Qantas surveying members about spend-based status attainment

[serfty]

QFF. It hasn’t followed VA before. Why start now?

Of course Qantas have.

They copied Velocity's 750 and 1500 mile zones, up from 600, 1200 etc.

 

[Supersonic Swinger]

So? Why would QF want to follow VA? QF is the market leader, and while QF and VA compete as airlines, I don’t think Velocity even holds a candle to QFF. It hasn’t followed VA before. Why start now? As the saying goes, never interrupt your opponent while they’re making a mistake. VAs changes achieve specific outcomes for VA the airline but overall it reduces value in Velocity. Quite the opposite of what QF would be seeking to do.



It’s been about a week and you’re calling it? Everything I’ve seen and read has been intensively negative, with large majorities saying they will either leave BA entirely or accept a status downgrade. Even BA wouldn’t know the outcome yet - neither would VA for that matter.



Do you actually understand how much QF (and similar companies) research such things? Happens all the time, doesn’t mean they’re going to happen.

What seems like a mistake to individual flyers doesn't when an airline is looking at the program overall. I have seen a lot of paywalled analysis from the likes of EIU, CAPA and the big strategy consulting firms which show that this is an industry trend which is not going away. Even from this Forbes article (Loyalty Program Trends In 2024: What To Expect And Watch For) one of the trends they call out is:

"Revenue-Based Earning
Many airlines and hotels have recently made changes to better align their loyalty programs with their corporate mandates to turn a profit. In the past, the majority of airlines focused on the number of miles you’d flown in a given year and hotels focused on the number of nights you’ve stayed. But now the more popular metric is the revenue you’re bringing to the company... Expect the trend of linking the amount of money spent to the rewards and status earned to continue throughout this year and beyond."

I'm not calling the BA changes. When DL announced their revenue based earning model, the fallout was such that they watered down some of the criteria to what is in place now, and that has been operating that way for over a year now. BA might reduce some of their thresholds they have announced, but much like when Finnair went revenue based with Avios last year, they will retain the revenue based concept.

Sadly the days of the Loyalty division operating independently of Revenue Management are behind us. When QF has worked out the 'enhancements' they can make to best drive revenue, I have no doubt they will roll them out, dressed up in the appropriate PR spin.

 

[Himeno]

Sadly the days of the Loyalty division operating independently of Revenue Management are behind us. When QF has worked out the 'enhancements' they can make to best drive revenue, I have no doubt they will roll them out, dressed up in the appropriate PR spin.

Then they can be shocked by the amount of people who will no longer interact with the program.

 

[drron]

Most of the people who are members of QFF are not OWE or even OWS unlike the people complaining of these changes. Just look at the profiles of those complaining in this thread. Then the links to travel bloggers who quite probably have more to lose. Every one singing from their own songbook.
As a NB who can’t access the awards he wants I think it might level the playing field a little so I might have a chance of getting awards I actually want not what the privileged think that I should be happy with.
A revenue based system is coming like it or not. It might take some time but it will occur.

 

[justinbrett]

What seems like a mistake to individual flyers doesn't when an airline is looking at the program overall. I have seen a lot of paywalled analysis from the likes of EIU, CAPA and the big strategy consulting firms which show that this is an industry trend which is not going away. Even from this Forbes article (Loyalty Program Trends In 2024: What To Expect And Watch For) one of the trends they call out is:

"Revenue-Based Earning
Many airlines and hotels have recently made changes to better align their loyalty programs with their corporate mandates to turn a profit. In the past, the majority of airlines focused on the number of miles you’d flown in a given year and hotels focused on the number of nights you’ve stayed. But now the more popular metric is the revenue you’re bringing to the company... Expect the trend of linking the amount of money spent to the rewards and status earned to continue throughout this year and beyond."

I'm not calling the BA changes. When DL announced their revenue based earning model, the fallout was such that they watered down some of the criteria to what is in place now, and that has been operating that way for over a year now. BA might reduce some of their thresholds they have announced, but much like when Finnair went revenue based with Avios last year, they will retain the revenue based concept.

Sadly the days of the Loyalty division operating independently of Revenue Management are behind us. When QF has worked out the 'enhancements' they can make to best drive revenue, I have no doubt they will roll them out, dressed up in the appropriate PR spin.

