What's Your Strategy?

[verduzzo]

Hi All,

Have recently been dropped down to Gold (LTG to be precise...) after approx. five years as WP. The decrease in flying was due both to a change of jobs (although new role is now ramping up travel plans again), as well as no QF int. option from Perth (before they reinstated SIN mid-last year). I did attempt the discussion with QFF and mentioned these two reasons in the hopes of a comp., but was flatly told that I hadn't even attempted to fly QF internationally mad: selective amnesia when it comes to PER situation mentioned above) and that my upcoming flight (since flown) was on QR (they weren't happy about that).

With the travel ramping up again, I am quite keen to maximise my SC earn to try and bump myself back up to WP. I have already noticed a significant (negative) difference flying as LTG as opposed to WP, so I guess that's my main reasoning for wanting this. I also regularly transit through the Middle East, so 1st lounge access is important also.

:?: I guess my question is twofold:

1. what strategy does everyone use in mapping out their year and in planning SC earn?
2. Given my Anniversary date is end-Feb, I assume it would be better for me to attain WP as quickly as possible, as then I will have status benefits from that point, as well as the for the entire year following (that's my understanding anyhow)

Thanks in advance,
V.

 

[trippin_the_rift]

I did attempt the discussion with QFF and mentioned these two reasons in the hopes of a comp., but was flatly told that I hadn't even attempted to fly QF internationally mad: selective amnesia when it comes to PER situation mentioned above) and that my upcoming flight (since flown) was on QR (they weren't happy about that).

What a vague and broad comment for someone from QFF to make. Are they analysing your flight searches on qantas.com, kayak, skyscanner, expedia and other sites you may frequent?
Are they then comparing this to your activity with other FF programs? Qantas have no clue of the share of wallet they capture from you. I have no doubt it costing them millions upon millions in lost sales.
Aside from knowing many good people from almost every major airline in the world and the insights that come from this (and to be fair many of them face similar challenges) - this same problem is clearly evident from the Platinum One thread where customers complain about QFF not knowing them.

Have you continued to send credit card points into QFF since dropping? This is a clear marker that you have remained loyal and generated them revenue in the process (it's also an indicator that you might not be flying other airlines FYI).

With the travel ramping up again, I am quite keen to maximise my SC earn to try and bump myself back up to WP. I have already noticed a significant (negative) difference flying as LTG as opposed to WP, so I guess that's my main reasoning for wanting this. I also regularly transit through the Middle East, so 1st lounge access is important also.

Given the lack of QF flights ex-Perth - where does most of your travel take you? Is there any reason to pursue QF Plat as a LTG? Keeping in mind your first 700 status credits are 'wasted' because you are already gold.

- Since first class lounges are important to you (do you really want to fly via SYD/MEL for this?)
- As you regularly transit via ME, there are more options available to you. Do you enjoy flying QR? Their status earning is similar to QF, they have soft landings and their airfares in biz/first are almost always cheaper than Qantas.
- Etihad is an option too, and they will status match you to Gold straight off the bat. You could then switch to flying VA domestically and retain lounge, priority everything etc.
- Emirates status is useful on Qantas flights too, and EK treats their Gold/Plats *EXTREMELY WELL* with upgrades.

You're not the first person to wonder which is the best direction after attaining LTG (I'm in the same boat) and there are no shortage of threads here and flyertalk where people move to better frequent flyer programs once hitting the milestone.

Hope this helps!!

 

[mviy]

1. Depends on a range of factors e.g. if you wish to do status runs. For status runs positioning yourself to somewhere with a high SC earn per dollar spent (e.g. the US) would be advisable. Also keep a lookout for bonus SC offers in your email. If you get one of those it's a good time to book QANTAS marketed and operated flights covered by the promotion.
2. Yes. If you achieve WP now you will have it till at least end-Feb 2018

Personally I have always had NB status and will achieve SG for the first time this year and decided going for WP this year isn't worth it for me. Maybe if I had achieved WP before and visited the first lounges I would think differently.

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

I do have strategies I use, to keep SG but they are not popular on here, ie, its too expensive.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

1. what strategy does everyone use in mapping out their year and in planning SC earn?.

My strategy is to earn enough FF points so that for long haul internationals I only fly by redeeming for J or F so that I do not have to earn status.

 

[bismarck]

I'll take a quite hard-nosed judgement.

I'm extremely loathe to do a status run, so if I'm not making it based on my regular flying I'll have to seriously consider whether I'll get value out of it.

Fell about 300 SC's short of WP last year. Clearly not worthwhile.

For me, SG is the sweet spot anyway. A lot of incremental flying required to get to WP. Hard to do without Intl premium cabin.

