Velocity Frequent Flyer, Redemption Tips

uniqualz on 23/02/2017 - 16:42
Last edited 23/02/2017 - 17:08

Hi All,

I have 415,000 Virgin Velocity FF points, and my wife has another 136,000. So all up, we have around 550,000 to try to get us both and our 15 and 11 year old kids return flights to Europe on roughly 10th Sep, returning on 7 Oct 2017. I'm completely new to all this, and it's a nightmare to figure stuff out. I've been advised on a few things, like convert them to Krisflyer points, cos they go further, but then you find Singapore Airlines charges a huge fuel levy etc - not so good. Someone also said to convert them to One World points, so I might be able to book the One World round-the-world 5-flight fare. Should I roll them all into my name, so we have 550k in one place to buy fares? Also, I don't think 550k is enough anyway to get us there. Particularly as it looks like taxes etc push it way beyond that amount. Buy another FF credit card for emergency extra points to make up the difference? Or should I just sell the points and pay cash for whatever flights with any airline then?

What to do? Any help/worldly advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
UniQualz

Travel

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Comments

  • points4life on 23/02/2017 - 17:28
    +3

    Ok, start of by visiting http://www.pointhacks.com.au/ and read. Once you're done, read some more.

    Personally i never waste points on economy travel so I hope that's not what you are looking to do?

    Most airlines charge taxes, it just depends where you depart from or fly to. VA points can not be transferred to OW airlines reward programs.
    Best value can be found with KF, for example from Perth to Europe i only pay 76k for a one way in business which is fantastic value.

    Pool your wife's points into your account, just makes it easier to book things. Also don't expect to find enough reward seats for a family of 4. Sometimes it's easier to split up.

    Hope this helps you get started… :)

    • mskeggs on 23/02/2017 - 17:40
      +1

      This is good advice.

      My view on points is not to look at them as a substitute for cash, but rather an enhancement to my travel.
      So if I want to make a trip, I get the best deal I can for cash, then look at segments and see if there is value to be had doing part with FF points, or getting upgrades etc.

      Booking the whole thing on points almost always is either too hard or too point costly.

    • uniqualz on 23/02/2017 - 18:33

      Thanks P4L, yeah, I've already read loads on that website, but I guess for me there's still no substitute for going thru it in practical experience terms, and by the time I wrap my rather thick head around the smart way to do it, I'll have missed the Sept-Oct availabilities, I guess anyway? I appreciate your advice on not wasting points on economy travel, but I can't figure out why that is.. How do you mean/why is it a waste? Also, your sugg of booking a business KF fare to Europe for 76k points is a ripper, but how does that come about? You can't book Krisflyer fares on the Virgin webpage, can you?

      • points4life on 23/02/2017 - 18:58
        +2

        Well if you look at the economy fares on sale: https://www.ozbargain.com.au/node/293581 you will quickly learn that using points for Y isn't a great deal. Taxes alone will set you back a bit so why not just purchase a ticket out right? Where as flying business or first is obviously my preferred way to travel and there's just no way I'm going to spend 5k on a ticket. So in this instance my points become more valuable. I hope this makes sense? Points travel isn't free. There's always a tax to pay (not always but in most cases).

        VA is a partner with SQ so you can transfer your VA points to KF points, just look in your VA account. There is an option there to link it.
        VA isn't part of any alliance such as SA or OW so they have individual partnerships with SQ and EY - which are of most use to people in Aus.
        You can also book reward tickets on SQ via the VFF website. You will just need to toss up if that's the best deal. Can't say because I don't know from where you're flying from.

        If you have no time or struggle to understand the intricacies of it all you can have a look at https://flightfox.com/ which can help you find the best award tickets to redeem.

        • uniqualz on 23/02/2017 - 19:25

          Thanks mate, great help. Do you know if EY flights can be redeemed on VA's site?

        • points4life on 23/02/2017 - 20:06
          +1

          @uniqualz: You have to call up to redeem EY on VA. Taxes are out of control tho. Def no good for economy :)

      • Dacs on 24/02/2017 - 09:52
        +2

        I appreciate your advice on not wasting points on economy travel, but I can't figure out why that is.. How do you mean/why is it a waste?

