The Kiwi company offered online guides to airport lounges and Dragonpass provided access to lounges including Auckland’s Strata Lounge.
It said the new partnerships would deliver LoungePair’s lounge passes to Freely and AFF members through their respective rewards and loyalty programmes.
And it said the Dragonpass agreement would strengthen lounge coverage across Asia.
LoungePair chief executive Daniel Kinnoch said travellers for a long time depended “on luck or loyalty” to access lounges.
“Our mission is to remove the barriers to premium travel experiences and give every traveller, whether flying for business or leisure, the ability to start their journey or wait for a connection in comfort.”
LoungePair partnered with lounge operators and others to offer flexible day passes.
It said those passes provided access to many travellers, not just those with high-tier frequent flyer or credit card benefits.
It said the Freely partnership would offer lounge benefits to more than 200,000 Australian travellers through a new Travel Rewards programme.
Freely members received tiered lounge benefits based on their memberships.
“Freely customers usually start their journey looking for travel insurance. By working with LoungePair, they can now add improved airport experiences too,” Kinnoch said.
He said this would make for a more streamlined process.
LoungePair said the alliance with Australian Frequent Flyer would give AFF Platinum members a complimentary LoungePair+ membership.
Those Platinum members would get a free lounge pass and access to rewards, such as lounge satisfaction guarantees and refunds on unused passes.
AFF gold members would get discounted LoungePair+ access and additional lounge credits.
LoungePair said the new deals would provide access to the Dragonpass global lounge network.
It said this would be especially useful to people travelling through Asia and mainland China.
“Securing Freely and AFF demonstrates our ability to provide travel perks to businesses that need to reward their customers,” Kinnoch said.
LoungePair is headquartered in Auckland’s Eden Terrace and incorporated in Delaware.
Airline data company OAG in a report last year said some loyalty programmes were under pressure from generational trends.
OAG said older travellers were more likely to enrol in loyalty schemes than younger peers were.
To entice sign-ups for airline credit cards, 63% of travellers OAG surveyed wanted free checked baggage, 56% wanted sign-up bonuses, and 43% wanted access to airport lounges.
Qantas earlier this year made changes to its loyalty programme, introducing Status Fast Track.
It said Status Fast Track enabled members to climb faster up tiers, gaining entry to hundreds of lounges worldwide.
Air New Zealand chief executive Nikhil Ravishankar last month told the Herald the airline was reviewing its loyalty programme’s tiers and benefits.
He said as part of that, the airline will be launching a new tier above Gold Elite.
He said that tier might have a soft launch before Christmas, and a full launch next year.
Meanwhile, Qantas is rebuilding its Auckland lounge and Air New Zealand is nearly doubling the size of its Auckland lounge.
John Weekes is a business journalist covering aviation. He has previously covered consumer affairs, crime, politics and courts.
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