.

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      November 24, 2024 at 6:02 pm

      Agreed, but why doesn’t SK think so?

  11. PM Reply
    November 24, 2024 at 3:58 am

    I think it’s a wet lease-type arrangement and should count as a proper UX flight. While I take the point of those saying that SAS will try and take advantage of technicalities, SkyTeam rules are different from Star Alliance and points are credited on the basis of the marketing carrier.

    SAS being an ex-Star airline probably thought that the status quo ante made more sense than the current arrangement (spoiler alert; it didn’t) so they added the confusing rule which can however be helpful to those passengers doing the challenge and wishing to leverage codeshares (i.e. buy a ticket issued by an airline with flights bearing their code, some of which are operated by another alliance member).

    I think that when they come to review this they’ll have to grant the miles in this type of situation. However, I really don’t have time and energy to argue about this sort of stuff- that’s why I bought a ‘mainline’ flight on CI instead of the segment on Mandarin Airlines (same sort of arrangement as UX-X5) that seemed a better fit for my travel plans.

  12. Brugan Reply
    November 24, 2024 at 7:33 pm

    Matthew, your software is dropping the first letter f from a couple of instances of the word flight (they say light).

    Cheers!

    • DFW_Scott Reply
      November 24, 2024 at 11:46 pm

      ..or his F key contact is dying….that has been my experience

  13. Em Reply
    November 24, 2024 at 11:56 pm

    Omgg….. I just made the same mistake… Did you fly already?

    • Matthew Klint Reply
      November 25, 2024 at 11:17 am

      Yes, I did.

      But I’m waiting for clarification from SK.

      Maybe a redo won’t be necessary…

  14. UA752 Reply
    November 25, 2024 at 1:56 pm

    Every time I’ve had to deal with SAS it is a bad experience. It doesn’t seem like they care about their customers too much, and I’d certainly expect them to find as many inane loopholes to avoid doing things for you as possible.

  15. Pelle Reply
    November 28, 2024 at 8:29 am

    I’ve gotten 3 replies from Chat, phone1 and phone2. Chat and phone 1 said UX Express counts while Phone2 said it does not. You could try reaching out to their Head of EB (Olivia W), as she did reply to someone regarding if someone paid an award ticket for you (she said it counts).

    • david Reply
      December 19, 2024 at 9:37 am

      I flew with Air Europa Express. Do you have the final answer regarding this matter? Does Air Europa Express count as part of the challenge?

      • Matthew Klint Reply
        December 19, 2024 at 12:51 pm

        Air Europa Express counts!

        • Øystein Reply
          December 19, 2024 at 5:36 pm

          Thank you for that! What’s the source?

          • Matthew Klint
            December 19, 2024 at 5:51 pm

            I got the million mile email today, having only flown Air Europa Express:

            https://liveandletsfly.com/sas-eurobonus-million-mile-challenge-completed/

  16. Øystein Reply
    December 20, 2024 at 3:42 am

    Great, congrats! Did Air Europa Express also credit in the normal way, with a few points? After how long?

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