QANTAS: Discounts points redemptions for holidays and hotels

You will need 30 to 40% fewer points to redeem Qantas Holidays, or hotel bookings. Qantas says this is to give members more value, I’d say its more to keep customers booking hotels and holidays through the Qantas portal.

Qantas promotes this as a ‘permanent improvement in value’ for frequent flyers. I think that is a bit of overpromising. However, who wants to look a gift horse in the mouth?

Not just Hotels and Holidays – also flights

Qantas claims that it has reduced the price of redeeming flights by 20%, when using Points Plus Pay, although the offer is limited to bookings made before the end of April 2022, for travel until April 2023. Point Plus Pay is not usually a good deal, with flights costing multiples of the points required for a Classic Flight Reward – think a million points plus pay, for a Classic Flight Reward of say 150,000 points plus a couple of hundred dollars – if it was available. However, this will bring the points cost of a flight ‘closer’ to the preferred Classic Flight Rewards, as the release says.

Sample Redemptions

Here are some examples of the change in the points cost of redemptions for domestic and international hotels and holidays, taken from the Qantas release:

Qantas Hotels (Domestic):

Hotel	Details	Was	Now
Ovolo Woolloomooloo	1 night, 2 adults Superoo Room	66,191 Points	46,368 Points
Lancemore Crossley St. Melbourne	1 night, 2 adults William Standard King Room	46,406 Points	30,980 Points
Intercontinental Hayman Island	1 night, 2 adults Classic Room	190,871 Points	133,610 Points

Qantas Hotels (International):

Hotel	Details	Was	Now
L’Ermitage Beverly Hills – Los Angeles	2 nights, 2 adults Classic Suite	289,686 Points	202,780 Points
Sheraton Fiji Golf & Beach Resort – Fiji	2 nights, 2 adults Garden View Room	164,945 Points	115,461 Points
Alohilani Resort Waikiki Beach – Hawaii	2 nights, 2 adults Partial Ocean View Room	213,982 Points	149,787 Points

Qantas Holidays (combined airfares and accommodation):

Holiday	Details	Was	Now
Crystalbrook Riley – Cairns	5 nights, 2 adults Urban King Room Return economy Qantas flights ex Sydney	525,834 Points	289,209 Points
Vibe Hotel – Hobart	5 nights, 2 adults Guest Room King Return economy Qantas flights ex Sydney	327,908 Points	180,349 Points
Pan Pacific – London	5 nights, 2 adults Guest Room King Return economy Qantas flights ex Sydney	908,512 Points	499,512 Points

2PAXfly Takeout

This is another timely reminder to wear your seatbelt when seated. Holding you close to your seat will protect you from the sort of injuries sustained on this flight, when unsecured passengers flew to the ceiling of the aircraft, and then came crashing down once the ‘drop’ ceased.

The hope will be that this is an anomaly – a ‘freak accident’ in casual parlance. If it is a systemic error either mechanical or electronic, then this is a larger concern for the airlines that fly Boeing Dreamliner 787 aircraft. Let’s hope it isn’t. If it is, it will pile on the woes to Boeing’s existing stack.

Any increase in the value of points redemptions in a frequent flyer scheme is warmly welcomed. Is this great? Well it might be, but you need to compare the points required to the $ cost of the hotel night. You need to divide that $ cost by the points required to give you a ¢ value for each point. According to the Australian website Point Hacks, if you are not getting 1.9¢ per point then you are not getting good value.