Virgin Family transfer - 30 day expiry

[kreuky]

I have been trying to consolidate my family accounts into one, and talking to them on the phone, there's a new condition to be wary of that was relatively recently implemented with ZERO documentation anywhere and no one seems to be talking about it. I didn't believe it and HUACA a few days later and they said the same thing. So just a PSA since I don't think many people know about this.

Any family transferred points will expire after 30 days unless:
- Account is Silver, Gold or Platinum member
- Any amount of points are earnt or redeemed into account (except for additional family points transfers)

Very negative change and unannounced. I found this Ozbargain thread from earlier in the year so it's been going on for a few months. But no documentation on their website about it

Velocity Frequent Flyer - Family Points Transfer Expiry?

www.ozbargain.com.au

 

[justinbrett]

I would assume this means if the account itself has had no activity. Basically family transfers don’t count as activity so if there’s been no activity within 2 years then they would expire after a month.

If you transfer into an active account they would expire with the rest of the points, they wouldn’t have their own expiry.

 

[serfty]

It's bad enough they have gone offline and can only do by calling during Velocity Hours.

Transferring Points to the account of an eligible family member via our website is temporarily offline. Points transfer is still available by calling our Membership Contact Centre. We apologise for any inconvenience. Fees for transferring Points through the Membership Contact Centre are being waived at this time. Please have your membership details ready for our Membership Contact Centre agent to process.

Family Points Transfer

www.velocityfrequentflyer.com

I wonder if this is related to this ...

Velocity Family Transfers Online Suspended

Family Transfer been suspended online can only transfer over the phone.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

 

[PDog]

I have been trying to consolidate my family accounts into one, and talking to them on the phone, there's a new condition to be wary of that was relatively recently implemented with ZERO documentation anywhere and no one seems to be talking about it. I didn't believe it and HUACA a few days later and they said the same thing. So just a PSA since I don't think many people know about this.

Any family transferred points will expire after 30 days unless:
- Account is Silver, Gold or Platinum member
- Any amount of points are earnt or redeemed into account (except for additional family points transfers)

Very negative change and unannounced. I found this Ozbargain thread from earlier in the year so it's been going on for a few months. But no documentation on their website about it

Velocity Frequent Flyer - Family Points Transfer Expiry?

www.ozbargain.com.au

(my bolding) That's always been the case. I'm guessing you haven't earned or redeemed points recently?

Get yourself a flybuys card, spend a couple of dollars at Coles & swipe your flybuys card and you've added 2 years to the life of your points

I wonder if this is related to this ...

Velocity Family Transfers Online Suspended

Family Transfer been suspended online can only transfer over the phone.

www.australianfrequentflyer.com.au

I suspect the family transfer by phone is related to what seems to be a spike in Fraudulent transfers. I called up to transfer recently, and it was fast and painless (albeit def not as easy as online!)
The heading of that thread on it's own is misleading, it'd be good if the word online was added.

We need a 'community notes' ability on AFF!

 

[kreuky]

I would assume this means if the account itself has had no activity. Basically family transfers don’t count as activity so if there’s been no activity within 2 years then they would expire after a month.

If you transfer into an active account they would expire with the rest of the points, they wouldn’t have their own expiry.

Nope even if the account has been active - say for example my last activity was in July 2024 and i family transferred 100k on Aug 1, the 100k will expire on Sep1 if there has been no other non family transfer activity and you have no status.

Personally, not affected, as I have flybuys linked, but still good to know as other people have been caught out as per the OzB thread.

 

[justinbrett]

Nope even if the account has been active - say for example my last activity was in July 2024 and i family transferred 100k on Aug 1, the 100k will expire on Sep1 if there has been no other non family transfer activity and you have no status.

Personally, not affected, as I have flybuys linked, but still good to know as other people have been caught out as per the OzB thread.

Well that’s clearly a bug and not a feature. There has been no rule change.

 

[PDog]

Nope even if the account has been active - say for example my last activity was in July 2024 and i family transferred 100k on Aug 1, the 100k will expire on Sep1 if there has been no other non family transfer activity and you have no status.

Personally, not affected, as I have flybuys linked, but still good to know as other people have been caught out as per the OzB thread.

An additional family transfer keeps points alive, but activity doesn't? Sorry, I really think you've misunderstood what Velocity have told you.

I have no status, but my account is active: I transferred 225k points last month (2 transfers) and there was no mention of that.

