Changes to Velocity reward seat pricing from 21 January 2025

[AFF Editor]

At the suggestion of @elanshin, this thread is specifically for discussing the changes to Velocity reward seat pricing that were announced this week as part of the broader program changes.

Yesterday, Velocity decreased the minimum points required on some domestic Economy redemptions. But on 21 January 2025, the maximum points required for these redemptions will go up. The points needed for some international partner airline redemptions will also go up.

Velocity is also splitting off its reward charts into separate charts for:

• VA domestic
• VA international
• United & Virgin Atlantic
• Singapore Airlines, Etihad & Qatar Airways
• All other partner airlines (Hawaiian, South African Airways, ANA and Air Canada)

You can read our article on this topic here:

Velocity Changing Reward Flight Prices

Velocity Frequent Flyer has reduced the number of points needed to book some Virgin Australia Economy flights, but other reward seats will become more expensive.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

The new reward charts are available on the Velocity website:

Using Points For Flights

Use your Velocity Points to fly to over 500 destinations. Check out our flight reward options and turn your Points into a flight for your next trip or dream holiday today

www.velocityfrequentflyer.com

 

[elanshin]

Thanks,

I was just trying to find the new charts again and it was a bit all over that thread.

 

[Human]

What I’m very keen to discover is what will happen if/when VA starts flying to Doha. Remember that these flights will be VA international flights even though they’ll be on wet-leased aircraft.

Obviously the vast majority of the people flying VA to Doha will then be flying on Qatar to other destinations. But as things stand, VA and Qatar are on different points tables.

That means that people using Velocity points on the VA flights to Doha will then have to book a second sector under a different rewards table, with the commensurate increase in the number of points required.

Will VA and Qatar eventually be on the same points table? Makes no sense to me if they’re not.

 

[elanshin]

I guess also from one angle, if you earn more points from flying than on the ground this is a double whammy. You earn less and it costs more. So its a much bigger devaluation than the ~10% increase in costs.

 

[levelnine]

I guess also from one angle, if you earn more points from flying than on the ground this is a double whammy. You earn less and it costs more. So its a much bigger devaluation than the ~10% increase in costs.

It makes sense when you consider the move to a revenue-based frequent flyer scheme. One of the key attributes of such a scheme is that earn from spend on the ground eclipses earn from time in the air.

While devaluations are always unwelcome, this is one of the smaller devaluations we've seen in the industry. The most disappointing part in my opinion is that Velocity already has very high partner redemption carrier charges, and they are going up even higher with Singapore redemptions.

 

[Digicola]

In light of this the velocity amex refresh makes sense… it better be good.

 

[L2.]

I had wondered how long until it would take until we had a devaluation because in recent times it's been good for customers, as many of us have been earning more points on the ground, yet the number of points needed for a redemption hadn't shifted in years.

My non-scientific justification for the above is that with significant inflation in the economy over the last 2-3 years in particular, pretty much everybody is spending a fair bit more money on goods and services, translating into more points coming through from credit cards etc, plus with Flybuys having increased the transfer rate back in 2021 and significant food inflation there's probably a fair few more points coming through to Velocity from that program too.

 

[burmans]

In light of this the velocity amex refresh makes sense… it better be good.

Good luck with that, not the way it’s gone recently!

 

[harryhv]

Walloping YQ increases will add injury to the insult of the points-devaluations, for awards on QR, SQ etc.