Virgin Platinum Pointless?

[smit0847]

There's some misinformation about VA WP in this thread that I would like to clear up. I've been both SG and WP with VA.

Yes, there's not much difference between SG and WP on VA. VA offer SG too much (IMO) to compete with QF SG but dont have as many carrots to dangle in front of WPs as QF do (1st check-in, 1 hub lounges etc). The main benefits for me have been Row 3 at booking, and the 4 comp upgrades. Remember SG can select Row 3 at T-48 - if you travel outside peak you'll have a pretty high success rate of getting Row 3 as a SG anyway (I'm at about 90% success). Since the Virgin Flyer CC can no longer be used for flexis I dont think the 4 comp upgrades are that valuable anymore, considering how overpriced the flexi fares are. They should also only be used for A330 to PER, and I agree that if you dont need to go there its quite a waste of money to holiday in PER purely for the upgrades.

This 'getting additional award seats' comment needs to be clarified. SG receive guaranteed domestic award seats once a year (2 adults and 2 kids I believe) and WP receive this for international seats.
HOWEVER, there are several conditions that really take the shine off this offer:
1. You must provide at least 6 months notice;
2. There must be no award seats available on any flights for 3 days either side of the day you want;
3. It is for Y only; and
4. It's for VA metal only - remember VA only fly to 2 destinations long-haul (LAX and AUH).

I think this 'guaranteed seats' benefit would be one of the most rarely used benefits of the program, I dont know anyone who has used it and I didnt bother during my WP year as its unlikely there will be no Y seats for an entire week. If you rang VA today and said 'I want to use my WP benefit for SYD-LAX on Boxing Day' the response would likely be 'you can't - there's a flight leaving at 6am on Christmas Day via BNE available for points redemption so you have to use that - it will cost you more points than a direct flight and it invalidates the guaranteed seat option'.

Even if there was 1 J redemption seat available and you called up as a WP asking for 1 more to be released the answer would be no. They're extremely inflexible with award seats.

Also this idea that you'll get upgraded travelling in peak - if you're not travelling alone I think its very unlikely to happen.

So in answer to your question, if you don't have a desire to go to PER then yes, I do think VA WP is rather pointless. QF WP is far, far more valuable but obviously far harder and more expensive to obtain.

 

[williamsf1]

There's some misinformation about VA WP in this thread that I would like to clear up. I've been both SG and WP with VA.

This 'getting additional award seats' comment needs to be clarified. SG receive guaranteed domestic award seats once a year (2 adults and 2 kids I believe) and WP receive this for international seats.
HOWEVER, there are several conditions that really take the shine off this offer:
1. You must provide at least 6 months notice;
2. There must be no award seats available on any flights for 3 days either side of the day you want;
3. It is for Y only; and
4. It's for VA metal only - remember VA only fly to 2 destinations long-haul (LAX and AUH).

I think this 'guaranteed seats' benefit would be one of the most rarely used benefits of the program, I dont know anyone who has used it and I didnt bother during my WP year as its unlikely there will be no Y seats for an entire week. If you rang VA today and said 'I want to use my WP benefit for SYD-LAX on Boxing Day' the response would likely be 'you can't - there's a flight leaving at 6am on Christmas Day via BNE available for points redemption so you have to use that - it will cost you more points than a direct flight and it invalidates the guaranteed seat option'.

Even if there was 1 J redemption seat available and you called up as a WP asking for 1 more to be released the answer would be no. They're extremely inflexible with award seats.

Also this idea that you'll get upgraded travelling in peak - if you're not travelling alone I think its very unlikely to happen.

So in answer to your question, if you don't have a desire to go to PER then yes, I do think VA WP is rather pointless. QF WP is far, far more valuable but obviously far harder and more expensive to obtain.

You point 4 is incorrect

16.3.1 VRPL guarantees that Platinum Members can make one Reward Seat booking for up to four guests on Economy Class return flights either:

(a) on any Virgin Australia Domestic route; or
(b) departing from Australia (or from New Zealand if the Platinum Member is a New Zealand resident) to an Any International destination to which Virgin Australia or an Airline Partner flies,

So if you wanted to fly to China, you could use this on SQ
​

 

[smit0847]

Okay - thanks for clarifying that - I didn't know.

But remember:

Redemption rates on SQ are absurdly high (its a very, very poor use of points)
Long-haul Y on EY, NZ and DL is awful.

The biggest issue with the guarantee is my point 2 - its unlikely there will be a week with no Y seats and very likely you'll be forced to travel when you dont want to (i.e. Xmas Day). The reason there wont be any seats on a Saturday is because everyone wants to travel then.

