Qantas frequent flyers unleash over ‘almost worthless points’ in submissions to Senate

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Of course all this will have to wait now until I am off leukaemia imposed isolation and travel ban. Who knows when that will be 🤷‍♀️

Off topic but unapologetically to continue to wish you all the best. My father defied some horrific odds to beat a gnarly cancer last year and said that forced isolation at the end was as excruciating as it was "skull-numbingly dull". Here's to you being back in J in the skies soon yourself! 🍻
 
that forced isolation at the end was as excruciating as it was "skull-numbingly dull"
Thanks for your kind wishes @FlyingKangaroo . And boy your father is right. So far I have completed 3 weeks of isolation - and they expect I will need at least 8 weeks in total and most likely 12 weeks. I have all the time in the world now to comment of AFF! It's helping me to believe that there is light at the end of the tunnel and perhaps its the PAPI lights at an airport!!
 
QF points are useful if you have status, much less so if you do not. Being able to use points to position to Asia (eg SIN) and then book revenue fares to EU/UK has saved us about $6K for our upcoming trip. By having 1 leg opened up as WP (the other was a classic reward) and we even used points for the Crowne Plaza at the airport to put some space between the reward and revenue flights.
Agree in full - status enables Classic Rewards to be secured where it would otherwise be very difficult. And that’s one of the reasons we are all doing this!

I did the same thing this year - points return to SIN, revenue fare SIN to Italy return. Saved $6-7k thanks to the tips in the AFF podcast on getting cheap business class to Europe
 
Well @drron we decided to take a trip with AA from SYD to LAX using up some of those AA Miles. My favourite youngest son suggested that we try first class longhaul this time. We did enjoy their business class pre covid.
There won’t be any Krug but I can cope with that.
I think that I will pay our California property tax on my AA credit card this year.
 
Everyone has their own perspectives based upon their situation and their needs and wants. No one size fits all.

As has been pointed out earlier, it's very different for a high status solo passenger to request and (mostly) get what they want vs a couple at mid tier, a family with no status and everything in between.. and then some cases nobody would imagine :)

That's why I try to avoid generalisations and blanket statements - specially based on my own experiences because that's going to be wildly misleading to some and not reflect the experience of the majority of punters. Sure, I've been very successful in getting J and F seats released to do trips I want to do. I'm very lucky that I have a) the status and b) the flexibility (in some ways) to do this. So if I went out and said "Hey points aren't worthless! You can get most places reasonably easily" - then I should be cut down in size a bit for such a statement.

I know, for example, as a Solo P1, I probably have one of the best opportunities to secure what I want when looking for just me. Even a P1 couple will have that much harder time to secure 2 (or more) seats. Yes, it's been done (as @Matt_01 and others can attest to) but it's that much harder.

If I have low or no status and are looking for a couple of seats (let alone more) on popular routes and popular times, then sure my chances are probably slim without a lot of planning (ie to grab 330 days out, or get lucky in a release) or.

Then again, there's those who can use points effectively for even Y travel on highly expensive routes (LDH comes to mind, or some regional routes) and that can provide value that may not be otherwise apparent.

And while I don't accrue points with AA, As or other OW carriers to use like some do, I do with UA an have mixtures of success and frustration over on that side. In many ways this is why being able to mix and match programs / partners / alliances can be the best of both worlds. Consider mid tier with QF and VA potentially has greater opportunities to build reward trips with mixed redemptions across carrier groups - eg: say SQ one way, and QF back.

Again though, that's a subset of members who have the kind of travel and earn ability to be in this sort of situation - and that's hardly the majority of folks.

So again, so many situations are different.

I do think part of the problem - in general as opposed to QFF in particular - is perhaps related to expectation - and this has been driven by the marketing of all of the loyalty programs so much that you can't blame people. Marketing is aspirational - and when it comes to this kind of thing of course it's "You too can fly Business class to London!" and that kind of thing, when the reality is often much less attainable than they would have us believe.

I remember when AAdvantage started, and all the rest that followed - the idea back then being to simply "give away" unused seats that would fly empty as a reward for some loyalty - a win/win and very simple and well understood. heading to 50 years on, things have evolved to so much more than the original idea is subsumed by the revenue based, broad based ecosystems of spending and "reward" all designed (like huge shopping centres everywhere) to keep us in as long as possible and to extract as much from us during the process - and make us feel good about it at the same time.

The other thing to remember is that, QFF for example, has >12m members - maybe more now. Certainly around half the population of Australia (and yes, I know there are, of course, non resident members). That's a HUGE number. Even if we take say 5% as a tiny number of "active" members trying to find and redeem award seats, that's over half a million.. for how many total seats accross the network? Put in those terms, and given QFF want to actually SELL the seats above all else, it really is hard just with the competition of demand. That's totally a made up figure of 5% of course, but even still.. and I've not accounted for partner FF program requests and so on.

In no way am I defending anyone here. I try to be a bit of a pragmatist / realist when it comes to things like this though. Sure, QFF can do more - to elease more seats on popular routes, to provide a better interface that isn't so deliberately skewing people AWAY from CR's unless you know what you're doing (and of course an actually functional one for partners and all the rest that works more often than it fails!) - but there is a fundamental issue that demand for reward seats will ALWAYs outstrip supply. It's a simple numbers game. Is it hopeless? no... this forum is full of strategies, hints and ideas on ways to make things work, or increase the odds - but again it comes back to expectations.

"value" of the program is very much in the eye of each beholder imo - it's what you CAN get out of it in relation to what you WANT that will, in general, govern that value judgement - and that's totally reasonable.
 
