Cathay "World of Winners" promo - discounted tickets to Hong Kong

[Mattg]

Cathay Pacific is giving away (almost) free tickets from many worldwide destinations to Hong Kong in various batches. Next week, it will offer free tickets to lucky Cathay members in Europe. Australia should come later in May.

To enter you need to be a Cathay member aged 18 or over, take a quiz on the giveaway date, and be one of the first X number of people to answer all the questions correctly. You win a return Economy flight to Hong Kong on CX, excluding the fees & taxes which you still need to pay.

Details here:

https://flights.cathaypacific.com/en_AU/offers/world-of-winners.html

Registrations don't seem to be open yet for the Australian giveaway, but to give you an idea of what to expect, here's the promo page for flights ex London:

https://flights.cathaypacific.com/en_GB/offers/world-of-winners-teaser.html

 

[kyle]

Wish it was in J

 

[tomlee1986]

Wish it was in J

all economy class seats there...

 

[MELso]

Looks like it goes live on 29 May.

 

[dmgale1960]

Concept is a winner, but in no way will I travel to Hong Kong again. I love HK but not even a free ticket could get me back there.

 

[MELso]

Full T&Cs are up: https://flights.cathaypacific.com/en_AU/offers/HKIA-exclusive-ticket-offer.html

Looks like the taxes and surcharges (including a hefty fuel surcharge) will total about $520 for the return airfare, which means that this isn't quite as big a bargain as it first seemed (you save about $1k). It also seems that, unlike some other markets, you need to book on the spot, rather than just getting a code...

 

[2infinity]

Pro's

• Almost free ticket

Con's

• Economy
• Trust issues with Chinese government
• Even if i was lucky enough to score a ticket for myself AND partner, can't get a ticket for child, so its no longer a cheap deal.
• Still need to pay for regional airfares to Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne or Perth.
• Blackout periods will more than likely include every single date I would want to fly, eg: school holidays

Is it worth spending hours on Cathay website with non-stop crashing to get a ticket?

 

[Roger787]

Cathay Pacific is giving away (almost) free tickets from many worldwide destinations to Hong Kong in various batches. Next week, it will offer free tickets to lucky Cathay members in Europe. Australia should come later in May.

To enter you need to be a Cathay member aged 18 or over, take a quiz on the giveaway date, and be one of the first X number of people to answer all the questions correctly. You win a return Economy flight to Hong Kong on CX, excluding the fees & taxes which you still need to pay.

Details here:

https://flights.cathaypacific.com/en_AU/offers/world-of-winners.html

Registrations don't seem to be open yet for the Australian giveaway, but to give you an idea of what to expect, here's the promo page for flights ex London:

https://flights.cathaypacific.com/en_GB/offers/world-of-winners-teaser.html

Matt, how is this "almost" free when tickets cost $521.30 in taxes and surcharges (with over $350 of this the CX surcharge). I can fly from Mel return to Singapore with Scoot for less than that amount (OK. without luggage/food). Not really "almost free".

 

[drmatte]

Is 12pm midnight or midday?

 

[http_x92]

Sounds like we need to use our Asia miles number for the flight... well at least it gives us the chance to upgrade to J using points. Since it's class O we will likely not earn QF points anyway if we could switch to QFF.

 

[Peso]

Won a ticket during the Indonesian giveaway, though unfortunately due to travel patterns couldn't find a certain travel time to book the flights. Lessons learned:

• Set an alarm for 5-10 minutes before launch time. I got in at T+40 minutes and was lucky to score 1 (tried to get for 4 different people).
• When doing multiple people, have multiple devices/browser sessions handy, wait times got to 20-30 minutes.
• The voucher codes are strictly non-transferable. They do check the name, so don't expect to be able to stand in for other people.

Fortunately, there seems to be nothing disqualifying me from applying for the Aussie campaign, so I'll definitely do it again given the different redemption deadlines. I really wanna go back to Hong Kong and sneak over the border to Shenzhen.

 

[Mattg]

Won a ticket during the Indonesian giveaway, though unfortunately due to travel patterns couldn't find a certain travel time to book the flights. Lessons learned:

• Set an alarm for 5-10 minutes before launch time. I got in at T+40 minutes and was lucky to score 1 (tried to get for 4 different people).
• When doing multiple people, have multiple devices/browser sessions handy, wait times got to 20-30 minutes.
• The voucher codes are strictly non-transferable. They do check the name, so don't expect to be able to stand in for other people.

Fortunately, there seems to be nothing disqualifying me from applying for the Aussie campaign, so I'll definitely do it again given the different redemption deadlines. I really wanna go back to Hong Kong and sneak over the border to Shenzhen.

Out of interest, what were the "surcharges" like ex Indonesia?

The Cathay website doesn't specify anywhere which surcharges apply or how much they are. Do we know for sure if it includes a large CX carrier charge?

If the ticket ends up costing ~$500 then that's a decent discount off the regular CX fare but I would have to agree with @Roger787 that it's not really close to being free.

 

[Flightseeker]

A flight from Brisbane will cost over $610 in carrier charges and taxes. Their fees are why CX is no longer in my planning to travel overseas. They are rivaling BA with their claw-back of fares via excessive charges.

 

[tomlee1986]

Pro's

• Almost free ticket

Con's

• Economy
• Trust issues with Chinese government
• Even if i was lucky enough to score a ticket for myself AND partner, can't get a ticket for child, so its no longer a cheap deal.
• Still need to pay for regional airfares to Brisbane, Sydney, Melbourne or Perth.
• Blackout periods will more than likely include every single date I would want to fly, eg: school holidays

Is it worth spending hours on Cathay website with non-stop crashing to get a ticket?

TBH I would NOT go even if it is free... I DO NOT TRUST CHINESE GOVT!

Post automatically merged: May 15, 2023

Is 12pm midnight or midday?

Midday

 

[tvanloenen]

Is 12pm midnight or midday?

midnight / 00:01 is one min. past midnight I.E GOOD MORNING

 

[Peso]

Wish it was in J

Out of interest, what were the "surcharges" like ex Indonesia?

The Cathay website doesn't specify anywhere which surcharges apply or how much they are. Do we know for sure if it includes a large CX carrier charge?

If the ticket ends up costing ~$500 then that's a decent discount off the regular CX fare but I would have to agree with @Roger787 that it's not really close to being free.

I got the ticket ex CGK, costing just shy of IDR 1,8M ($180) return. Trips departing other cities carry slightly different surcharges, but are also a little under $180.

Worth noting that the tickets are upgradable to J using Asia Miles.

 

[Jacques Vert]

Is 12pm midnight or midday?

Both

 

[tomlee1986]

Both

in this case, it has to be 12 noon, if midnight - it will be 12am

 

[Flyinfish]

Agree that $500+ is far from nearly free, considering the time and effort required. I believe Hong Kong is currently deluged with visitors from the mainland which takes a shine off the experience. I have many fond memories of Hong Kong but will give this a miss.

 

[MELso]

I got the ticket ex CGK, costing just shy of IDR 1,8M ($180) return. Trips departing other cities carry slightly different surcharges, but are also a little under $180.

Worth noting that the tickets are upgradable to J using Asia Miles.

Looking on ITA Matrix, that seems about right (I was noodling around with dates in October and the taxes and charges came to about $156), so this means that the ticket ex-MEL will indeed be about $520. At that price, I'll pass (even though I haven't been to Hong Kong since 1985 - my first time outside Oz)...