You point 4 is incorrect

16.3.1 VRPL guarantees that Platinum Members can make one Reward Seat booking for up to four guests on Economy Class return flights either:

(a) on any Virgin Australia Domestic route; or
(b) departing from Australia (or from New Zealand if the Platinum Member is a New Zealand resident) to an Any International destination to which Virgin Australia or an Airline Partner flies,

So if you wanted to fly to China, you could use this on SQ
​

 

[Intra]

Row 3 at booking is a big plus being a VA Plat for me; Sometimes Row 3 seats would appear at random times during Mobile Check-In as Gold, but besides the peak hour flights, I always could get atleast 4A/4F, usually with shadows.
All depends on the mix of status flyers...

Only other thing of note for me has been the fact sometimes they welcome me by name now. Small little touch, but I'm not going to cry a river over it.

I'll drop back to Gold next year being a full-time student, don't think it'll be too bad!

 

[Deleted member 29185]

There's some misinformation about VA WP in this thread that I would like to clear up. I've been both SG and WP with VA.

Yes, there's not much difference between SG and WP on VA. VA offer SG too much (IMO) to compete with QF SG but dont have as many carrots to dangle in front of WPs as QF do (1st check-in, 1 hub lounges etc). The main benefits for me have been Row 3 at booking, and the 4 comp upgrades. Remember SG can select Row 3 at T-48 - if you travel outside peak you'll have a pretty high success rate of getting Row 3 as a SG anyway (I'm at about 90% success). Since the Virgin Flyer CC can no longer be used for flexis I dont think the 4 comp upgrades are that valuable anymore, considering how overpriced the flexi fares are. They should also only be used for A330 to PER, and I agree that if you dont need to go there its quite a waste of money to holiday in PER purely for the upgrades.

This 'getting additional award seats' comment needs to be clarified. SG receive guaranteed domestic award seats once a year (2 adults and 2 kids I believe) and WP receive this for international seats.
HOWEVER, there are several conditions that really take the shine off this offer:
1. You must provide at least 6 months notice;
2. There must be no award seats available on any flights for 3 days either side of the day you want;
3. It is for Y only; and
4. It's for VA metal only - remember VA only fly to 2 destinations long-haul (LAX and AUH).

I think this 'guaranteed seats' benefit would be one of the most rarely used benefits of the program, I dont know anyone who has used it and I didnt bother during my WP year as its unlikely there will be no Y seats for an entire week. If you rang VA today and said 'I want to use my WP benefit for SYD-LAX on Boxing Day' the response would likely be 'you can't - there's a flight leaving at 6am on Christmas Day via BNE available for points redemption so you have to use that - it will cost you more points than a direct flight and it invalidates the guaranteed seat option'.

Even if there was 1 J redemption seat available and you called up as a WP asking for 1 more to be released the answer would be no. They're extremely inflexible with award seats.

Also this idea that you'll get upgraded travelling in peak - if you're not travelling alone I think its very unlikely to happen.

So in answer to your question, if you don't have a desire to go to PER then yes, I do think VA WP is rather pointless. QF WP is far, far more valuable but obviously far harder and more expensive to obtain.

I think this is a nice summary of the issue.

Your point 4 may be incorrect, but I can add another point 4 for you.....
4. It's only available for flights originating in Oz. cough concept, cough benefit.

All in all, WP needs a shake up. SG doesn't.....it's about right, WP is a poor status level. Changing some of those complementary upgrade conditions for WP would be a great start, perhaps even including short haul international.

 

[paultiffen]

I'd value the incremental benefits at the following (keep in mind that I'm cheap):
- Row 3, 5 dollars per flight
- Premium entry, 5 dollars per flight
- Incremental points earn 2.5%*value spent per year*subjective value of points. ie 2.5%*6000*1c = $150 per year
- Etihad first lounge access - 100 per trip in the evening at least per person
- 4 upgrades - maybe $20 each max as it would only be for work if I book a flexi when I can expense whatever anyway and don't fly to Perth. Changing these to be saver compatible would help. An alternate would be a small copay on a saver similar to AA which is space available ie 4 1000 point upgrades

Maybe more subjectively for some of these but I'd say it's only worth it if you are planning on going through AUH.

Paul

 

[hydrabyss]

One benefit not mentioned is being at the top of the list when you know what hits the fan.Recently flying out of NTL on a flight to Melb. flight was delayed followed by we are waiting for an engineer to arrive followed a few hours later by please collect your bags off the carasel.

Checkin tells me Head office are looking at booking Plats and Golds on JQ to Melb.Everyone else I heard was going by bus to Sydney. I dont know how many Golds or Plats made what flight but noticed some where going via Brisbane and my partner(silver level) and myself(Plat) and a few others I noticed were going direct to Melb.

We arrived 3 hours late but considering the alternative bus trip to Sydney a big thankyou to Virgin for getting us there especially when you consider the costs involved on booking last minute fares.

 

[Caversham04]

One benefit not mentioned is being at the top of the list when you know what hits the fan.

