Qantas introducing Travel Fund

[kevrosmith]

Qantas has announced a Travel Fund for Business Reward accounts. Similar to VA's Travel Bank, seems you can cancel fares to the Travel Fund and then have flexibility to use those funds at a later time in a flexible manner, without the previous PNR re-book restrictions.



It will be interesting to see if this is rolled out more broadly to retail customers of Qantas.

 

[SYD]

I actually think thought it worked this way already…

RE regular retail flyers, I “Travel Bank” like VA could suit some but maintaining vouchers has its use in some circumstances. Many here wouldn’t like that enhanced away.

 

[kimsd]

I was able to use this today when I needed to cancel a ticket. The funds were then immediately available for a new booking. It was all smooth sailing until I proceeded to the confirmation screens and payment. In two different browsers, it kept erroring out, which was really frustrating. In the end, it worked in Safari. If it wasn't for the errors, it would have been quite seamless.

 

[elanshin]

I was able to use this today when I needed to cancel a ticket. The funds were then immediately available for a new booking. It was all smooth sailing until I proceeded to the confirmation screens and payment. In two different browsers, it kept erroring out, which was really frustrating. In the end, it worked in Safari. If it wasn't for the errors, it would have been quite seamless.

I assume this is more for flex fares? I would imagine the normal cancellation policies still apply so the amount you get back is determined by the ticket type right?

 

[kimsd]

Correct regarding normal cancellation policies. The ticket I cancelled was an international sale fare, so it ended up being the $225 cancellation fee and the remaining balance went into the travel fund. The new ticket I purchased happened to be part of the latest sale, on the same route with slightly different dates and a new name assigned, and it ended up being cheaper than the cancelled ticket.