"... we'll shortly announce a major investment to improve our Frequent Flyer program"

[tdimdad]

Some good points there and as we have seen with EY recently they have been the latest to block award seats in premium cabins to partners until 30 days out.
Looking after their own FF’s first and foremost and then any seats remaining unsold at 30 days can be up for grabs.

The challenge with QF is that they have not looked after even their own FF's but (purposefully?) let the program devalue because of the poor and now also unpredictable availability of flight rewards. If we had a reasonable chance of redeeming points for our desired trips (give or take some flexibility), you could discuss about which programs preference their own FF's first before partners' FF's.

 

[elanshin]

I feel this is more a skew of AFF and other FF forums where premium cabin are the goal.

I have friends that legitimately don't want to fly in premium cabins. They don't have a glut of points, but a modest amount. And as they put it, "i know I can fly in comfort for a trip, but if I book economy rewards I can take 3 trips".

The mindset is also the same logic for non CR as well. Plenty of people fly scoot around. The flight isn't what they care about.

Whilst people would like to splash out once or twice for business, most aren't actively seeking to redeem every flight into J or above.

 

[encryptededdy]

Yeah, I suspect they can probably silence 80% of the people complaining (but probably 0% of AFF posters) by just dropping more Economy rewards and adding an Economy "advantage" rewards tier that has availability most of the time.

 

[exceladdict]

So the flight I'm currently looking at, which is probably QFi's most popular route, at Christmas, so most popular (read expensive) time:

Syd-Lhr in J

Flex pricing $17,000

CR = 289,200 points = 5.87c per point value

Points plus pay = 3,000,000 = 0.567c per point value.

Now we know QF prices points at roughly 2.7c per point to buy, but for example woolies is 1c per point.

I can't see QF going for a easily available points option above 2c/point, so would guess flights either severely limited or 3x CR or higher...

Qantas points can be easily acquired for 1c/point (or less). Qantas holds the value of unredeemed points on its balance sheet at <1c/point (~0.7c last time I checked).

They are never going to release so much premium seat inventory that the redemption value of Qantas points goes above those sorts of numbers. I do not understand why this simple fact seems to be overlooked by those complaining about a lack of business or first class international rewards. If they release more business and first class seats then either the cost has to go up (to keep average value at <$1c per point) or something else has to be devalued.

So the cost on the balance sheet would be the expected liability to the business when they're redeemed.

If the only redemption option is flights, then via facilitate internal cost shifting, the airline business unit receives 289200 * $0.007 from the FF business unit when someone takes a J CR in @gethsemene 's example above.

There's a gap between $2024 and the $17k quoted, but the cost to operate doesn't change, it's just lost profit in the airline BU (if the seat was sold).

But there are many other redemption options where the FF BU would pay less (for example gift cards which have a lower points per dollar, and which QFFF probably don't buy at face value from the supplier either).

QF (airline) can very well choose to charge QF (FFP) less for redemptions and make more available. Perhaps, the profit on selling toasters helps to subsidize these J redemptions.

It's all up to the business as to what trade offs they think will make people happy. Personally, I'm not expecting them to go too far in the short term.

 

[hb13]

I tend to worry about the same thing. And even if the number of seats doesn’t chnge, it’s not very attractive to me if they just do a bunch of short notice “points planes” or all the “same number of seats“ they release are for routes like Wagga (WGA) to Gladstone (GLA) nd no offence to either of these places where I have flown for work many times. I just don’t want to use points to do it. The true test for me will be reasonable availability of J seats at convenient times (for me this does not have to be school holidays or European summer) to reasonable destinations. I wait in trepidatious hope!

edit typos

Couldn't agree more. Although, I feel like there is no hope. QF just don't care about the customer. They have been found out and have been publicly called out - but nothing will change IMO.

 

[Berlin]

I feel this is more a skew of AFF and other FF forums where premium cabin are the goal.

I have friends that legitimately don't want to fly in premium cabins. They don't have a glut of points, but a modest amount. And as they put it, "i know I can fly in comfort for a trip, but if I book economy rewards I can take 3 trips".

The mindset is also the same logic for non CR as well. Plenty of people fly scoot around. The flight isn't what they care about.

