Virgin Australia Slashes the Cost of Flex Fares

Virgin Australia 737 lands in Queenstown, New Zealand
Virgin Australia has overhauled its airfare pricing. Photo: Virgin Australia.

Virgin Australia has significantly reduced the price difference between its Economy Choice and Flex airfares, making its flexible tickets a lot more attractive on many routes.

The change comes as Virgin updates the way it prices tickets more generally. Instead of tying Economy Flex fares to the most expensive fare classes (RBDs), as Qantas does, Virgin now offers Choice and Flex tickets as an “upsell” over Lite in every available Economy fare class.

New Virgin Australia 737 Economy Class
Virgin Australia Boeing 737-800 Economy Class. Photo: Virgin Australia.

Virgin is likely hoping that this encourages more customers to buy up to its Economy Flex fares, which include:

  • The ability to change flights without paying a change fee (fare difference still applies, unless using Velocity’s Fly Ahead benefit)
  • The option to cancel a flight for a travel credit with no fees
  • The option to cancel a flight for a cash refund with a $99 fee
  • More status credits (for tickets purchased before 2 April 2025)

Some examples of Virgin’s new Economy Flex pricing

As an example, on this Virgin Australia flight from Melbourne to Canberra, Virgin Australia is today charging $149 for an Economy Lite fare in “M” class:

Example of Virgin Australia's new airfares on the Melbourne-Canberra route.
Example of Virgin Australia’s new airfares on the Melbourne-Canberra route.

Alternatively, you can book a Choice fare for an extra $20, or Flex for an extra $81 over the Lite ticket price. Regardless of whether you book a Lite, Choice or Flex fare, it will now book into the same fare class, which in this instance is “M”.

For comparison, here’s an example of how Virgin Australia priced tickets on the same route earlier this year:

Comparison of Virgin Australia fares from Melbourne to Canberra
Comparison of Virgin Australia fares from Melbourne to Canberra.

As you can see, the Economy Flex fare used to be much more expensive – even, in this case, more than Business Class! So, Virgin is now offering Flex fares for a much more reasonable price.

Let’s look at another example. This is how Virgin Australia is now pricing its airfares on the Sydney-Perth route:

SYD-PER airfare brands and prices on the Virgin Australia website
New fare pricing on the Sydney-Perth route on the Virgin Australia website.

In this case, there’s still a fare difference of more than $100 between Choice and Flex. However, that’s still a much smaller difference compared to the pricing earlier this year:

Comparison of Virgin Australia fares from Sydney to Perth
Comparison of Virgin Australia fares from Sydney to Perth.

In some instances, however, the price difference between Lite and Choice is now greater than before.

This has implications for Velocity members upgrading to Business Class

There are a few reasons why this change could be good for Velocity members who want to upgrade using their points.

Firstly, Velocity Frequent Flyer currently charges fewer points when you upgrade to Business Class from an Economy Flex fare, rather than from a Choice fare. This means there is an opportunity right now to purchase relatively inexpensive Flex fares, and upgrade for a low amount of Velocity points.

However, as announced with the recent Velocity program changes, this will change on 18 November 2024. After this date, Velocity points upgrades from Flex fares will cost the same, higher amount of points as from Choice fares.

In the longer term, though, this is great news for Velocity Platinum members hoping to use their four annual complimentary upgrades. These are only valid on Flex airfares, which are now much more affordable.

Virgin Australia 737 business class
Virgin’s lower Flex fare pricing creates some opportunities to upgrade for less. Photo: Virgin Australia.

Virgin follows other airlines in introducing branded fares

Virgin’s new ticket pricing strategy aligns with other international airlines including Air New Zealand, Malaysia Airlines, Air Canada, Cathay Pacific, Lufthansa and Finnair. These airlines also offer tickets in every fare brand when purchasing tickets in any fare class, rather than tying their ticket’s inclusions directly with the fare class.

This is generally better for consumers because flexible tickets are available at substantially lower prices in many cases. This change could particularly benefit businesses that prefer to book Flex fares for their employees.

However, on busy flights, Economy Lite and Choice fares could be more expensive. You could end up buying a very expensive Lite airfare, and still only getting the lesser inclusions that fare brand.

This system can also be problematic if you want to credit the points and status credits to a partner airline’s frequent flyer program.

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 90 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include economics, aviation & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.
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This seems to be for corporate accounts, not the general public or am I missing something?

Reply 1 Like

If this change extends through to regular commercial airfares, it might make my Platinum upgrades a bit easier to use 😉

Hard to see the value in booking Flex and trying to upgrade with prices like these...

View image at the forums

or

View image at the forums

Reply 3 Likes

We are excited to announce a significant enhancement

We all know what that means 🤣

Reply 7 Likes

View image at the forums

Reply Like

This seems to be for corporate accounts, not the general public or am I missing something?

I would expect this will translate to general public fares too.

Reply Like

Well somebody sure is getting ready for an IPO.

Reply 1 Like

I expect this to be problematic for those crediting VA flights to non-VFF programs, since booking Flex no longer guarantees a higher booking code than Choice, and you may not be able to force a higher fare code (to ensure you earn status credits) when booking online, without engaging a travel agent.

This would be similar to issues crediting NZ to other *A, crediting CX/MH to other OW etc. caused by this sort of fare structure.

Other than that though, I feel this is probably overall a good change if it means Flex will no longer be ridiculously priced

Reply 3 Likes

I expect this to be problematic for those crediting VA flights to non-VFF programs, since booking Flex no longer guarantees a higher booking code than Choice, and you may not be able to force a higher fare code (to ensure you earn status credits) when booking online, without engaging a travel agent.

This would be similar to issues crediting NZ to other *A, crediting CX/MH to other OW etc. caused by this sort of fare structure.

Other than that though, I feel this is probably overall a good change if it means Flex will no longer be ridiculously priced

That was also one of my first thoughts.

For anyone not aware of this issue, it's explained here:

Many airlines are heading in this direction, but frequent flyer programs around the world have not caught up.

Reply Like

click to expand...

Based on that graphic above, you can buy a Y class fare and it’s still non-refundable unless you pay the Flex surcharge?

Reply 1 Like

Wow I really hope this applies to regular fares and Virgin Business Flyer. It will drive all my corporate travel for myself and my staff to VA.

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