Qantas Award Charges Outrageous

[drewbles]

It has been possible to earn AA for ages: 0.625 withAmex MR, 0.78 with Diners MC and 1.78 with Diners. I wouldnt expect a putative specific AA card to earn better

Yeah i'm aware of the washing to AA but the value turns out to be marginal unless you're earning major points.

It's a little messy for me as I earn a lot of points via work spend on my personal card (long story, but work allows me to). Most in foreign currency so i'm earning 2 points per AUD (QF Ultimate card), and i'm putting a lot through my card per month The inflated QF awards are more easy to tolerate but the taxes not so much.

It's just a shame that nowhere except hotels airlines and supermarkets really take Diners.

AA direct earn cards in the USA are amazing, but of course, huge market, competition and home ground. Different kettle of fish.

There's not really an Amex that makes the points earning/washing to AA worthwhile.

 

[Pleb Status]

I have close to 1M QFF points to burn but could not handle the taxes. So I still have them and they are almost useless to me now. If I could legally trade them for VFF points I would consider it.

Booked VA/EY LHR-AUH-PER this afternoon in J for 110k+AUD393 to give the new EY 388/789 J studio a go.

Could not justify the QF/EK 112k+1109AUD for almost the same trip (this was not available on the day I wanted to travel).

 

[Abdul_A350]

I find it confusing when people say QFF points are worthless because of the high taxes, but also complain about how many of those worthless points a given booking takes.

There is a reason they are so easy to obtain.

 

[cjd600]

Looked at coughet to Madrid today - taxes in J or F were $640 - using Emirates
Brisbane to Madrid was $668 - using Emriates

You would have thought that a much shorter sitance would require less fuel tax - clearly not.

BTW, using CX 139,000 points plus $98

Lets hope someone will listen one day. As for the AA comment above, I think AA and QF are bed with each too much on this, would think there might be a non compete on credit card in their codeshare agreement

They don't seem to have non-compete on charges for same route/flight award tickets..

 

[JohnK]

The CX option would seem like a lot less pain. And good value from the Pier/Wing F class lounge in HKG.

That's what you would think. But it gets me in to BKK one day later. Time is important this trip. Don't want to sit around in SYD on Sunday night and all of Monday to depart Monday night when I could be there Monday night with the QF/EK option.

The QF award booking engine has given me grief trying to plan this award.

 

[ComeFlyWithMe]

A recent J award SYD-BKK-SYD was 120k points and around $620. The taxes and charges amount to about the cost of the economy sale that was on, so I suppose it could be considered a confirmed upgrade. I bought my fare in the J sale so this was just for SWMBO. Not great value but when you add my cash fare plus SWMBO's redemption and divide by 2, it's not so bad. She doesn't need the status as she flies with me 99% of the time.

 

[Happy Trails]

That's what you would think. But it gets me in to BKK one day later. Time is important this trip. Don't want to sit around in SYD on Sunday night and all of Monday to depart Monday night when I could be there Monday night with the QF/EK option.

The QF award booking engine has given me grief trying to plan this award.

What about MH?
They have availability every day at the end of Sept, including Sundays 18 & 25.

 

[andye]

What about MH?
They have availability every day at the end of Sept, including Sundays 18 & 25.

MH's YQ is pretty outrageous too

 

[JohnK]

What about MH?
They have availability every day at the end of Sept, including Sundays 18 & 25.

Fuel surcharge is quite high and I am still skeptical about MH.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

A recent J award SYD-BKK-SYD was 120k points and around $620. The taxes and charges amount to about the cost of the economy sale that was on, so I suppose it could be considered a confirmed upgrade. I bought my fare in the J sale so this was just for SWMBO. Not great value but when you add my cash fare plus SWMBO's redemption and divide by 2, it's not so bad. She doesn't need the status as she flies with me 99% of the time.

Considering the award seat is a seat QF wholly believes it cannot sell anyway, the 120K points and $620 is a hefty profit for them.

 

[Limewood]

The argument is the award fees charged can be as much as 10 times more than most other airlines like AA for instance and Qantas should reduce them to a reasonable level

 

[trixydoza]

The argument is the award fees charged can be as much as 10 times more than most other airlines like AA for instance and Qantas should reduce them to a reasonable level

It's a really facile argument. There is a points component and a cash component to any award offered by pretty much any airline. The value of the cash is known to all. The value of the points is arbitrary.