Oh, not that old chestnut about people not caring about their flights!

Those “scooters” are not the ones making Qantas money, are they?

 

[elanshin]

Oh, not that old chestnut about people not caring about their flights!

Those “scooters” are not the ones making Qantas money, are they?

Thr point wasn't about that, it's that many people don't care as much about higher end cabins. I'd actually say thats the overwhelming majority of thr flying public.

Business class would be nice, but they definitely don't go out of their way to get it. In this context, it means those that choose QF economy but rarely will get anything sbove that on their own initiative even if they could.

 

[levelnine]

I feel this is more a skew of AFF and other FF forums where premium cabin are the goal.

I have friends that legitimately don't want to fly in premium cabins. They don't have a glut of points, but a modest amount. And as they put it, "i know I can fly in comfort for a trip, but if I book economy rewards I can take 3 trips".

The mindset is also the same logic for non CR as well. Plenty of people fly scoot around. The flight isn't what they care about.

Whilst people would like to splash out once or twice for business, most aren't actively seeking to redeem every flight into J or above.

The problem with your view is that it is directly contradicted by Qantas' Head of Loyalty:

But she acknowledged the biggest bug bear for the scheme’s 15 million members, was the difficulty in getting premium cabin seats on premium routes internationally with their points.

“That’s a problem we’ve really been looking at over the past 12 months of how do we solve this, how do we ensure we keep our member engagement high?” Ms Wirth said.

And there's a good reason for her view. The people redeeming business class cabins are, by definition, the most engaged and the most valuable members. A person who earns 10K points a year flying a couple of SYD-MEL flights and can only ever aspire to Y redemptions is no where near as valuable to them as someone earning hundreds of thousands of points through credit cards/white label products (insurance, etc)/paid flights/groceries/etc where Qantas clips the ticket on every single transaction. The latter group are generally looking to redeem for premium cabins. While there will be some exceptions (people with 2+ children), most people aren't going to go to the effort of all that engagement unless the pay off is substantial.

 

[aikman]

I actually think that most people do want to use their points for premium cabins. Social media and travel blogs make sure of that. It may be that they try, fail to find availability and just settle for economy.

 

[SYD]

The problem with your view is that it is directly contradicted by Qantas' Head of Loyalty:



And there's a good reason for her view. The people redeeming business class cabins are, by definition, the most engaged and the most valuable members. A person who earns 10K points a year flying a couple of SYD-MEL flights in Y is no where near as valuable to them than someone earning hundreds of thousands of points through credit cards/white label products (insurance, etc)/paid flights/groceries/etc. The latter group are generally looking to redeem for premium cabins. While there will be some exceptions (people with 2+ children), most people aren't going to go to the effort of all that engagement unless the pay off is substantial.

There are of course the new brethren of PC/PC+ folk with new found recognition of their large points haul but often low status and limited ability to redeem for premium seats.

I actually think that most people do want to use their points for premium cabins. Social media and travel blogs make sure of that. It may be that they try, fail to find availability and just settle for economy.

This has been mine and SYD+1’s motives since joint QFF in the 90s. Our first redemption was J return to Canada a few years later. Then further long haul J rewards every other year. Now it’s several times per year!

 

[levelnine]

There are of course the new brethren of PC/PC+ folk with new found recognition of their large points haul but often low status and limited ability to redeem for premium seats.

Exactly. And if they can't redeem for premium cabins, they will disengage. They'll start collecting Velocity points instead or move to an airline-agnostic program (eg a bank rewards program). These are the people Qantas is trying to hold on to.

 

[Mr H]

Exactly. And if they can't redeem for premium cabins, they will disengage. They'll start collecting Velocity points instead...

Then they are in for one helluva disappointment.

 

[levelnine]

Then they are in for one helluva disappointment.

Sure, but Velocity currently has more award flights to SFO than Qantas has to all of its long-haul destinations combined.

 

[SYD]

Sure, but Velocity currently has more award flights to SFO than Qantas has to all of its long-haul destinations combined.

View attachment 372345

But how many when peeps want to fly there in our winter? (yes, I know SFO is colder in summer than Sydney in winter…!).