        People often say that it's a waste, but that's debatable.

        A return international flight that costs, say, $1000 in economy might be offered at $4000 in business class. Some people might feel it's worth paying $4000 for the extra luxury, others not.

        If using points for those same flights, the economy flight might cost 90,000 points + $500 taxes (ie the value you get for your points is 0.56c each), whereas the business flight might cost 200,000 points + $500 taxes (ie 1.75c per point).

        But a better way to value it is to ask yourself how much the extra luxury is worth to you. If you would only be prepared to pay $1500 for the business class flight, then using your points for that makes their value to you worth only 0.5c each.

        • uniqualz on 24/02/2017 - 11:08
          +1

          Brill. Now I get it, thanks mate - I had no idea that bus class fares weren't uniformly more expensive per $/point value than economy ones (ie same ratio, just more expensive).

        • points4life on 27/02/2017 - 15:38

          @uniqualz:
          I'll give you a more specific example.

          This is the result for flights booked on Singapore Airlines from PER-AMS return. Sometime in October, same date for all options.

          Economy Return Points: 68,000KF + $790.16 taxes
          Economy Return Cash: $1370.16 Inc Taxes

          Difference in $$ cost: $580
          Value per point: 0.008529

          Business Return Points: 144,500KF + $847.36 taxes
          Business Return Cash: $7386.36

          Difference in $$ cost: $6539
          Value per point: 0.045252

          The question you have to ask yourself is this: is all your hard work saving points really worth a $580 saving + 20h of discomfort?
          Or is all your hard work saving points worth: amazing service, fantastic seats + bed to sleep, lobsters & champagne + 20h of bliss?

        • Dacs on 27/02/2017 - 21:28

          @points4life:
          Good to have a real-life example with which to work.

          Business Return Points: 144,500KF + $847.36 taxes

          I get slightly different figures when I look, but lets work with this. This is "Business Standard" class, not "Business Full", right?

          The question you have to ask yourself is this: is all your hard work saving points really worth a $580 saving + 20h of discomfort?

          A $580 saving? How do you get that?

          Here's a way I might calculate it:
          If you're using the points for economy, it's fair to value them at $0.008529 per KF point.
          The business return flight costs 76,500 more points than the economy flight. Going by the 'Economy value', that's worth $652. Plus the extra taxes of $57 gives a total of $709 extra to fly business class.

          So some options you can choose are:

          • $2,079 (in points + cash) to fly Air Singapore business
          • $1,370 (in either cash or points + cash) to fly Air Singapore economy
          • $1.027 (in cash) to fly Qatar Airways (or whatever airline has a special on at the time of booking). An advantage of this is that it's usually easier to find a good cash price a couple of months before flying than it is to find a reward seat.

          If you chose the third option then you haven't made any use of your points at all. So what could you do with them? Usually the best non-flight alternative is to use them for gift cards, eg a BP gift card which would give value of $0.0055 per Velocity point = $0.0079 per Krisflyer point (1.35 Velocity points = 1 Krisflyer point).

        • uniqualz on 28/02/2017 - 09:53
          +1

          @points4life: That's brilliant, thanks mate. The penny (or points equivalent) is starting to drop!

        • points4life on 28/02/2017 - 14:30

          @Dacs: You should always look at the saver fare and keep in mind that the price you see (in points) gets a 15% discount. See: http://prnt.sc/ee9578

          $580 comes from $1370.16 (Y ticket price) - $790.16 (Taxes paid on Y award).

        • Dacs on 28/02/2017 - 15:08

          @points4life:
          Yeah, I was looking at the Saver fare (Economy) and taking into account the 15% points discount.

  • Peck on 23/02/2017 - 19:22
    +2

    If you convert to KrisFlyer you will lose a %. Looking at a couple of trips Business Class I noticed that I can book Singapore Airlines via Velocity, and the taxes etc are a lot less than SA charge. But it will cost more VV miles than KF miles. "Swings and Roundabouts", but I would just book via Virgin Velocity.