I agree; flying NAN-SYD-ADL last month, Platinum FF's were re-booked onto NAN-BNE (in preference to people in Premium Economy) when the inbound flight was delayed such that most people would miss their connections in Sydney. This meant that we got home on the same day as planned, rather than having to overnight in Sydney.

 

[Jack_OC]

The ability to sign up to 3 guests into the Lounge is nice, esp if you have a family and any of the kids are over 12.

Interesting that no-one has mentioned the partner hotel/car hire status.

And the bonus points are worth a bit too - especially since by definition the more you fly the more that benefit is worth, so Platinums are likely to gain quite a bit from it.

All in, I agree the incremental benefit between Platinum and Gold is less than that between Silver and Gold, but I think that's true of most if not all FF programs.

As far as I can see, the only significant additional benefit that QFF WPs get is the domestic J/international F lounge access. Of course it would be nice if VA offered the same, but since they don't actually have domestic J/international F lounges, that's a fairly big ask!

 

[bcworld]

I think my favourite and most useful VA Plat benefit is HHonors Diamond...that should about sum it up!

 

[hummel]

I think my favourite and most useful VA Plat benefit is HHonors Diamond...that should about sum it up!

Agree with that!

 

[trippin_the_rift]

I think my favourite and most useful VA Plat benefit is HHonors Diamond...that should about sum it up!

100% Agree.

When they relaunched the Velocity program a few years back it had enough unique features to give QFF a good run.
Obviously it went better than Velocity expected and they got a decent chunk of business from it.

Fast forward three years and almost nothing has changed. It's almost as if Velocity is content with how things are from a status POV.
Sure they're adding points bonuses for credit cards, status credit earn on credit cards, partner global wallet cards and more partner airlines but this is boring fluff. It's too obvious these things are designed to make money while providing minimal real world benefit tot he customer.

Just because QFF isn't doing something is not an excuse not to continually innovate.
It wouldn't be difficult to blow away QFF with some minor tweaks! I mean heck for starters, VA Platinums don't seem to realise they're making more points under Velocity than they otherwise would with QFF (assuming you're not buying saver lite).

VA Plat in general is pretty good, but if you're a regular domestic flyer Golds are getting almost exactly the same value from the program as you.

 

[rioter]

When did this come about for transpac flights?

I recently inquired about the availability of upgrading a transpac PE flexi farefor next May & was told there were no award seats available. I know ExpertFlyer isn't an exact science but it showed that there were no business class seats allocated for the flight I was interested in upgrading on.

I have never been able to score an upgrade with virgin using points on a transpac flight. Yet always get the upgrademe offers. Little frustrating.

 

[williamsf1]

I have never been able to score an upgrade with virgin using points on a transpac flight. Yet always get the upgrademe offers. Little frustrating.

A tip is to keep your eye out if a reward seat becomes available and call up asap.

 

[ap_spd]

Fly ahead is a good benefit, not sure if this is applicable for SG.

Now that SQ CEO is on board, can we expect better lounge access when flying SQ, atleast as WP. I would be willing to overlook a lot of things

 

[Mogul]

Platnum for me is about 3 things.

1. Row 3. It's a pity if Row 3 is full that platnum's cannot select exit rows at say T-4.
2. Comp upgrades as I fly on to CTC there to four times a year.
3. Extra guests into the Lounge.

 

[MH_fan]

Fly ahead is a good benefit, not sure if this is applicable for SG.

Now that SQ CEO is on board, can we expect better lounge access when flying SQ, atleast as WP. I would be willing to overlook a lot of things

I love Fly Ahead. I can confirm that I do get this benefit as a SG.

 

[rioter]

A tip is to keep your eye out if a reward seat becomes available and call up asap.

This is usually my strategy(it has not worked yet). Just a little painful. Especially when you know there are non status pax taking up what could be reward seats.

 

[Deleted member 29185]

What I'd really like on the VA gold/plat list is another hotel status match choice...........Starwood.

Frequent flying, frequent hoteling and frequent car hiring frequently go hand in hand () so that foresight on VAs part was certainly an added sparkle in their slightly tarnished crown. SPG SM would help Brasso the crown up a bit, especially if they gave a one off gesture to past SMed FFers.

 

[Moopere]

I think my favourite and most useful VA Plat benefit is HHonors Diamond...that should about sum it up!

I'm gold and will appreciate the leg-up to HH Gold at the end of this year as circumstances will almost certainty mean I won't make it on my own. Can't conceive life at the Hilton chain without some status hehe.

However, as this benefit appears to be a once only thing its more of a status linked promotion than a real status entitlement. I've love to see HH status linked directly and permanently to VA status ... even if it were a perk only for VA WP's ... so long as you're WP you will be HH Diamond. Low or no cost for both providers, a big benefit to customers and and obvious and continuous income earner for the HH chain.