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Yes, your Air France/KLM Flying Blue program expire if you have no qualifying activity on your account for a two-year period. Per the Flying Blue Terms and Conditions (warning: PDF):
“For Explorer Members aged 18 years and older, Miles are valid for two (2) years, after such time the Company shall cancel the Miles in case no registered Earn Activity extends the validity of the Miles.”
What is Qualifying Activity?
In its wisdom, Air France–KLM Flying Blue decided that one type of qualifying activity is not good enough. Instead, there is a complex system with two types of qualifying activity: “Overall” and “Partial.” Both types extend the validity of miles earned, though in different ways.
Overall Qualifying Activity
You can extend all of your miles, regardless of how they were earned, for two years from the date of one of the following activities:
- Taking a qualifying flight with Air France, KLM, Aircalin, Kenya Airways, TAROM, Transavia, Air Corsica, or with one of Flying Blue's SkyTeam partners.
- Making a purchase with your Flying Blue co-branded credit card.
- Holding Flying Blue Silver, Gold, or Platinum status.
This makes extending mileage validity easy for U.S.-based travelers. All they need to do, for example, is replace their SkyMiles number on a Delta ticket with their Air France–KLM Flying Blue account number. As Delta, Air France, and KLM are all SkyTeam members, this prevents your Flying Blue miles from expiring for another two years.
Partial Extending Activities
Partial extending activities only affect miles earned with Flying Blue partners (car rental partners, hotel partners, experience partners, and some select airlines). Earning miles with any of these partners resets the clock by two years — but only for the miles earned from these types of partners.
Here's an example: If you earn Flying Blue miles from booking a hotel stay, that activity also extends the life of the miles earned from car rentals, experience partners, etc. However, it will not extend the life of miles earned from flying with Air France, KLM, or any SkyTeam members. These Flying Blue miles will expire without appropriate extension activities.
Earning Flying Blue Miles Through Credit Cards
By far, the easiest option for U.S. residents to earn bonus Flying Blue miles and maintain account activity is through everyday spending on the Air France KLM World Elite Mastercard®. The card is currently offering a 50,000-mile sign-up bonus after you make $2,000 or more in purchases within the first 90 days of your account opening.
As Air France and KLM are European airlines, it's no surprise that residents of several European countries can apply for a Flying Blue co-branded credit card. American Express issues Flying Blue co-branded cards for residents of France and The Netherlands while residents of Switzerland can apply for a co-branded Mastercard. Spending on all these cards will ensure your Flying Blue miles don't expire.
Boosting Your Air Franc KLM Flying Blue Mileage Balance
If you need to boost your mileage balance for a redemption, you have plenty of options, due to Flying Blue's extensive partnerships with various flexible point currencies. However, transfer activities don't change when your Flying Blue miles expire. Only transfer points if you have an award in mind, such as the fantastic monthly Flying Blue Promo Rewards discounts.
All of the following points transfer to Air Franc KLM Flying Blue:
- American Express Membership Rewards: 1:1 transfer rate; most transfers process immediately
- Bilt Rewards: 1:1 transfer rate; most transfers process immediately
- Brex Cash: 3:2 transfer rate; most transfers process within 24 hours
- Capital One Rewards: 1:1 transfer rate; most transfers process immediately
- Chase Ultimate Rewards: 1:1 transfer rate; most transfers process immediately
- Citi ThankYou Points: 1:1 transfer rate; most transfers process immediately
- Marriott Bonvoy: 3:1 transfer rate plus a 5,000-point bonus for each 20,000 points received; most transfers take one or two days
Our Take
If you are into Flying Blue miles, then it pays to understand when your Flying Blue miles will expire. However, this can get a little complicated with multiple accounts across different airlines and hotels. In this situation, you can always use AwardWallet to keep on top of your Flying Blue expiration dates. Ultimately, doing so will ensure you don't lose any of your precious points or miles.
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Here’s a free fast way to keep your points – transfer them to a spouse or significant other.