  • tuvz on 23/02/2017 - 19:44

    Give the points a cash value of 1cent each and work based on that.
    Obviously if you can snag a business class seat then you are getting amazing value.
    For economy though, in general you will find yourself paying more if you use points than buying the ticket straight out.

    Also note that 550k isn't enough for 4 business seats to Europe whether you use them as va or convert to kf…unfortunately :(

  • Stewardo on 23/02/2017 - 21:57
    +1

    Yeah as Tuvz said they are worth less than a cent each,
    You can't swap them for one world as it's the opposition of velocity.i could be wrong.
    You can switch them for KrisFlyer but then you lose points in the trade
    You could just book three seats and pay for the fourth/husbands seat.
    You could fly to lax or JFK with velocity points and pay to fly to Europe with Icelandair.
    Or fly to Europe with velocity and pay for one fare.
    Or leave one kid at home and use ticket as a prize.
    Use search engines like kayak or google flights to find cheapest days and fares.
    I don't think you will get much change out of 200000 points per person return,

    • tuvz on 23/02/2017 - 22:04

      you can get one cent per point value in the classifieds section ;)

      • Stewardo on 23/02/2017 - 22:33
        +1

        Which you would probably be better off doing.

  • Peck on 23/02/2017 - 23:04
    +1

    Just another though. Airfares tend to be cheap early September. Early Oct they can be a bit dearer until about 10th-14th. Maybe research budget airlines oneway and then Business class overnight back. EG. I know that you can get Business Class Virgin redemption (Singapore Air) about 78,000 +$170-250? per person if my memory serves me well.

    • Peck on 24/02/2017 - 10:40

      Bangkok to Sydney I should have said.

  • nickyd84 on 25/02/2017 - 19:58

    My partner and I are flying Singapore suites 1st class in August, one way to Paris (Sydney > Singapore > Paris, both flights a380). We moved our velocity points over to KrisFlyer even though you're losing on the conversion its still far better than anything I could find via Virgin. I did a few exact same flight comparisons and Virgin didn't come close to KF for value. I think from memory it cost around 500,000 Velocity. Stick kids in economy, treat yourselves haha.

    • robbo135 on 27/02/2017 - 18:56

      You can't book Suites 1st class through Velocity, you can only do so directly through Krisflyer (by converting your Velocity points to KF).

      Keep in mind that KF also charges higher taxes/surcharges on award redemptions compared with Velocity. The other advantage with converting to KF, is you have access to additional award space that isn't offered to SQ's partners (e.g. Virgin).

      • nickyd84 on 27/02/2017 - 20:30

        Yep, that's what I did.

      • uniqualz on 28/02/2017 - 09:43

        "Award space"? Sorry for the N0ob naivety.. could you pls explain what that means?

        • points4life on 28/02/2017 - 14:33
          +1

          It's the hard lesson you will learn when it comes to booking an award flight with a family of 4 ;)
          Award space is literally that: space allocated to award bookings. It is a small number and it changes based on loading etc.

        • illumination on 28/02/2017 - 16:49

          @points4life: Not sure if that really helps much :P

          Award booking = a flight booking paid using points. Also called redemption booking, award redemption booking, flight redemption ticket, etc.

        • points4life on 02/03/2017 - 14:03

          @illumination: He asked what award space is. Not what an award booking is ;)

        • illumination on 02/03/2017 - 14:12

          @points4life: Haha fair enough, true!
          In hindsight I think "award booking" sounds pretty logical..

  • illumination on 28/02/2017 - 17:06
    +1

    Agree very much with Dac's comment.

    As others have already pointed out, generally Economy gives you inferior value. However, what is your priority? Are you just trying to get from A to B, or are you trying to fly in style? Someone once made an argument here that, "how does economy give you inferior value when it gets you a greater number of flights?"

  • anna10 on 02/03/2017 - 16:08
    +1

    The SQ info changed this morning as SQ just made some mostly overall negative adjustment to their redemption tables

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