Upcoming Qantas Frequent Flyer Changes

[Awesom Andy]

Going back a couple of pages... I was in row 23 on a dom 767 as a QPPS last month, so I doubt your fears (as a WP) would materialise.

 

[AnonymousCoward]

That means we could manufacture a WP1 for about 500k to 600k points range if we are not too fussy about some of those towns.

I'm going to hazard a guess that WP1 membership will be at QF's discretion. They will want to give it to people who have earned a lot of SCs on QF metal, and have spent a lot of money with QF. Just a hunch I have.

 

[markis10]

I'm going to hazard a guess that WP1 membership will be at QF's discretion. They will want to give it to people who have earned a lot of SCs on QF metal, and have spent a lot of money with QF. Just a hunch I have.

Its a poor guess given QF have announced the qual is 3600 SCs

We'll soon introduce extra benefits for members who earn over 3,600 Status credits within their membership year, including a dedicated team to look after your travel needs every step of the way.

Frequent Flyer - Member Specials - Latest News

 

[AnonymousCoward]

Its a poor guess given QF have announced the qual is 3600 SCs



Frequent Flyer - Member Specials - Latest News

That doesn't mean that there is no other qualification criteria. Red Roo has stated a number of times that they are still working out the details, hasn't (s)he?

 

[markis10]

That doesn't mean that there is no other qualification criteria. Red Roo has stated a number of times that they are still working out the details, hasn't (s)he?

Working out the details of what you get, not how to get it AFAIK.

 

[oz_mark]

I'm going to hazard a guess that WP1 membership will be at QF's discretion. They will want to give it to people who have earned a lot of SCs on QF metal, and have spent a lot of money with QF. Just a hunch I have.

My undesrtanding is that it is more or less a non-formalised status now. It seems they will be formalising the requirements. Until we see the actual number, anything else is guesswork.

As for the QFSC requirements, IIRC this was hinted at in one of the past discussions.

 

[jaffa]

Ok, Whilst my status is only gold and l am no expert, l do have some thoughts.

I believe these changes are a pre-emptive shot to deal with the new Virgin Australia, rebranding, partnerships, business and full service, lounge and service changes. These new Qf changes are to sure-up and reduce the possible moving across of QF's biggest repeat cash flow customers ie Silver and gold.
Whilst WP may be more frequent flyers, as a bucket their cash flow pot would not be as big as gold, silver combined due to there lesser numbers.

However l also believe that there will be advantage changes still to come for WP's. But QF will now hold out until they see the re-action and announcement of Virgins new Velocity programe and changes to come later in the year.

I have been told that Virgin intends to run a solid top teir status match aimed at their new proposed business/corporate market. I would hazard a guess that QF suspects that this on the agenda and is holding out on final announcements for an updated standard WP and will re-act to it when Virgin lays out it's new/updated programe aimed at QF's best customers.

I believe that these QF announced changes are designed to make it expensive for Virgin to match.

I also believe we would not have any QF changes to the programe if it were not for Virgins move to hit the Corp/business market.

I do see changes in the future for WP's, but QF is holding an ACE card up it's sleeve, in reserve.

WP's should not give up hope and drop to gold or to change programes just yet, I have a feeling if you do, you are going to kick yourself at a later stage.
I think QF are just being very cunning here.

I think this is all a very clever game of cat and mouse at the moment.
QF is trying to out think one of their ex-owns and they know and fear he is very good at what he does.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I believe that these QF announced changes are designed to make it expensive for Virgin to match.

That's an excellent point.

And waiting to finalise WP1 status presumably allows QF time to see what Virgin will offer...

 

[serfty]

I believe the WP One is to have a membership limit - perhaps a hard number such as "Top 10,000" or something.

Maybe that level was around 3,600 at the time of the announcement.

 

[Archphoto]

3,200 SCs in Y in 1 year? Is this even possible without going insane? That's 27 round trips SYD/MEL-SIN/HKG in full fare Y per year.

Trust me, by the end of the year, you literally look like hell, and have a hard time remembering what your hotel room number is.

Have even walked to my walk-in robe a couple of times thinking it was the bathroom when I had a chance to sleep at my home address!

And on more than one occasion I quoted the hotel room number from the week before, when I had to replace one left in my current hotel room.

Plus, I was very tempted to put 747 as my address on the numerous immigration cards I had to fill in. . . . . . :mrgreen:

 

[connieguy]

3,200 SCs in Y in 1 year? Is this even possible without going insane? That's 27 round trips SYD/MEL-SIN/HKG in full fare Y per year.