1. If your spouse or significant other doesn’t have a Flying Blue account, create one for them.
2. From the Flying Blue account of your spouse/significant other, Create a Flying Blue Family by inviting you to it.
3. Accept the invite to your spouse’s Flying Blue Family
4. From the Flying Blue account of your spouse/significant other, transfer all of the points from your account.
This is free and resets the timer on your miles to a fresh 24 months.
I have a question about closing the card while I still have 7k pts, will I lose them?
If the miles have been earned through the card and transferred to your Flying Blue account, you don’t have to worry about the miles expiring upon closing your card. The normal expiration policy will be in place.
I’m so confused. I had 20,732 miles that were set to expire at the end of 2022. I got those miles by transferring from a card a long time ago. I recently credited a car rental to Air France and got 500 miles. I thought this would extend ALL my miles but now I see this:
20,732 valid until December 31, 2022
500 valid until May 31, 2024
Is there nothing I can do to extend the bulk of my miles?? Please help!
Oh interesting. I would think that those two mileage sources would be in the same partner “bucket”. Do you have any bank loyalty programs that you can use to transfer 1k points? (Here’s a cheat sheet: https://awardwallet.com/mile-transfer-times)
Honestly this is so confusing.
But this article set it straight for me: https://frequentmiler.com/air-frances-flying-blue-miles-are-easier-to-extend-than-i-thought/
Basically if you have only ever used your FB account via transferred miles to FB (never crediting flown flight miles) then this is the simplest way of understanding the program and how to extend the miles. In this special yet common case for US based folks, the extension of the validity of miles only requires that you complete another transfer from your US based partner credit card – this act alone will extend the miles you previously transferred from FB partners.
If however you have tainted your pool of miles with flight posting credit(or other), the rules are ultimately more complicated and dictated by “the last flight credit positing/ FB Branded Credit Card activity/Elite Status”. So I believe that if you only ever transferred 100K miles from ie Citi 23mo ago and then credit a flight in the 24th month to extend the points – the miles will be extended – however in order to extend any further in the future – you can only do one of the three things mentioned above to extend. Transferring points will no longer help as they have been tainted.
But alternatively you could have just transferred a new 1K miles into your account (instead of flight credit positing) and you could have extended the miles that way and retained the ability to indefinitely extend (as long as you do not taint the pool of miles with any flight credit positing/ FB Credit Card Spend/ Elite status)
I am glad Flying Blue extended the expiration deadline of my accrued miles but, better than that, I am glad that I can credit miles (and therefore extend the expiration deadline) through domestic flights of Aerolineas Argentinas. This helps a lot!!
With the rate that Omicron is going, I think they should just drop the 24 month expiration and have no expiration.
24 months is a good period of time for trying to keep your miles alive
Believe I got an email last month saying they were extending my expiration another year- only had 500 points there but it was from a partial chase transfer- wish chase wouldn’t make you transfer points as a set of 1,000.
I got the Air France/KLM Mastercard around Halloween, and did a test transfer of MR points using the November transfer bonus, and it DID update/extend my mileage expiration date. All of my miles come from transfers or co-branded card spending, and it’ll be awhile before I ever have miles earned from revenue flights, so YMMV. VFTW noted that using the Flying Blue shopping portal also extended miles as well. The AF/KLM Mastercard has been quietly pulled from BofA’s website, and there’s a better bonus available for $100 statement credit and 50,000 miles via a dummy booking on KLM (the route I took, credit to DoC). Interestingly, I hit the spending requirement at the beginning of the month, and BofA posted the $100 credit today, well before the statement closed.
Thanks for sharing this data point!
They should follow other airlines and just get rid of the expiration policy.
so much easier with AA
I have miles with flying blue but lost them already ones
So I’ll try to book a flight as soon as this pandemic has quieted
As of now I’m not so sure anymore if when can fly again as I’m already forgood here in my country the Philippines. So I would like to know if what will I’m going to do with my remaining miles.