I wouldn't get too hung up on that OzB thread, where first it was a cousin transferring points, and then a partner...

 

[kreuky]

"if there has been no other non family transfer activity"
Other activity keeps it from expiring. Family transfers do not.

 

[kreuky]

Well that’s clearly a bug and not a feature. There has been no rule change.

No documentation, but it has been clearly communicated to myself multiple times and many others (based on the OzB post as well as few reddit ones) over the phone that that is the new policy.

Feel free to test it out with a small transfer and let us know

 

[justinbrett]

Nope even if the account has been active - say for example my last activity was in July 2024 and i family transferred 100k on Aug 1, the 100k will expire on Sep1 if there has been no other non family transfer activity and you have no status.

Personally, not affected, as I have flybuys linked, but still good to know as other people have been caught out as per the OzB thread.

The OzB thread shows no indication it was an active account.

Call centres get things wrong all the time. The T&Cs are the source of truth on this.

You need to disregard points transfers as any activity. If you had a flybuys credit within the last two years, the family transfer points would expire the same time as the flybuys points. That could be 30 days for some, and the OzB thread said it was a new account opened for this purpose.

 

[oz_mark]

AFAIK, there has been no rule change. I think the 30 day thing may be relevant if you transfer to an inactive account (rather than immediately expiring them)

Not sure what happens in the case of a new account that has had no activity at all.

 

[Growing Older]

I ran into this issue today.

Me - Active, Platinum member - seeking to sweep Velocity points from the kids' VFF accounts into mine to help fund school holiday travels in the USA later in the year. After going through all of the identification, mother's maiden names, DOBs, etc, my agent told me that the Velocity points that she had just transferred into my (Platinum) VFF account from the kids' (Red) accounts would expire if there was no activity on my account within 30 days.

I queried this, as there has been flight activity across all of our accounts in the past 6 months, so nobody was stale. I've run my balances down and just needed to consolidate points before embarking upon the next award flight booking spree. She doubled down. I must register new activity on my Velocity account or these transferred points will expire within 30 days. Luckily, I have some VA metal flights coming up in the next 3 weeks - and we will be burning these transferred Velocity points on UA or VS redemptions anyway - but this one certainly caught me off-guard!

 

[PDog]

I ran into this issue today.

Me - Active, Platinum member - seeking to sweep Velocity points from the kids' VFF accounts into mine to help fund school holiday travels in the USA later in the year. After going through all of the identification, mother's maiden names, DOBs, etc, my agent told me that the Velocity points that she had just transferred into my (Platinum) VFF account from the kids' (Red) accounts would expire if there was no activity on my account within 30 days.

I queried this, as there has been flight activity across all of our accounts in the past 6 months, so nobody was stale. I've run my balances down and just needed to consolidate points before embarking upon the next award flight booking spree. She doubled down. I must register new activity on my Velocity account or these transferred points will expire within 30 days. Luckily, I have some VA metal flights coming up in the next 3 weeks - and we will be burning these transferred Velocity points on UA or VS redemptions anyway - but this one certainly caught me off-guard!

Was your balance at 0 points prior to the transfer? I'm not sure I've seen these long and short term activities defined before:

3.4 Points expiry

Points in the Velocity program have an expiry date (Points Expiry Date) which have different durations and depend on different Velocity account activities (Long Term and Short Term Activities).

Points Expiry Date

The Points Expiry Date for the Points in your Velocity account is 24 months from the date of your last Long Term Activity unless you have one or more Short Term Activities which may change the Points Expiry Date for the Points in your Velocity accounts as follows:

• If you don't have any Points in your Velocity account and your first transaction is a Short Term Activity:

The Points Expiry Date for your Velocity account will be the last day of the month following the month in which the Short Term Activity occurs (for instance, if you carry out a Short Term Activity on 6 August 2024, your Points Expiry Date will be set to 30 September 2024).

• If you do have Points in your Velocity account (therefore you have an existing Points Expiry Date) and your last transaction is a Short Term Activity:

The existing Points Expiry Date for the Points in your Velocity account will be extended to the last day of the month following the month of your existing Points Expiry Date (for instance, if your existing Points Expiry Date is 7 November 2024 and you carry out a Short Term Activity on 6 August 2024, your Points Expiry Date will be extended to 31 December 2024).

