Update: New Qantas Frequent Flyer program has been announced. More info here.
Qantas is set to change the way people earn and use FF points:
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/qantas-set-to-anno…
What do you think the change will be? I personally don't think it's going to be great and it will be at the loss of the consumer.
I guess because many other FF programs have made negative changes to the value of points in recent times.
Yet another so called enhancement rolls eyes
For your convenience your points are now worth much less!
Even better, the points will expire sooner and there'll be less ways to keep your account active!
Qantas are scum, they stole 250,000 points from me on a silly technicality, and refused to do anything - I fly twice a month, used to be a loyal customer, not anymore!
They tried to do that to us but I managed to claw them back. We had enough points for two round the world tickets and then they were all gone because of inaction; this was a while ago when it wasn’t as easy to keep them ticking over. It took about 6 months of concerted effort but we finally pointed out their emails used to tell us when expiry would occur and , although the emails kept coming, they had stopped that feature. They finally coughed up the points and told us we had a week to book everything. We booked as quickly as we could. Now I have the Qantas well-being app. The steps keep the points ticking over and, bonus, it makes us walk more.
Nice! No such luck for me, I didn't notice the erroneous inaction-deletion until 2 years later when I tried to use the points - I tried a ton, they just bounced me around for months (I even wrote to the CEO), and eventually just said no, it was too late. It's so dumb - I'm FIFO and they know I fly 2-4 flights a month, have done so for decades!
It really bugged me, I was looking forward to a "free" holiday! But so much for loyalty :)
@nuchalis: Yeah, we were pissed off as well. No warning at all; just lost the points. Fortunately we had been tracking so we noticed immediately. We just kept lobbing it back to them and their modification of the email seemed to do the trick. We were pretty lucky, from what we’ve heard. Canada, France, it was a nice trip.
Probably way to late but it might be worth talking to the airlines ombudsman. If they cocked it up, then who knows.
http://www.traveller.com.au/airline-complaint-who-you-gonna-…
My worry is that they will (like Krisflyer) put an expiry date on pts earned. I have a stockpile atm and dont plan to use it any time soon.
Points constantly depreciate you realise? 100k 10years ago would have gotten you more than 100k now.
If that's the sort of length stockpiling you have
Yes I understand the time value of money.
Its more like I have just under a million but haven't had the chance to use it due to lack of leave. Might consider it in few years when I go through long service.
If the program was losing money, then I'd expect some cost-cutting which would be bad for members. But it's very profitable so I'm not sure why many people are assuming the changes will be negative.
My answer: I have no idea ;)
I suspect they will make it slightly easier to get flights for points, but will increase the number of points needed to get those flights
My guesses:
Frankly I don’t think using the points is useful unless you get enough to go business class or you are only flying one way. We are currently in Portugal, doing our European “grand tour” and we got enough Qantas points for two business class tickets over and are flying back economy on Virgin points. We are Virgin Gold members so we are hoping to get lounge access with Etihad. I wouldn’t have used the virgin points but we are Gold members and finding cheap one way flights from Europe didn’t appear to be possible; it seemed to cost more than a round trip. However, because the points are based on sectors you only need half compared to a round trip. Happy if someone can give me the hack for one way international fares.
I would guess it to be a huge announcement, how they’ve listened to customers and are going to enhance the product to make it even better than before. Where in reality they will tinker with it to generate more revenue.
So far it isn't as bad as we thought it will be and there are some improvements (new partners).
It will be Simpler and Fairer Mark 2. I wouldn't get any hopes up whilst Joyce is at the helm.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/qantas-unveils-fre…
less cash charges on redemption, more points required.
I think it's more points required for Business Class and the other premium seats.
Some basics from how I understand it:
More available rewards seats (extra 1 million available rewards seats annually)
Economy rewards seats need lower pts + less fees (e.g. Flight to Dallas used to be 55,000pts+$294, will be 51,200pts+$219) (side note: how does this affect those selling and buying pts?)
But higher pts needed for premium seats and upgrades (e.g. Melbourne to LA premium economy used to be 144,000, will be 162,600). But fees still also reduced from $793 to $603.
New 2-tiered "Points Club" for those who earn pts through ground activities, i.e. not flying (I understand this to be through credit card earning, shopping, dining, etc). Benefits include flight and travel benefits (including lounge access and bonus status credits) and other member-exclusive offers and discounts. Not sure why they would have to separate this
New Lifetime Platinum tier for those who reach a sh*t-ton of status credits in their lifetime (75,000 lifetime status credits)
etc
how does one get the lifetime platimum status
75000 lifetime status points apparently.
edit: It says above.
- New Lifetime Platinum tier for those who reach a sh*t-ton of status credits in their lifetime (75,000 lifetime status credits)
whoa that'll take a while
You have to spend approximately $1.5million on flights with qantas to earn lifetime platinum.
@Archi: Yeah no kidding. I once worked with a guy though who made double platinum that year (and probably several times since). He was flying 2 or 3 times a week, and multiple international trips to the US each year.
Any changes to oneworld classic award?
Going up in price for business and first:
Popular Oneworld Classic Flight Rewards, which are typically used to book around-the-world journeys with Qantas and its Oneworld partner airlines, will also increase. In first class, the cost will rise from 420,000 to 455,000 Qantas Points, and in business class, from 280,000 to 318,000 Qantas Points.
https://www.ausbt.com.au/how-the-qantas-frequent-flyer-overh…
I am trying to make sense of the overhaul of Qantas FF program. Can someone briefly explain the changes. From my understanding, it will be difficult to book flights by points. But is this restriction only for business class seats or economy seats as well?
Thanks
There's a tonne of info out there by a quick google.
The gist is…
Economy: fewer points
Business and above (possibly including premium): ~+15% more points, less surcharge, more availability
Should be easier but more costly points wise for the best value classes (business and above), generally I believe Qantas is trying to reduce their liabilities from points their books.
More availability? I'm calling BS.
They're achieving that by putting on "points planes" to places you don't want to go to at times which suit them. I doubt overall availability is going to increase much, if at all.
I don't want points planes, i want more rewards seats availability on most if not all flights.
PointHacks has some articles on it - I think the verdict was yes, there is now additional availability (but not by a large amount).
It depends on where you were in the "queue", if you just missed out in the past then you'll likely see more availability, if you were way down the queue then it most likely won't matter. Either way the surcharge has been reduced which is good since it was too high compared to partner airlines.
BA in the UK make 2 business and 4 economy seats available on EVERY flight for their frequent flyers. It is time the ACCC made Qantas do something similar.
You can make a submission to the ACCC's current review of loyalty programs here: https://www.accc.gov.au/focus-areas/market-studies/customer-…
Wife and I are looking at travelling to Europe next year and we've been scoping out the reward flights with Qantas. We're definitely flying economy as we can't afford business so is it worth waiting for the changes to take effect before we book since it seems like economy flights will be cheaper?
Changes have been implemented as of today, so no longer makes any difference for you.
Yeah thanks, I realise last night that the changes were already implemented. I thought the changes were for all classes starting today.
Why do you say that? They literally have given out zero information.