 

[verduzzo]

I'll take a quite hard-nosed judgement.

I'm extremely loathe to do a status run, so if I'm not making it based on my regular flying I'll have to seriously consider whether I'll get value out of it.

Fell about 300 SC's short of WP last year. Clearly not worthwhile.

For me, SG is the sweet spot anyway. A lot of incremental flying required to get to WP. Hard to do without Intl premium cabin.

Agreed, SG is indeed a sweet-spot. I need to think more positively about it!

 

[verduzzo]

What a vague and broad comment for someone from QFF to make. Are they analysing your flight searches on qantas.com, kayak, skyscanner, expedia and other sites you may frequent?
Are they then comparing this to your activity with other FF programs? Qantas have no clue of the share of wallet they capture from you. I have no doubt it costing them millions upon millions in lost sales.
Aside from knowing many good people from almost every major airline in the world and the insights that come from this (and to be fair many of them face similar challenges) - this same problem is clearly evident from the Platinum One thread where customers complain about QFF not knowing them.

Have you continued to send credit card points into QFF since dropping? This is a clear marker that you have remained loyal and generated them revenue in the process (it's also an indicator that you might not be flying other airlines FYI).




Given the lack of QF flights ex-Perth - where does most of your travel take you? Is there any reason to pursue QF Plat as a LTG? Keeping in mind your first 700 status credits are 'wasted' because you are already gold.

- Since first class lounges are important to you (do you really want to fly via SYD/MEL for this?)
- As you regularly transit via ME, there are more options available to you. Do you enjoy flying QR? Their status earning is similar to QF, they have soft landings and their airfares in biz/first are almost always cheaper than Qantas.
- Etihad is an option too, and they will status match you to Gold straight off the bat. You could then switch to flying VA domestically and retain lounge, priority everything etc.
- Emirates status is useful on Qantas flights too, and EK treats their Gold/Plats *EXTREMELY WELL* with upgrades.

You're not the first person to wonder which is the best direction after attaining LTG (I'm in the same boat) and there are no shortage of threads here and flyertalk where people move to better frequent flyer programs once hitting the milestone.

Hope this helps!!

Some really thoughtful comments here TtR...thank you for your input; much food for thought. Hopefully you will share your loyalty strategy going forward (past LTG) as I think you will be making some very educated and well thought through decisions which we could all learn from.


Who would have thought LTG would have brought so many (1st world) issues?

 

[verduzzo]

1. Depends on a range of factors e.g. if you wish to do status runs. For status runs positioning yourself to somewhere with a high SC earn per dollar spent (e.g. the US) would be advisable. Also keep a lookout for bonus SC offers in your email. If you get one of those it's a good time to book QANTAS marketed and operated flights covered by the promotion.
2. Yes. If you achieve WP now you will have it till at least end-Feb 2018

Personally I have always had NB status and will achieve SG for the first time this year and decided going for WP this year isn't worth it for me. Maybe if I had achieved WP before and visited the first lounges I would think differently.

Thanks mvly, we are definitely thinking along the same lines. And yes, having tasted 1st lounges it's hard to go back! Cheers, V.

 

[verduzzo]

I do have strategies I use, to keep SG but they are not popular on here, ie, its too expensive.

as long as they work for you AP!

 

[verduzzo]

[/LIST]

My strategy is to earn enough FF points so that for long haul internationals I only fly by redeeming for J or F so that I do not have to earn status.

A valid strategy and one which I would mostly adhere too if entirely self-funded travel. Cheers, V.

 

[NZflygirl]

Have you tried a spreadsheet? List your flights you know about and the potential trips you may take along with sc earn and just add them in as you go. You'll get an idea soon of whether you'll hit targets and if not it gives you time to maybe "fix" it by adding in an extra leg or positioning flight or you may choose to fly up a cabin to get extra points to hit your target. It can be painful to keep that stuff in your head!

For QF I give I pretty much give them my medium haul flights which reaches my target so I do have that one in my head but I did need to do a bit of working out of flights for fine tuning towards the end so as not to overfly them.

I'm using a spreadsheet for NZ and VA which has been helpful to determine which flights get credited to which airline as I adjust it sometimes when new trips are added in changing the balance. I'm just trialling it for the first time as I was thinking I could hit targets but it will be tight so I wanted to get things right rather than guessing. Bit geeky but so be it.

 

[medhead]

A spreadsheet is pretty much my go to method. Map out the known flights for the year, predict SC earn and then fill in the gaps. Adding extra trips to visit family and friends.