But seriously, that example of releasing seats a few weeks out is what we might see more of. But unless you’re Uber flexible, they’re not really solving the problem.

 

[levelnine]

But how many when peeps want to fly there in our winter? (yes, I know SFO is colder in summer than Sydney in winter…!).

But seriously, that example of releasing seats a few weeks out is what we might see more of. But unless you’re Uber flexible, they’re not really solving the problem.

It was just an example. Velocity has great availability to Europe and North America at the end of the calendar with Singapore.

Velocity is by no means a perfect program, and has gotten worse with the recent Etihad changes, but there's no way a rational person would pick Qantas over Velocity at the moment if your goal was long-haul premium travel (unless you're Platinum or above with Qantas and can request the release of award seats).

 

[Mr H]

there's no way a rational person would pick Qantas over Velocity at the moment if your goal was long-haul premium travel (unless you're Platinum or above with Qantas and can request the release of award seats).

I like to think I’m fairly rational. I also prefer long haul premium travel to tins of soup - but I know others make a different choice when presented with the opportunity.

 

[levelnine]

I like to think I’m fairly rational. I also prefer long haul premium travel to tins of soup - but I know others make a different choice when presented with the opportunity.

I should have added the qualifier 'outside extremely niche cases', which yours is.

Edit: Indeed, if we want to talk about the 'AFF bubble', it is in the OWA thread. That thread makes it look like there's way more people doing 16 segment round-the-world itineraries than there are in the general population. The vast majority of people are looking for pretty simple return or open jaw trips to Europe/North America/Asia beginning and ending in Australia.

 

[seritonin]

Exactly. And if they can't redeem for premium cabins, they will disengage. They'll start collecting Velocity points instead or move to an airline-agnostic program (eg a bank rewards program). These are the people Qantas is trying to hold on to.

I am one of those people. I fly Virgin (Platinum) exclusively for work even though my company's preferred airline is Qantas simply because I get more points per dollar spent.
I still collect QFF through credit cards and other means. Finding international J seats on QFF is possible but sometimes it's just so tiring even though I know most of the tricks using multi city booking etc.

We fly internationally 2-3 times a year (Asia/ Europe mostly) often during peak winter and Christmas so the availability of international J seats is very important for us. At the moment, you just can't beat SQ and QR availability on Velocity.

 

[RichardMEL]

I reckon of COURSE everyone WANTS premium rewards - I mean that's a no brainer. I think the point is that many regular members of QFF are more realistic with what they can attain and wanting to attain. Don't play the churning game or have high spend with big points balances and probably have the aspiration to get "some" value out of these points. Like taking the kids on a holiday to the theme parks or perhaps to disneyland. It's a stereotype for sure, but probably not too far from the mark in a general sense. There was a thread on AFF recently regarding the best use of 50k points to potentially get to Asaia iirc. That was talking Y. Many folks here probably consider 50k points to be pretty small amount but we have to remember that to mny that would be a fair sum, and represent a fair deal of saving. I guess it's all about perspective isn't it? Many of us (myself included) come from that of being used to premium cabins, lounges etc. I try and put myself into the shoes of others though and consider what realistic goals might be. Years ago, I upgraded my (Bronze, rarely flies) sister on some domestic flights. As mundane (to many of us) as you can imagine. She came back saying she "felt like a princess" and many might scoff at that, but that is where her level of experience and expectation were (so it was a delight to me to give her that simple pleasure ). There was a lot of excitement yesterday for the people getting on that A380 MEL-SYD as a oot of "free upgrades" to Business even on that short flight.

Yeah, your QFF member with a few kids and 50k points would love to sit in J to go somewhere, but they also probably want to take those kids on a special trip someplace with those points - and that's a totally different equation to many of us but I dare say quite common spread across the 15m QFF members out there.

There's the apsirational and then there's the "I will never be able to fly First Class" notion.

 

[I love to travel]

Very good point.

This will become more or less akin to what many see when trying to get partner rewards - where say one can see avail at a saver rate on AA but it's not available to QF.

This would be potentially on top of the various carriers that limit availability to partners as is

Also need to factor in Oneworld upgrades that are coming this year