QFF already sell as many awards as they want to at the combined price of the two components. Will you be really happy if they reduce the latter and increase the former? Or do you just suddenly expect them to gift you X-hundred dollars?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

It's a really facile argument. There is a points component and a cash component to any award offered by pretty much any airline. The value of the cash is known to all. The value of the points is arbitrary.

QFF already sell as many awards as they want to at the combined price of the two components. Will you be really happy if they reduce the latter and increase the former? Or do you just suddenly expect them to gift you X-hundred dollars?

Award seats are only seats the airline doesn't believe it can sell through any other means. Or at least that's the logic behind carriers stating that 'award availability is limited'.

With the change of FF programs to full-blown money makers in their own right, some airline might sell seats through their FF program if they believe they can make more money out of them than selling them to ordinary fare paying passengers (possibly in some cases 'anytime awards' might fit into this category).

The argument that a reduction in award charges and fees would somehow detract from availability is hard for me to imagine... the seat is empty anyway.

 

[trixydoza]

Award seats are only seats the airline doesn't believe it can sell through any other means. Or at least that's the logic behind carriers stating that 'award availability is limited'.

With the change of FF programs to full-blown money makers in their own right, some airline might sell seats through their FF program if they believe they can make more money out of them than selling them to ordinary fare paying passengers (possibly in some cases 'anytime awards' might fit into this category).

The argument that a reduction in award charges and fees would somehow detract from availability is hard for me to imagine... the seat is empty anyway.

The first paragraph is basically just a straw man, as is the last. And is pretty much contradicted by the middle one.

Qantas *are* selling awards in a way that makes them money. Which is presumably why the consumers are complaining. They can even make a WP feel special by giving them the right to ring up and ask to pay points + purportedly exorbitant cash.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

The first paragraph is basically just a straw man, as is the last. And is pretty much contradicted by the middle one.

Qantas *are* selling awards in a way that makes them money. Which is presumably why the consumers are complaining. They can even make a WP feel special by giving them the right to ring up and ask to pay points + purportedly exorbitant cash.

The middle para only really comes in for double or triple priced awards where the airline is going to make the same or more money from a points redemption than selling a revenue ticket. Even then, the inventory is probably from revenue inventory, not award space.

The standard awards are seats the airline doesn't think it can sell. If it could sell them for full price, they would.

 

[trixydoza]

The standard awards are seats the airline doesn't think it can sell. If it could sell them for full price, they would.

You make it sound way too binary. Are you saying that Qantas is failing to sell those empty seats even as award tickets because those awards are too expensive?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

You make it sound way too binary. Are you saying that Qantas is failing to sell those empty seats even as award tickets because those awards are too expensive?

no, I'm saying there doesn't 'need' to be any correlation between a decrease in $$ and an increase in points required for an award (as per post #112)

the seat is an empty seat, so they assign it for award purposes. They could maintain the same number of points, and reduce the charges for it, and still be profitable (just as other airlines remain profitable now without adding excessive charges to their award seats)

 

[trixydoza]

OK, thanks, I understand your point, but I don't agree.

You say it's an empty seat, I say it's just another way for Qantas to make money. The "empty" thing isn't written in stone anywhere, it's quite possible that the pricing of awards is just part of the whole spectrum of pricing and yield management. You're really just asking them to keep offering the same number of awards but make them cheaper, right?

 

[esseeeayeenn]

Award seats are not non-revenue seats.
Points are a liability. Selling an award seat removes that liability from the balance sheet.
If the liability is carried by a separate company even better - money actually flows to the airline.

I don't think anyone is expecting award seats to become cheaper in both points and cash.
They're just asking to be able to book a flight by redeeming points without a significant cash outlay.
I wouldn't mind if QF whacked a few points on to the "cost" to make it worthwhile.
Just as I prefer* to spend 73,000 points and $80 for a seat on CX rather than 58,000 points and $300 for a seat on MH (BKK/HKT-HKG/KUL-PER).

*OK my preference might be swayed by the lounges in HKG.

 

[medhead]

Classic awards do allow you to pay the taxes with points.

Points + pay fares do come from revenue fares. You select a revenue fare and then choose to pay with P+P.