Earning with BMI

Hi all

First post so be gentle..

Im looking at flying to Canada in March. Any of the VS flights with connections arent particularly nice and it means Id have to land in the US so Ive been looking at BMI DB4851 from LHR to Calgary which is a codeshare on Air Canada metal and then BD4858 back from Toronto to LHR - both are direct flights.

Ive rung flying club twice and been told different answers by the people there as to whether I can earn VS miles on BMI for these flights. The website mentions specific flights to specific destinations trans-atlantic but the agents were vague - both said yes but I have no confidence in their answers.

So can anyone here confirm or deny that I will get miles and Tier Points for the flights?

Thanks in advance

Paul..

PS - If anyone has any other ideas of itineraries that would earn me some flights and TPs without them being too onerious then please let me know..

Hi Paul,

Well, where do I start. I live and work in Calgary, and I used to go via SFO. So earning miles and TP's with Virgin wasn't a problem. Now I don't have to include SFO as part of my trip, I fly direct from Calgary to LHR and vice versa on Air Canada.

I too thought that booking a BMI ticket (on the codeshare with Air Canada) could in fact earn me TP's and miles with Virgin. However, this doesn't seem to be the case, and is certainly a grey area.
BMI aircraft are never used and BMI only get issued a with a few seats on every Air Canada flight. And that is exactly what it is, an Air Canada flight.

Calgary airport nor Toronto have a BMI desk (you check in at Air Canada), and their system doesn't recognise the Virgin FF number. It will however recognise the BMI FF club.

After a few phone calls and much frustration I just joined Aeroplan, which can be used with the Star Alliance, so I stuck with that.

Not much help, but if you have success be sure to PM me!

Rgds
Jon

[preiffer]

You do not earn VS miles on BMI codeshare (AC operated) flights.

Trust me, this is as confirmed and concrete as you could imagine. It used to feature specifically in the T's and C's (ie: flight no's 4000-4999 don't qualify, etc) but I can't find it now.

If you take these flights, despite them being BD ticketed you will NOT earn any Tier Points or Miles with VS.