Upcoming Qantas Frequent Flyer Changes

[oz_mark]

Hope this helps - food for thought. I guess this way of calculating rewards people who fly regularly and thus keep their SCs topped up, rather than those who do the one big trip with max points earned.

Not sure which of the two systems I would prefer Qantas to use but I think that the Virgin system is better for the airlines... what do you think?

Actually, according to Velocity they did a fair bit of modelling on this, comparing those that make status on fixed dates, versus those that make it on a rolling calendar. Not surprisingly, more people make status on the rolling calendar than on the fixed dates (We on AFF see this as the number of times this sort of things come up on threads - e.g. can I change my anniversary date etc)

Of course, it does mean that your quest for renewal starts on the date you get up to the new status, rather than from your next membership anniversary!

So, it does mean more people will get to status - but the renewal changes means that you may go down quicker as well (although I didn't ask about this point):shock:

 

[angusburns]

Found this on the bottom of the page - looks like once you crack the next level you keep it for 12 months before they look at you again, ie you do not fall back a level the day that your older SCs move out of the twelve month window and take you below the threshold. The renewal threshold is also reduced from 250 to 200 (Silver) and 500 to 400 (Gold)


"Maintaining your level of membership - Once you upgrade to a higher level of membership, you will have 12 months from the day of your upgrade to earn the required number of Status Credits to maintain your level of membership."

So I read that to mean that that you qualify and then get 12 months at that level from that date with Velocity, whereas with Qantas you qualify and then get the rest of the time until your anniversary date and then the next twelve months at that status before they review you.

Looks like the Velocity method makes it easier to obtain a status level as any 12 month period will qualify but Qantas method is better if you qualify early in your year as you would get two years v one with Velocity (as a prior poster pointed out a couple back). Which makes sense as Virgin is trying to get more frequent fliers on their planes.

 

[samiam]

Did anyone else notice in the June inflight magazine that QF promote the recent benefit improvements for SG & PS, amongst other things. Maybe I have a blind spot, but I saw no mention of an uber Platinum One level- has this gone cold, or is it just pending the DJ Platinum announcement?

The spiel is a few pages in.

 

[Jobu]

Did anyone else notice in the June inflight magazine that QF promote the recent benefit improvements for SG & PS, amongst other things. Maybe I have a blind spot, but I saw no mention of an uber Platinum One level- has this gone cold, or is it just pending the DJ Platinum announcement?

The spiel is a few pages in.

Yes I noticed too. Been waiting for any information to be released on P1...

 

[chessen]

Hi All,
this is my first post, so please excuse any political errors.
Has anyone noticed the dramatic increase in tax when using points?
my latest booking with qantas frequent flyer award bookings has the tax from Narita to Brisbane at $360, instead of the usual $120-$150!!
Yet when i checked the price from LAX to NRT it was only $5?? Maybe the $5 was an error but how can they increase the tax by $200 nrt bne.
Anyone have any thouhts on the above?

chessen

 

[dajop]

my latest booking with qantas frequent flyer award bookings has the tax from Narita to Brisbane at $360, instead of the usual $120-$150!!
Yet when i checked the price from LAX to NRT it was only $5?? Maybe the $5 was an error but how can they increase the tax by $200 nrt bne.
Anyone have any thouhts on the above?

chessen

Hi welcome to AFF. This perhaps is not the right place to discuss these (moderators move?) but I will anyway.

Firstly, these are not all taxes, the majority of what you pay is fuel surcharges, which have increased a lot with recent increases in the oil price.

Also they vary depending on the carrier, usually you find American carriers (or tickets in originating in the US) do not have fuel surcharges, that explains the low cost of the taxes and surcharges LAX-NRT.

Lastly, QF charge different surcharges for tickets not issued in Australia. It is worth calling, paying the phone booking fee and asking that they ticket your flight in Australia, using an Australian credit card, that, despite the booking fee should save you some money (that's if they let you, sometimes they won't). In your example (just using commercial fares), a one way BNE-NRT (via SYD) has $229 AUD in taxes. A return BNE-NRT-BNE (via SYD in both directions) has $437 AUD in taxes, from these we deduce the NRT-BNE sectors have a total of $208 in taxes/surcharges. BUT, just purchase a one way fare NRT-BNE it the taxes/surcharges come to 30,480 JPY which equates to $348 (and add on the extra 3% or so for credit card foreign currency fees, and you're looking at around the $360 you mention)

 

[bsymons]

And my conundrum continues awaiting P1 announcement...