What has the FFP got to do with bilateral agreements? Whether Australia has bilateral agreements with other nations for airport access has zero relationship to Qantas' nor any other airlines FF scheme.

Well, do you see any Qatar reward flights on offer?

Goes part of the way to explain why.
 
In the past year we redeemed over 1m points which definitely took some effort and flexibility on our part. I assume most of these complaints are from people who either do not put the time in to find reward flights and / or are expecting there to be plenty of availability for in demand routes.
We too have redeemed a similar number of points over the same period, but I will say that the amount of effort required to find CR flight rewards is much greater now than it was a year ago, and infinitely greater now than pre-COVID.

You have to be prepared to fly for longer to get to your destination, and via less popular destinations. I compare what I've done over the last couple of weeks to get our current reward to a person walking through a field turning over rocks looking for a rare gem. Hard work, but it can make the difference between getting there and not!
 
Well, do you see any Qatar reward flights on offer?

Goes part of the way to explain why.
As has already been covered multiple times, QR withholding awards has naught to do with flight numbers, its all part of their tantrum because QF partners with EK.
 
I think I understand why Qantas is defaulting to showing ‘revenue points’ seats when no classic award seats are available. That probably includes showing people ways to use points (even if bad options) and to reduce Qantas liabilities.

What the award search engine should do (for the single date search) is default to classic awards only but display an option at the top of the result display ‘More flights are available using points to purchase revenue seats. Select here to display’.

That way people understand that the high point cost seats aren’t award seats but you are purchasing non award seats. It also is better for transparency of how many award seats (and lack of) that there are.

Qantas could make it easier on themselves and their reputation by setting minimum standards for award seats for domestic and international flights by plane type (maybe with blackout periods).

For example:
Minimum awards seat chart
International
B737 6 Economy seats / 1 Business seat
A380 10 Economy seats / 2 Business seats / 1 First
Etc

Qantas could also put a message against the revenue point options stating ‘All award seats (8) redeemed. Revenue point seats available’

A lot of people believe there were never award seats (which does happen) when they can’t find seats a few month out from flying but there might have been a lot of award seats.

Transparency might help a little with QF’s reputation.

It could also hurt QF if it becomes obvious how few (or if no award seats were ever available) but at least people will be dealing with facts not speculation like now.

To do the above you would need some technology changes (should be easy) and culture change ie transparency (which is probably biggest hurdle).
 
I think I understand why Qantas is defaulting to showing ‘revenue points’ seats when no classic award seats are available. That probably includes showing people ways to use points (even if bad options) and to reduce Qantas liabilities.

What the award search engine should do (for the single date search) is default to classic awards only but display an option at the top of the result display ‘More flights are available using points to purchase revenue seats. Select here to display’.

That way people understand that the high point cost seats aren’t award seats but you are purchasing non award seats. It also is better for transparency of how many award seats (and lack of) that there are.

Qantas could make it easier on themselves and their reputation by setting minimum standards for award seats for domestic and international flights by plane type (maybe with blackout periods).

For example:
Minimum awards seat chart
International
B737 6 Economy seats / 1 Business seat
A380 10 Economy seats / 2 Business seats / 1 First
Etc

Qantas could also put a message against the revenue point options stating ‘All award seats (8) redeemed. Revenue point seats available’

A lot of people believe there were never award seats (which does happen) when they can’t find seats a few month out from flying but there might have been a lot of award seats.

Transparency might help a little with QF’s reputation.

It could also hurt QF if it becomes obvious how few (or if no award seats were ever available) but at least people will be dealing with facts not speculation like now.

To do the above you would need some technology changes (should be easy) and culture change ie transparency (which is probably biggest hurdle).
Exactly! I remember the good old days of waiting until t-360 (whatever it was) and jumping on the award flights for SCL. I just had a look, there is literally nothing in Y for the whole next year BNE-SYD-SCL, not even SYD-SCL. There are a few LATAM award seats but QF doesn't even give seats on its own metal to its own members. At least release 6 Y and 2 J or something, first come first served.
 
Transparency might help a little with QF’s reputation.
At least release 6 Y and 2 J or something, first come first served.
I say again: Get rid of award seats

And again Put a $ value on each FF point
The FF point is the redeemed against $$ which is then used to buy revenue tickets
Then there is no need for award seats

Your Status credits balance can be used as a weighting mechanism. Higher SC balance increases the dollar value of FF point.
 
As has already been covered multiple times, QR withholding awards has naught to do with flight numbers, its all part of their tantrum because QF partners with EK.

Isn't it because Qantas actively lobbied for their additional flights to be blocked? EK partnership has been there for a long time. It's only relatively recently that QR dropped reward seat availability.
 
I say again: Get rid of award seats

And again Put a $ value on each FF point
The FF point is the redeemed against $$ which is then used to buy revenue tickets
Then there is no need for award seats

Your Status credits balance can be used as a weighting mechanism. Higher SC balance increases the dollar value of FF point.

And I say again, this already exists and people here tend not to use it because it is extremely poor value.
 
I say again: Get rid of award seats

And again Put a $ value on each FF point
The FF point is the redeemed against $$ which is then used to buy revenue tickets
Then there is no need for award seats

Your Status credits balance can be used as a weighting mechanism. Higher SC balance increases the dollar value of FF point.
Huh?

Find me a single program that has moved to revenue based earning/burning that has worked in favour of the customer.
 
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LOL @ 540k points yet "price nearly gone"

(Obviously it just aligns with the cash saver fare almost being gone but still: hi-lar-i-ous. Act fast to secure this bargain, folks!)

Yes, let's definitely roll this out as the only option across the board.
 
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