Just going around in circles now. QFF is already structured to entice spend, even if it isn’t strictly linked directly to revenue. It’s arguably better as it allows QF to fine tune status to specific routes and cabins. Someone spending 2K on return discount economy flights to LAX is making the company far less money than someone spending 2K on return business class between SYD-MEL. There is a loophole with some partner earning (eg AA domestic F) but that’s easily fixed. I actually think a blunt revenue system would be a step backwards for QF. Further enhancements to squeeze more profit? Sure. Following the pack and going to a flat revenue (not profit) model? I don’t think so.

Most of the people who are members of QFF are not OWE or even OWS unlike the people complaining of these changes. Just look at the profiles of those complaining in this thread. Then the links to travel bloggers who quite probably have more to lose. Every one singing from their own songbook.
As a NB who can’t access the awards he wants I think it might level the playing field a little so I might have a chance of getting awards I actually want not what the privileged think that I should be happy with.
A revenue based system is coming like it or not. It might take some time but it will occur.

That’s just confusing the issue. For one, revenue based status isn’t going to help your reward availability at all. Fully dynamic rewards might but that’s not what’s being discussed. A lot of people are earning points through ground programs (eg credit cards) which is causing an oversupply of points but that’s has nothing to do with status.

By total membership elites are a small minority of the QFF program, but in terms of pax it’s quite high (I believe VH quoted 30% of pax are elites). For pax who use the program for ground spend and don’t fly often, that’s why they created Points Club. Possibly they could merge it into the main program but again they would lose a lot of the highly specific levers they have by dumbing down the program.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

That’s just confusing the issue. For one, revenue based status isn’t going to help your reward availability at all.

I don’t think it’s an absolute ‘not at all’.

Elites get earlier access to awards. Halve the numbers and it might leave better availability for lower levels.

Platinums also have the ability to request revenue seats be converted to awards. Reduce that and it leaves seats which can be either sold cheaper to the public, or which will later be available for awards, or upgrades, to lower level members.

With BA I understand top elites could change or cancel awards for free. Reduce those numbers and the pool of speculative award bookings may reduce, freeing up seats for others.

 

[justinbrett]

I don’t think it’s an absolute ‘not at all’.

Elites get earlier access to awards. Halve the numbers and it might leave better availability for lower levels.

Platinums also have the ability to request revenue seats be converted to awards. Reduce that and it leaves seats which can be either sold cheaper to the public, or which will later be available for awards, or upgrades, to lower level members.

With BA I understand top elites could change or cancel awards for free. Reduce those numbers and the pool of speculative award bookings may reduce, freeing up seats for others.

Well I think most of that is based on the old procedures, since now the good seats are not routinely released as they once were, and are now done in batches at various times.

The WP release - marginal benefit and no guarantee that’s sticking around anyway, it’s already been curtailed quite a bit. Either way they’re not coming at the expense of lower tier members.

P1 is a different story but those P1 members will likely retain status under any new system, so it doesn’t really change there either.

Again, if QF wanted to reduce the number of elites it wouldn’t be running two DSC promos a year. Clearly it’s quite happy with the number of elites.

 

[RooFlyer]

I assume that’s at least four.

Yes, in total, but I was referring to just including one or two QF flights in the around the world I was discussing.

 

[scottz95]

Throwing a view out there for a consideration Qantas would need to make. Given how QFF is often seen as a moat for protecting Government travel revenue from moving to VA, moving to a purely revenue based program may harm this lucrative revenue stream for the airline. As many would guess, AusGovt fares with Qantas are generally cheaper than published fares so if QF were to adopt a fully revenue based model, it would become dramatically harder for Government employees to earn/retain status and may start to move spending away from Qantas overall.

A similar arguement could be said about corporate travel deals. Many are now aligned to BFOD and have set +/- dollar limits on alternative options (e.g. a very large mining entity allows $150 +/- on international J fares so staff can go non-preferred airline or routing within $150 of BFOD). If QFF makes it too hard to earn status, and they aren’t the actual cheapest fare, there’s a good chance business travellers will start looking at other factors to determine who to spend with (e.g. Timing, Onboard Product, etc), of which is very subjective to the individual.

Given the program is already loosely profitability based (e.g. less for discounted tickets, more for full fare or higher cabins), which has arguably been Qantas’ focus for a number of years now, they may not want to play with this too much.

However, I could definitely see an uptick in the required flights on QF metal to earn status at all tiers taking effect to rule out cheap partner tickets as a practical way to earn status e.g. AA J fares in the US can have really good earns for relatively cheap prices. Such a change would benefit Qantas more as it converts more revenue into their pockets, rather than revenue that might’ve been otherwise sent to competing airlines and in turn, uplift revenue and likely profits from elite pax.