Kindly advice
Yours Truly
Please note that we at AwardWallet are not related or affiliated with the programs we support, thus if you have any questions related to your miles please contact FlyingBlue representatives directly.
I have miles that are expiring Feb 2021. We had transfered them from Chase and then had to cancel our trip. What is the best way to extend the life of the miles without flying? If I get a credit card for me am I able to transfer miles between accounts without a fee?
Flying Blue’s expiration policy is quite strange. The good news for your situation is that non-flying activity (“Partial extending activities”) will extend the expiration of your points – since they were from a non-flying source (“Partial extending activities”).
As Flying Blue states: “You can also extend the validity of Miles earned with all other partners (car rental partners, hotel partners, and experience partners) for 2 years by earning Miles with any of these other partners. These “Partial extending activities” with other partners will extend the validity of Miles earned with any of these other partners by 2 years from the date of the activity.”
So, you can transfer 1,000 more miles from Chase (or another bank) or earn a few points by making an online purchase through Flying Blue’s shopping portal (https://earnonline.flyingblue.com/en/)
I have a Air France credit card so I don’t have to follow closely the expiration date of miles.
It’s a little more complicated as the extension is possible I think only by a qualifying flight.
Can you clarify what you mean? Are you saying that if you only have credit card activity but do not have any flights, your miles are going to expire? Even though you have a credit card?
They are only restating #2 of the extending activities above: that if you have an Air France credit card and have activity on it, that keeps extending the expiration… so they’re covered and don’t have to worry about losing their miles.
this year it’s harder to keep track of everything that might expire but thankfully awardwallet makes it easier
24 months in the current context of pandemic does not sound much
I think that Flyng blue is not a good miles program!
Thank you; you would think it’s easy to make the connection between airlines in the same team but for some reason I always remember only the bigger airlines.
Gonna go and try to get all the missing miles from the partner airlines.
Good news !! I hope everything comes back to normal soon !!
Thank you, in some ways it is obvious that Delta can be credited to KLM but for some reason I never thought of this idea!
I think all airlines/hotels should extend their window for miles/points until travel gets back to normal.
In my opinion, Flying blue is, by far the best FFP within Skyteam.
A good perk is other AF/KL’s partners airlines (non Skyteam) such as JL, G3, QF are considered qualifying flights so you can earn XP points and of course, miles.
All airlines should ensure that their mileage programs do not expire until the end of 2021. In this way, we can travel better next year
Wow, the “partial extension” mechanism is sneaky!
We have a couple of vouchers/credits expiring. Any tips?
Question – does flying on Air Antwerp, booked on KLM website, qualify for extension of points validity period?
We consider the best option would be to address the question to Air France representatives.
Do all your miles expire on the expiration date, i.e. 24 months after last quakifying flight activity ?
What if I transfer miles from chase or amex, when I only have 1 month left to the expiration date. Will the transferred miles also expire on the expiration date (i.e. one moth after they were transferred) ???
No, provided there is qualifying activity on your account, none of your miles expire. If you have no qualifying activity on your account for 24 months, all of your miles expire.
I figure the answer is no – but just checking – if I book a Delta flight (using Delta miles/award ticket) would that extend my Flying Blue expiration date? Or does it have to be a Delta flight that was paid for with cash. I see some general posts online that say award tickets don’t generate miles for frequent flyer accounts but can’t find a specific mention of Flying Blue (and also don’t care about earning miles, just pushing the expiration a bit farther). Any advice? Thanks
Hey there, an award ticket doesn’t earn any redeemable miles, so that won’t reset an expiration date. If you put your flying blue number on a paid reservation with Delta, you’ll earn FB miles and reset the expiration date. Note that transfers from Amex, Chase, Citi, and Capital One do not reset the FB expiration date.
Appreciate these types of all-in-one-place document. I am planning on transferring some Citi TYP points over and this artile puts my mind at ease that I will have 24 months to use it. thanls.