This year, I'm 30SC short of platinum, accounting for 26 known flights still to book. I've got a potential school reunion trip. Between that lot I can decide when to book a higher earning fare to make up the shortfall. Otherwise, I visit family one weekend. I don't count that as a status run, even if I'm taking an unnecessary flight because of the status, it's more about varying the timing of a family visit that will happen at some stage.

I've also had 40 non-earning flights purchased with a prize from Qantas. So when the 50% bonus SC promo came in I locked some flights to make up the short fall. Probably that is a status run, but the cost was ~$1800 to make up for a much high value of prize fares. It was cost effective.

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

How many points short of getting to the first SC in WP are you, OP?
If 120/240, you could do several domestic trips in Aust in flexY.
Or 1 return trip to NZ, between about Nov and Feb there is a 330 direct flight from PER - AKL, does not need to be J, but if you can afford it, you could do it one way J and flexY back via SYD/MEL/BNE to PER.
Does not fly everyday, but 2 days a week.
Can fly EK metal QF flight number apart from QF metal QF flight number (Jetconnect).
But with Feb, its still a long way to go, so you could still make it worthwhile, if you are able to fly outside school holidays/Dec/Jan.

 

[dfcatch]

A spreadsheet is pretty much my go to method. Map out the known flights for the year, predict SC earn and then fill in the gaps. Adding extra trips to visit family and friends.

This year, I'm 30SC short of platinum, accounting for 26 known flights still to book. I've got a potential school reunion trip. Between that lot I can decide when to book a higher earning fare to make up the shortfall. Otherwise, I visit family one weekend. I don't count that as a status run, even if I'm taking an unnecessary flight because of the status, it's more about varying the timing of a family visit that will happen at some stage.

I've also had 40 non-earning flights purchased with a prize from Qantas. So when the 50% bonus SC promo came in I locked some flights to make up the short fall. Probably that is a status run, but the cost was ~$1800 to make up for a much high value of prize fares. It was cost effective.

That school reunion is useless unless you book a JQ Plus fare

 

[medhead]

That school reunion is useless unless you book a JQ Plus fare

Highly likely if I fly from ADL, I want to get a new route. But the brain keeps saying no. Not so likely from SYD or BNE.

 

[esseeeayeenn]

Another vote for a spreadsheet.
I always look out for opportunities to break flights up into multiple sectors.
The status credit earn usually makes it worthwhile.
I also look for opportunities to book international business fares which include a domestic sector.
That is easy to do from Perth. Apart from NZ you could look into the South Pacific.
Noumea and Fiji may be the only options unless they reinstate the code shares with Air Vanuatu.
The business fares from Perth to these destinations are usually a lot less than a domestic business fare to the east coast.
They can be as low as half the fare, and they earn double the status credits.
If you book carefully you may even be able to break the domestic flight up into two sectors, earning even more SCs.
There used to be opportunities to do this to Asian destinations as well.
However, with the return of QF flights PER<->SIN, flights to Asia via SYD or MEL have become much more expensive.
Qantas expect us to fly to SIN and then connect to Jetstar flights to other Asian destinations.
They do not seem to understand (or care) that many of their most loyal PAX simply do not want to fly Jetstar under any circumstances.

 

[JohnK]

What's a status run?

You mean to tell me that BNE-SYD-MEL-KUL-SIN-CNX followed by CNX-SIN-KUL-SIN-SYD-BNE is not normal?

I try to maintain Qantas Platinum and Virgin Gold without wasting any SCs. I generally know how many domestic trips I am doing and 4-5 trips to Thailand. In those trips to Thailand I try to maximise the SCs earn by finding cheap intermediate points to utilise cheaper airfares although that's not always the case.

I have already flown/booked 90 flights for this year with a few more to come.

 

[ozmille]

I dropped to SG last year and trying to get back up to WP. I also keep a spreadsheet and with leisure travel will reach about 1000SCs, now to get some work travel booked

*edit*
my strategy is to look at the routemaps for a fare and use as many flights as the fare allows

 

[NZflygirl]

What's a status run?

You mean to tell me that BNE-SYD-MEL-KUL-SIN-CNX followed by CNX-SIN-KUL-SIN-SYD-BNE is not normal?

I try to maintain Qantas Platinum and Virgin Gold without wasting any SCs. I generally know how many domestic trips I am doing and 4-5 trips to Thailand. In those trips to Thailand I try to maximise the SCs earn by finding cheap intermediate points to utilise cheaper airfares although that's not always the case.

I have already flown/booked 90 flights for this year with a few more to come.

I think there should be an icon where the eyes have literally fallen out of it's face! But as none exist thus far, this will have to do -------------------> :shock: