How do book Cathay flights using QFF points

[Albert Park]

Hi - I'm a newby here, and am seeking advice on how to search for OW award flights on Cathay Pacific using QFF points.

Do I need to join the CX Marco Polo Club and transfer them across somehow, or is it possible to search in some other way? Doing a few searches in the QFF site for award flights ex HKG seemed to come up with QF and BA options, but never CX flights.

I checked and searched around and couldn't find this mentioned anywhere on this forum - nor is it anywhere obvious on the QFF site - but sorry if it is covered somewhere already.

Thanks in advance for any advice
M

 

[notzac]

Welcome Albert Park!

Hi - I'm a newby here, and am seeking advice on how to search for OW award flights on Cathay Pacific using QFF points.

Do I need to join the CX Marco Polo Club and transfer them across somehow, or is it possible to search in some other way? Doing a few searches in the QFF site for award flights ex HKG seemed to come up with QF and BA options, but never CX flights.

It's probably not a bad idea to join Marco Polo so you can see what award flights are available, but to use QF points on CX metal, you'll need to call QF. As I understand it, some people have managed to get the convenience fee (5k points) waived on account of not being able to book online - but generally, expect to pay the additional fee to book over the phone.

 

[oz_mark]

It's probably not a bad idea to join Marco Polo so you can see what award flights are available, but to use QF points on CX metal, you'll need to call QF.

I would have thought joining Asia Miles would have been sufficient. Marco Polo costs real money!

 

[samh004]

I would have thought joining Asia Miles would have been sufficient. Marco Polo costs real money!

Exactly what I was going to say. The Marco Polo Club costs USD$50. Essentially the same thing too for what the OP needs.

 

[notzac]

Exactly what I was going to say. The Marco Polo Club costs USD$50. Essentially the same thing too for what the OP needs.

Ahh, I didn't realise CX charge for that - sorry if I mislead anyone

 

[NM]

Of course the other way to do it is just to call the Qantas FF service centre and ask them. You are going to need to call them anyway as CX flights cannot be booked on-line using Qantas FF points.

But if you want to find availability before calling, then creating an Asia mile account does work. Its not possible to transfer Qantas FF points to Asia Miles. You just the the empty Asia Miles account to find the availability and then call Qantas FF to make the booking using your Qantas FF points.

Note that Qantas will add a surcharge of 2500 points to make the booking over the phone. Some people have been successful in having this surcharge waived since its not possible to book CX flights on-line at Qantas FF.

 

[Albert Park]

Thanks everyone - and especially for the suggestion of joining Asia Miles instead of Marco Polo Club. I would like to look at various options before calling QANTAS and booking so Asia Miles sounds like an excellent way to do that online ... rather than tying up an operator for an hour or so!

Thanks
M

 

[Archphoto]

Just remember QFF service center charges 2500 points for *any* phone booking regardless of the fact you can't book CX online with them. (Applies to any other booking too; QF, BA, JAL etc)

 

[JohnK]

Just remember QFF service center charges 2500 points for *any* phone booking regardless of the fact you can't book CX online with them. (Applies to any other booking too; QF, BA, JAL etc)

It is possible to have the 2,500 award booking fee waived if you are not able to book the award online due to the inefficiency of the award booking engine. You may find that you need to call back a few times to get the right consultant.

 

[Albert Park]

Re: How to book Cathay flights using QFF points

Thanks to everyone for their replies. By using a combination of the QFF Award engine and the (free) Cathay Pacific engine on Asia Miles we were able to put together quite a complicated itinerary that took advantage of available award flights on many One World airlines. When I then rang QFF we were able to just quote all the flights and had the whole thing booked with the minimum of fuss, and without having to make any last-minute changes on the fly.

The other really useful thing I found was a PDF timetable for *all* One World airlines on the Iberia site under "timetables" (but beware that it is about 5Mb in total).

The "One World Classic Award" table on the QFF site make it pretty clear that the required points includes the 2500pt "Assisted Award booking fee" so I must admit I didn't even try calling back again in order to see whether I could get it dropped! And I must agree with another poster (elsewhere on this site) that the "One World Classic Award" is very good value, especially for a complicated trip that involves multiple destinations.

Thanks again
M