Long Term Activities:

• earning or redeeming Points through your Velocity account, or transferring Points to your Velocity account, with us or one of our partners (excluding family transfers or Family Pooling);
• receiving Points transferred by a Virgin Australia Business Flyer member to your Velocity account; or
• buying Points for your Velocity account using Points Booster (clause 3.2)

Short Term Activities:

• earning Points on your Velocity account in a Family Pool as a beneficiary account member;
• receiving Points transferred by a Family Member to your Velocity account (see what we mean by this in clause 5); or
• receiving Points transferred to your Velocity account as inheritance from another Velocity member's account.

 

[eastwest101]

I ran into this issue today.

Me - Active, Platinum member - seeking to sweep Velocity points from the kids' VFF accounts into mine to help fund school holiday travels in the USA later in the year. After going through all of the identification, mother's maiden names, DOBs, etc, my agent told me that the Velocity points that she had just transferred into my (Platinum) VFF account from the kids' (Red) accounts would expire if there was no activity on my account within 30 days.

I queried this, as there has been flight activity across all of our accounts in the past 6 months, so nobody was stale. I've run my balances down and just needed to consolidate points before embarking upon the next award flight booking spree. She doubled down. I must register new activity on my Velocity account or these transferred points will expire within 30 days. Luckily, I have some VA metal flights coming up in the next 3 weeks - and we will be burning these transferred Velocity points on UA or VS redemptions anyway - but this one certainly caught me off-guard!

This sounds very peculiar to me, but I am wondering if the Velocity accounts of your kids have been inactive for a while without earning, Flybuys earn, credit card or other activity?

 

[Growing Older]

Was your balance at 0 points prior to the transfer? I'm not sure I've seen these long and short term activities defined before:

3.4 Points expiry

Points in the Velocity program have an expiry date (Points Expiry Date) which have different durations and depend on different Velocity account activities (Long Term and Short Term Activities).

Points Expiry Date

The Points Expiry Date for the Points in your Velocity account is 24 months from the date of your last Long Term Activity unless you have one or more Short Term Activities which may change the Points Expiry Date for the Points in your Velocity accounts as follows:

• If you don't have any Points in your Velocity account and your first transaction is a Short Term Activity:

The Points Expiry Date for your Velocity account will be the last day of the month following the month in which the Short Term Activity occurs (for instance, if you carry out a Short Term Activity on 6 August 2024, your Points Expiry Date will be set to 30 September 2024).

• If you do have Points in your Velocity account (therefore you have an existing Points Expiry Date) and your last transaction is a Short Term Activity:

The existing Points Expiry Date for the Points in your Velocity account will be extended to the last day of the month following the month of your existing Points Expiry Date (for instance, if your existing Points Expiry Date is 7 November 2024 and you carry out a Short Term Activity on 6 August 2024, your Points Expiry Date will be extended to 31 December 2024).

Long Term Activities:

• earning or redeeming Points through your Velocity account, or transferring Points to your Velocity account, with us or one of our partners (excluding family transfers or Family Pooling);
• receiving Points transferred by a Virgin Australia Business Flyer member to your Velocity account; or
• buying Points for your Velocity account using Points Booster (clause 3.2)

Short Term Activities:

• earning Points on your Velocity account in a Family Pool as a beneficiary account member;
• receiving Points transferred by a Family Member to your Velocity account (see what we mean by this in clause 5); or
• receiving Points transferred to your Velocity account as inheritance from another Velocity member's account.

It's all very interesting.

My points balance was (and remains) positive and I've had both short term and long term activities in the past 6 months. I had to do a status run 4 months ago to retain WP on the very last day, so I know that there has been flight activity on my account!

The kids also have been flying independently of me, with Family Pooling directing the Velocity points to me or Mrs GO. Perhaps that is the source of this issue - kids supporting Mr and Mrs GO with the Family Pool but not earning in their own rights? Hmmmm.

 

[Growing Older]

This sounds very peculiar to me, but I am wondering if the Velocity accounts of your kids have been inactive for a while without earning, Flybuys earn, credit card or other activity?

Not quite. Youngest daughter has been flying all over the country in the past few months with Mrs GO but family pooling all of her activity. She's the one going to the USA with Mrs GO in the middle of the year, so I'm effectively recycling her Velocity points anyway.

I just found it very bizarre to go through all of the interaction to be told at the end that I had 30 days or the points could have been lost. She even tried to tell me how I could get them back once that happened (so someone else must have had this occur!) but I have those mid-Feb VA metal flights in mind, so this shouldn't come to pass on my watch (this time anyway )

Just wanted to throw the warning out there for the AFF community.