Just as it’s possible to redeem Virgin Australia Velocity points for Singapore Airlines flights (albeit not in First Class at the moment), the same is also true in reverse. If you have Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer miles, you can redeem these for Virgin Australia flights in Economy or Business Class.
Singapore Airlines slightly increased the cost of Virgin Australia redemptions on 1 August 2022, but these are still good value on many routes.
How many KrisFlyer miles do you need for a Virgin Australia flight?
The number of KrisFlyer miles that you’ll need to book a Virgin Australia flight is published in the dedicated KrisFlyer award chart for Virgin Australia redemptions:
The prices shown above are for one-way awards. Round-trip bookings cost double the number of miles.
On round-trip bookings, you are allowed one free stopover. You are also allowed a surface sector at the destination. This means, for example, that you could book the following itinerary for 47,000 KrisFlyer miles in Business Class:
- Melbourne to Cairns in Virgin Australia Business Class
- Surface sector from Cairns to Townsville
- Townsville to Brisbane in Virgin Australia Business Class
- Stopover in Brisbane
- Brisbane to Melbourne in Virgin Australia Business Class
If you booked the above itinerary through Velocity Frequent Flyer, it would cost 82,500 Velocity points.
Stopovers are not permitted on one-way KrisFlyer award bookings.
The best use of KrisFlyer miles for Virgin Australia redemptions is longer flights within the eastern Australian states (i.e. excluding WA and NT), which are priced at a fixed rate of 12,000 KrisFlyer miles in Economy or 23,500 KrisFlyer miles in Business, each way.
Due to the zone-based award chart, short point-to-point flights on Virgin Australia are a relatively poor use of Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer miles. For example, a Sydney-Canberra flight costs the same number of KrisFlyer miles as Adelaide-Hamilton Island. Clearly, the latter is a better use of miles!
If you find that a redemption is significantly better value when booked using Virgin Australia Velocity points (or vice versa), it is also possible to convert KrisFlyer miles into Velocity points at a 1.55:1 transfer rate in both directions.
Although the KrisFlyer award chart features destinations including North America and Papua New Guinea, Virgin Australia no longer flies to these destinations.
Also note that you cannot combine Virgin Australia flights with flights operated by Singapore Airlines (or any other airline) onto a single KrisFlyer award ticket. KrisFlyer award bookings for travel on Virgin Australia may only include flights operated by Virgin Australia.
How to book Virgin Australia flights with KrisFlyer miles
In most cases, you can book Virgin Australia flights using KrisFlyer miles on the Singapore Airlines website. Simply log into your KrisFlyer account and search for the route you want to book from the Singapore Airlines home page, selecting “redeem flights”.
By default, the Singapore Airlines website will only show Singapore Airlines flights on the next page. If you’ve searched for a domestic route within Australia, this will probably mean that the Singapore Airlines website says there are no flights available.
But there’s one more step you need to follow! To view flights operated by Virgin Australia, you’ll need to click on “Other partner airlines” at the top of the search results page:
In general, Virgin Australia award availability via KrisFlyer should match what is available to Velocity Frequent Flyer members as Reward Seats.
If you believe an award seat should be available but isn’t showing up online, you could try calling Singapore Airlines on +61 2 7209 4388 (from within Australia).
You’ll also need to call up if you want to book a flight to a destination that doesn’t appear on the Singapore Airlines website, such as Port Hedland, or if you want to utilise the free stopover on round-trip bookings.
After booking, if you wish to select seats on your Virgin Australia flights, note that you may need to the Virgin Australia booking reference number (which is different to the Singapore Airlines reference number). You may also need to call Virgin Australia if you’re unable to choose a seat yourself on the Virgin Australia website, as is a common problem.
Join the discussion on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum: Using KrisFlyer miles on Virgin Australia
Would you like help using your frequent flyer points?
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