ANA All Nippon Airways Has A Severe Elite Passenger Problem And It Shows In Overcrowding

If you’ve ever heard the phrase “When everyone has status, nobody has status” then the perfect, real-life example for this is ANA All Nippon Airways, where the amount of “Elite passengers” has reached absurd levels.

The real problem with ANA’s number of passengers that are entitled to priority ground services especially shows at check-in, boarding, and baggage delivery, where you often have more than half the planeload lining up.

This issue stems from a variety of sources but mainly the easy maintenance of the Star Alliance Gold level by members in Japan who get the ANA Superflyers Credit Card which basically maintains their Gold status for as long as they keep the card active.

Once a premium member applies for this card the elite benefits are basically held perpetually even without reaching the normally required flying activity for the Platinum/Diamond level.

You can access the ANA website where they explain Priority Services here.

It all starts with Priority Check-in which is already the first bottleneck when it comes to ANA flights:

In addition, you have Priority Services available for Premium Economy as well. On routes that are very Elite heavy such as Tokyo-Bangkok-Tokyo or Tokyo-Singapore-Tokyo (among many others in Asia) you can easily have 40-50% of an entire flight be eligible for these priority services.

That however presents a problem because ANA Mileage Club has inflated the number of eligible members so much that there is hardly a benefit anymore when that many people are eligible to use priority counters, boarding, and baggage delivery.

It especially irritates customers who just buy a Business Class ticket and then have to deal with all these masses of people and long lines despite expecting to have proper benefits according to their class of service.

On a recent Bangkok-Haneda flight, there were 117 Star Alliance Gold members on board which is a staggering number. To assume that it’s even remotely possible to provide any elite or priority related service with such a high amount of Gold passengers (plus Business Class/Premium Economy pax who aren’t Gold) is just wishful thinking.

The check-in and boarding process was absolute mayhem. I have never seen something like this before, and it seems that Bangkok Airport always has problems these days, even with foreign airlines that are usually well organized. Largely because they operate with local staff, who aren’t used to proper procedures as they are in place, for example, in Tokyo.

Baggage delivery wasn’t much better. Except for ANA Diamond members who are treated as equivalent to First Class passengers, all bags of regular Business Class/Gold passengers come together – again, the bulk of all baggage checked.

And don’t get me started about the lounge services in Tokyo, especially Haneda Airport. Many of our readers already commented on my last Priority Pass-related article about the disaster that the ANA Lounges in Tokyo have become. There are way too many eligible passengers even for these very large lounges, it’s often impossible to find a seat.

Conclusion

Is ANA really doing itself a favor by inflating the number of Elite passengers so much that a normal priority service isn’t even possible anymore? I think this Superflyer Card perpetual benefit retention isn’t a healthy tool for the airline.

I can imagine that this would turn off customers who simply buy Business Class in expectation of better ground services only to then wind up in a large group of over 100 passengers who by some link have access to elite benefits.

What do you think about the situation at ANA? Do you still enjoy flying them?