Enhancements to VA partner redemptions

[Happy Dude]

Looks like VA have upped the fees for partner redemptions and, apparently, the number of miles required.

I say apparently because the link in the email I received leads to a page that shows the table for flights booked up to 4 Oct 2022 is the same as the one for flights booked from 5 Oct 2022. Ha ha VA - very funny.

 

[Zanzaid]

Looks like VA have upped the fees for partner redemptions and, apparently, the number of miles required.

I say apparently because the link in the email I received leads to a page that shows the table for flights booked up to 4 Oct 2022 is the same as the one for flights booked from 5 Oct 2022. Ha ha VA - very funny.

Only a few have changed in the middle zones, there will be 12 zones instead of 10. Economy have gone slightly down, business have gone slightly up, no change to PE or First though

 

[Happy Dude]

Only a few have changed in the middle zones, there will be 12 zones instead of 10. Economy have gone slightly down, business have gone slightly up, no change to PE or First though

Yep I didn't look at the middle zones nor the Y, just the J and F. Not the worst enhancement there but the copayment is annoying.

 

[odysseus]

Details are here:

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

experience.velocityfrequentflyer.com

New tables:


New Singapore Air surcharge - note USD and per segment

 

[Coops1]

The worst part is the PER SECTOR USD$150 for long haul business, booking SQ via velocity points.

 

[Doctore1003]

The worst part is the PER SECTOR USD$150 for long haul business, booking SQ via velocity points.

So US$480 for Australia-Europe business return?

 

[Flitter]

So US$480 for Australia-Europe business return?

US$600 unless my maths are off. Still better than Etihad tho.

 

[ChrisFlyer]

With SQ the carrier charges would be US$90 for Australia-Singapore in business and $150 for Singapore-Europe based on the distance of the flights. So US$480 return (not 'cheap', but nicer than US$600 - or what is charged on Etihad).

 

[Zanzara]

What is missing is a clear explanation as to why the charge has been introduced now...Apart from because we can. Many are triumphant (as am I) at the planned reinstatement of being able to transfer Velocity points to Silverkris. Although the exact rate still has to be top secret apparently.

 

[henrus]

US$600 unless my maths are off. Still better than Etihad tho.

MEL-SIN, SYD-SIN and BNE-SIN are all under 4200 miles.

This means they those sectors are only $90 each.

 

[ChrisFlyer]

What is missing is a clear explanation as to why the charge has been introduced now...Apart from because we can. Many are triumphant (as am I) at the planned reinstatement of being able to transfer Velocity points to Silverkris. Although the exact rate still has to be top secret apparently.

My understanding is that Singapore Airlines makes two different levels of availability to partners, and the level they pay for impacts the rewards their members get.

There's the level that Velocity used to get many moons ago, when you could barely find a premium seat anywhere (basically, what most of SQ's Star Alliance partners see). And then there's a more premium level of inventory that Velocity has now and had more recently before COVID, where premium seats are more widely available. But this costs the frequent flyer partner more (either in bulk or per seat).

So I think what's happened is that Velocity has realised how popular SQ is now for redemption, and how much they're paying per seat (likely more than other partners), looked at how things work with Etihad and decided to pass an extra cost along to Velocity members, with the highest carrier charges applying to the most premium seats that would cost the most cash-wise.

Not a perfect system, but I'd rather pay a small fee and get better availability than see the same SQ awards that United members (etc) get, which are so highly limited as to almost be useless!