I have customers in the London, Amsterdam, Milan, Bulgaria, Greece, Canada, US, Mexico South America, India, Thailand and elsewhere. Last year I was home, on average, 4 - 5 days a month. I buy mostly one way tickets and most of the time for flights that day to tomorrow. ~60% was with OW and ~40% was with non OW carriers. Not a low cost way to fly even in -Y.

BTW I do like the Malaysian 34 inch seat pitch. For me at 1.9 mtrs tall, the 3 inches of extra knee room, over the QF 31 inch seat pitch, is very welcome.

 

[dfcatch]

But you can draw this analogy either way.
Say you run a bakery... Do you provide your xmas bottle of wine to the customer who comes in every week to buy a single bread role on which you make hardly any margin, or to the customer who comes in every couple of months buying the chocolate cake on which you make a lot of margin

But we're talking about the original point which related to 2 people sitting in the F lounge - one is an F pax (who may or may not have status), and the other is a WP (earned status which may have been from whichever cabin). The comment inferred that the WP had no right to be in the F lounge if not flying F

Based on that information - your chocolate cake purchaser may be a once off.

In your example - of course you would look after both. Just as QF should look after both types of WP - and of course - they do.

Varying rates of SC earn are structured to cater for the different earning styles of FF's. Once at the status level though - they are treated the same.***


Now if the F flyer really is flying F more than once (ie. regularly), then no doubt they are either already CL, or will be a candidate for WP1.

The whole point of a loyalty program and its benefits is to encourage people to fly as often as possible and to get them to spend as much as possible in the process, whilst avoiding them trying out your competitor.

*** Yes Serfty I'm over-simplifying the PCV aspect, but my point stands in the general sense

 

[Oneworldplus2]

I believe these changes are a pre-emptive shot to deal with the new Virgin Australia, rebranding, partnerships, business and full service, lounge and service changes. These new Qf changes are to sure-up and reduce the possible moving across of QF's biggest repeat cash flow customers ie Silver and gold.


However l also believe that there will be advantage changes still to come for WP's. But QF will now hold out until they see the re-action and announcement of Virgins new Velocity programe and changes to come later in the year.

I also believe we would not have any QF changes to the programe if it were not for Virgins move to hit the Corp/business market.

I do see changes in the future for WP's, but QF is holding an ACE card up it's sleeve, in reserve.

Yep, this is exactly my view.

 

[awilcockson]

Working out the details of what you get, not how to get it AFAIK.

My undesrtanding is that it is more or less a non-formalised status now. It seems they will be formalising the requirements. Until we see the actual number, anything else is guesswork.

As for the QFSC requirements, IIRC this was hinted at in one of the past discussions.

And yet the original announcement only mentioned the 3600 SC qualification requirement, but a post quite a bit later from Red Roo stated in no uncertain terms that there would be a QF metal SC requirements as well, but that the amount was still being decided. The fact that they've alread given this out to 3 select individuals, and the wording "additional benefits for our most frequent flyers from 3600 status credits and beyond." leads my cynical side to believe that there is enough wiggle room in that for it be invitation only, not automatic entry.

 

[Robert K]

I could flip your argument around as say that as a 1200SC/year loyal customer, I don't want my F lounge taken up by your once-a-year F flyer who maybe a rich snob/academic elite flying on the university's dime/corporate flyer on the shareholders' dime.

You don't want people that pay for their F ticket to be able to use the F lounge coZ you think only people
That fly a lot deserve to use it?

Last time I checked it was called the F lounge and not the 'I'm so good I fly a lot' lounge

 

[oz_mark]

You don't want people that pay for their F ticket to be able to use the F lounge coZ you think only people
That fly a lot deserve to use it?

Last time I checked it was called the F lounge and not the 'I'm so good I fly a lot' lounge

While I recognise it is call the First Lounge, I think the fact they built it as big as they did is an indication that it was conceived of as a lounge catering for more than for just F passengers.

 

[Robert K]

Having lots of space is conceived as luxury.

Unlike J lounges which pack you in like sardines.

 

[dfcatch]

You don't want people that pay for their F ticket to be able to use the F lounge coZ you think only people
That fly a lot deserve to use it?

Last time I checked it was called the F lounge and not the 'I'm so good I fly a lot' lounge

You need to read the comment in the context of the one it was replying to.

However if the lounge was only built for F pax it would be a lot smaller.

Regardless of your view on space=luxury.... It would be smaller nonetheless.

F pax have access to the lounge, and WPs have access to the lounge. (in fact F pax have preferential access including spa bookings).

I have no problem with both groups being given access. I was simply playing devil's advocate with the original comment which suggested WPs shouldn't be in the F lounge.

 

[Robert K]

You're very good at it

 

[dfcatch]

You're very good at it

Haha thanks