I am tossing up putting a round trip (HON/DFW/NYC/ORD/SEA/FAI/ANC/HON) on my AA membership as it will get me to Platinum and be worth 100,000+ bonus pts per year (which will then get me to EP the next year)

This will cost me approx 10,000 points on Q and 630 SC's. The status credits would put me within striking distance of P1 prior to my march 12 end of year...

So what is P1 really going to be worth???

 

[TonyHancock]

This will cost me approx 10,000 points on Q and 630 SC's. The status credits would put me within striking distance of P1 prior to my march 12 end of year...

So what is P1 really going to be worth???

I'm in the same boat, I already have 3600+ SC's of travel booked for this membership year. (It started 1st Aug) If the benefits are access to a QF travel organiser and an SMS advising me if my upgrade request has been approved I'll be a little disappointed!!!

 

[fjc]

My gripe is with Bronze members.

You have to pay to join (or free through Woolworths) however for us bronze members the chances of reaching silver within a membership year is slim.

Welcome to AFF willjd.

Sorry, but I disagree with your statement. Although living in Western NSW, and only able to travel during school holidays, I was able to make silver using some of the suggestions that come up from time to time in this group. Since retiring, I've now made gold, again using the suggestions in this group. Now doing my planning to maintain gold in 2012.

Keep reading and watching!!

 

[MatF]

My gripe is with Bronze members.

You have to pay to join (or free through Woolworths) however for us bronze members the chances of reaching silver within a membership year is slim. Qantas say that they have 8 million members or whatever but how many of them are lowly Bronze members and what changes have they made for us? Say within a year we fly to the UK twice the status credits and points earned are minimal. How about making the membership year for Bronze members 18 months or even 2 years? At least give us something to aim for?
Also as others have said, the redemption rates are awful, for an upgrade or even award flights are out of reach of a large % of the 8 million members.

We were all bonze at some point (however briefly )

 

[jamesatfish]

And my conundrum continues awaiting P1 announcement...

I am tossing up putting a round trip (HON/DFW/NYC/ORD/SEA/FAI/ANC/HON) on my AA membership as it will get me to Platinum and be worth 100,000+ bonus pts per year (which will then get me to EP the next year)

This will cost me approx 10,000 points on Q and 630 SC's. The status credits would put me within striking distance of P1 prior to my march 12 end of year...

So what is P1 really going to be worth???

I really wish we had an answer to the P1 question also. My year expires on 30 September, and I've requalified for Partner Gold so no huge incentive right now to book further flights with QF other than the as-yet undefined benefits of P1. I've got another trip to the US coming up before my year expires, and with another ACIR22 fare the 3600 SC threshold to reach P1 is easily achievable.

On the other hand I've got a classic award booking in place in F for my wife and I to get to the US for that trip, and internal flights within the US booked with AA to be credited to my AAdvantge account. If the P1 benefits and qualification requirements had been announced, and assuming of course it's a worthwhile offering, I'd have no hesitation cancelling the classic award and AA bookings and instead pushing $25K+ of bookings back to QF for the same trip.

I'm not sure who is winning this game of QF holding back details on the P1 offering.

 

[cove]

With 25,000 dollars I would convert that into at least 5 million frequent flyer points to travel at the pointy end!

 

[Jasecoop]

When are qantas meant to release the details?
Luckily I'm only 2 months into my year but already well past renewing plat and on the way to partner again. Should crack 5000sc again but wish I was home more

 

[jamesatfish]

With 25,000 dollars I would convert that into at least 5 million frequent flyer points to travel at the pointy end!

Not far off...

 

[dfcatch]

When are qantas meant to release the details?
Luckily I'm only 2 months into my year but already well past renewing plat and on the way to partner again. Should crack 5000sc again but wish I was home more

I might need some help in my new membership starting october - i'll do some travel for you

 

[cove]

It is quite ineresting that I could get to LHR on SQ for 180k using J ex PER and First on SIN-LHR or just over a million points to go QF. Now that's a tough call I said to myself.
Which one would you pick??

 

[Oneworldplus2]

It is quite ineresting that I could get to LHR on SQ for 180k using J ex PER and First on SIN-LHR or just over a million points to go QF. Now that's a tough call I said to myself.
Which one would you pick??

Do l read this right...???

SQ for 180k points
PER-SIN; J
SIN-LHR; F
==or==
QF for 1 million points
PER-SIN J
SIN-LHR J/F

If those are the options, l'd go SQ.

 

[cove]

It was a close call!

 

[Oneworldplus2]

QF is 5 times more expensive :shock:. Go figure...

I'd go SQ every time if l had those options cove. Why waste points?

 

[cove]

The SQ kicker was 2 seats in Saver from PER-SIN and the First was on Standard points.
Back to a future of Dom Perignon and KRUG champagne!