You can now use your miles in AF’s shopping portal, or so they say!
Sad that this program has so limited options to extend life of the miles.
Air France is really not great for miles unless you are an elite member. You can’t use miles for first class if you are not.
marc, I’d take a look at some of the options when redeeming for flights on Delta to either Hawaii or the Caribbean — a few sweet spots.
Unless, you are a frequent premium flyer based in Paris.
This is my pet peeve! I do understand that it’s a frequent FLYER program and in order to extend your points validity you actually need to FLY but I find that the lack of other options for that purpose is somewhat user-unfriendly. Great program overall but I wish Flying Blue would add other options too!
Seems like a program best suited for redemptions using “just in time” transfers from transferable points programs. Otherwise probably best to credit AF/KLM flights to Alaska…
I have been a flying blue member since 2017. I have been flying every 2 months with Kenya Airways and every 4 months with KLM (long distance flight). I have noticed the following:
Some miles are simply not calculated, often I needed to calim them by providing a bording pass after.
My silver status is about expire in 30.06.2019 if I do not gain 100xp.
I am wondering how is this possible and what am I doing wrong? Can someone advise me I am new in this and not very consumeristic oriented so for me all this is rocked science. But I am shocked that I fly so often and my miles will expire.
Hi Sara,
I think only your status will be downgraded from Silver to Explorer. Your miles should be fine. I also fly Kenya Airways a lot, and it seems totally random the way the miles are automatically added to your Flying Blue account: sometimes they reflect same day or next day after a flight, and other times I have to manually claim them on the Flying Blue website.
Hope that helps.
Wow, we are on an expiration kick lately ;o) I appreciate all the info though, don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining! Love anything that reminds me to keep everything up to date. That’s why I am with AwardWallet :o) No where better to get info and reminders!
Not too worried since I don’t have AF/KL miles. A couple less to worry about ;o)
You can also earn Flying Blue miles by doing E-rewards surveys but since you say that E-miles doesn’t extend the expiration date, I wouldn’t risk it by trying E-rewards either. (Do you know if it does or does not?)
Although I have heard of their great discounted awards, this is a difficult enough program to keep active that I probably won’ t participate. Though the tip about using the Flying Blue number on a Delta flight might just sway me. Especially since Skymiles is such a poor value program.
This is the one thing I really don’t like about the Flying Blue program and the reason I don’t credit flights to it.
The only time I ever use it is for promo awards, and I transfer in from Amex.
Flying Blue is also a GOL Airlines partner (smiles), is it correct?
Yes, indeed. The full list of airline partners is here: https://www.flyingblue.com/partners/airlines.html
I have a Flying Blue account which I do not use anymore. I only fly KLM once every two or three years and for me it is easier to credit to those miles to my SkyMiles account.
This is one of the harder accounts to keep active if you don’t use it regularly, since there is no shopping portal, etc. But then again, if you aren’t using it regularly you probably don’t have the card or care I suppose.
Hmm. I did not even think about replacing my frequent flyer number on a Delta flight in order to extend the AF/KLM miles if needed. Good tip!
In the article there is no mention that the expiration policy has recently changed: before you needed a qualifying activity every 20 months now it is every 24 months.
This is a big improvement because in practice only flying with SkyTeam airline is considered a qualifying activity.
Actually, I am very surprised that the co-branded credit card exists only in France, Netherlands and Switzerland.
The increase from 20 to 24 months really isn’t significant news. Sure, it is nice, but the requirement to earn miles with a flight is there. If you weren’t going to fly is 4 months really going to make a difference? Maybe, but it isn’t all that significant — at least we don’t think so.
24 months is better than 18 months but still worse than no expiration date.
Well, I remember one time I made a trip just to keep my miles.
Having 4 more months it’s not a very big difference but sometimes can help.
Great update, I can transfer some points over to flying blue to take advantage of the routes on offer at present, thanks.