Emirates or Qantas or something else???

[FromTheRail]

My Wife and myself will be emigrating to Perth in September so I thought I would join up to get some info about various flights/airlines.

I was all set to be joining the Emirates Skywards program but since looking I have heard about the Qantas partnership so I am wondering which will be best.

We would be looking to use the points for upgrades when going back to the UK, either to Glasgow or Dublin and driving up to N. Ireland.

We are also looking at using partner credit cards etc to gain the maximum amount of points as we plan to go home at least once a year.

So, which program should we concentrate earning points.


edit: could getting an Amex and putting as much of the emigration cost on them be helpful?

 

[FromTheRail]

it also seems cheaper to buy the tickets through Qantas than from Emirates, any reason for this??

 

[Jack_OC]

I was all set to be joining the Emirates Skywards program but since looking I have heard about the Qantas partnership so I am wondering which will be best.

I would definitely join the Qantas FF program before you leave, as it's free to join from abroad, but it will cost you $82.50 each to join once you get here. Whether or not you should make it your main FF program or not is another matter, but if it costs nothing .......

We would be looking to use the points for upgrades when going back to the UK, either to Glasgow or Dublin and driving up to N. Ireland.

Do you mean you will sometimes be going to NI or you would be willing to fly in to DUB and then drive/boat/drive from there to Dundee? If the latter, why on earth would you do that??!

A word of caution, I believe that there is often limited availability of upgrades using points with Qantas long haul. Not sure about Emirates, but someone on here can probably advise.

Etihad/Virgin Australia is also worth considering, although it's not ideal from Perth as you'd have to fly to MEL or SYD first. On the plus side though, Etihad is a great airline, upgrade and reward availability is very good, and it's relatively easy to get elite status. They also now have a link up with Aer Lingus, which allows you to connect from DUB to Glasgow, Edinburgh or Aberdeen.

And the other one is Singapore Airlines, and if I was in Perth I'd probably lean that way. I believe you can fly into Edinburgh via Frankfurt (Lufthansa on the last leg).

One other question, do you expect to do a lot of domestic travel in Aus? If so, with which airline? Bear in mind that for work travel you may or may not have a choice of which airline to use. It's important to consider this though, as (a) you can earn a lot of points flying from PER to other major Australian cities and (b) you want to make sure any status you get allows you lounge access etc domestically. In other words, if you expect to do a lot of domestic travel with QF, then choose QFF or Skywards. But if you will travel a lot with VA, status with Etihad or Singapore is recognised by VA.

We are also looking at using partner credit cards etc to gain the maximum amount of points as we plan to go home at least once a year.
edit: could getting an Amex and putting as much of the emigration cost on them be helpful?

Yes, definitely. In Australia, Amex MR points can be transferred to a number of airline FF programs, including Etihad, Virgin Australia and Singapore Airlines, but NOT Qantas or Emirates. Not sure if it will be the same deal if you take the Amex card out in the UK.

Generally speaking, you can only earn Qantas FF points with a Qantas direct earn credit card these days, and not sure if you will be able to get one of those before you move here.

 

[FromTheRail]

To answer above, my wife is from NI so flying into Dublin is no problem as the train service up is great.

We have not thought much about travel in Aus yet, but would be handy to tie it into the long haul FF deal, if not its not a big deal. Its a shame no MR can be put into the Qantas/Emirates program, we are going to spending a lot on shipping etc and some final holidays with friends before we go so it would have been handy to get some points from that. A thought could be to get an Amex and use the MR for another program for internal flights in Aus or from the UK.

We would prefer to use the Qantas/Emirates route to either Glasgow or Dublin due to it cutting out an extra flight and missing London.

 

[markis10]

You might want to look at adding a walkabout pass to your qantas one way booking, which will allow you some cheap travel in Australia compared to what you can pay here on arrival, with a little bit of planning.

Australia & New Zealand Walkabout Pass


Perth to Sydney is normally $250 at best one way versus £98 + taxes on the Airpass.

 

[Jack_OC]

To answer above, my wife is from NI so flying into Dublin is no problem as the train service up is great.

Ok, that makes sense!

We would prefer to use the Qantas/Emirates route to either Glasgow or Dublin due to it cutting out an extra flight and missing London.

Yeah, I hear you. I'm originally from Dublin and I can't tell you how much I value not having to go via Heathrow! And 2 flights instead of 3 is obviously nice too. Having said that, for reasons that I won't bore you with, I am now going to be earning a lot of points on a credit card that I can't transfer to Etihad. As such, next time I go back, I may be looking at Singapore, despite the fact that it means an extra flight, and maybe Heathrow as well. The bottom line is, I would prefer a free business class seat/free upgrade on a less convenient route, compared to an economy seat on my route of choice, especially when the alternative airline is as good as Singapore.

If I was you, I would investigate further the likelihood of getting upgrades with Qantas before you commit, as there is not much point in amassing a lot of points with QFF if you are unlikely to be able to use them for your preferred option. The best place to find out more is the QF forum on this site - there is an unbelievable amount of experience and expertise there, and a lot of people might not see your post in this section. I have never actually tried to use QF points for international upgrades, so I'm not speaking from experience when I say I believe upgrade availability with QF can be limited, and there are definitely far better qualified people than I to advise you on that side of things.

If you are going to focus on QF/Emirates though, you're probably better going with QFF. Partly because you will be more likely to get looked after when flying on QF operated flights, and partly because there are other ways of earning QF points here - e.g. a supermarket rewards scheme (Woolworths) and many restaurants, hotels, retailers etc, in addition to credit cards. And as I said you might end up travelling with QF for work. But having said that, I don't know how the earn/burn rates between QFF and Skywards compare, so maybe look into that too.

All the best anyway.

 

[FromTheRail]

cheers for the info and the hints, i'm new to points collecting so i'm trying to take in as much info/recommendations as possible.

I've flown Singapore before in 2005 so know the standards of them, apart from they stuck me in an exit seat which has less leg room than a normal seat due to the inner door sticking out, being 6ft 5" it was a bit of a hassle, in the end they moved to old couple next to me and i moved across one.

I like the idea of 3 flight if there is a very good chance of an upgrade versus just a small chance of one on 2 flights.

 

[EuroFlyer]

Hi,
I'm originally from Ireland too. I think one of the best value options would be virgin/etihad.
You can join velocity free and set up family pooling. When you do you and your wife can pool your status credits and points into one account, this would get one of you to gold for example allot faster, plus its easier/quicker to get to velocity gold than QF gold. Virgin have some pretty good offers at the moment in terms of credit cards offers such as 30K points bonus sign up and 4 2for1 flights each year for $129. Like mentioned before though currently etihad dont fly to perth but you can fly out of Mel/Syd to abu dabhi and direct to dublin. Etihad have a excellent lounge in Dublin in fact one of the best iv seen in Europe and think its better than the BA 1st lounge in heathrow T3..

Any more questions drop me a pm and be glad to help.

Oh one last thing really worth checking this out, for 1875 USD got a first class ticket from Mel - Dub on Qantas and BA, not too shabby at all, if you set up a account for you and your wofe and both ourchase the 60000 miles plus 30000 bonus youd both have enough points to fly home to dub in F, a tickets worth almost $10K if you were to pay cash, just a thought anyhow.
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....advantage/now-50-bonus-miles-until-47141.html

Cheers,

My Wife and myself will be emigrating to Perth in September so I thought I would join up to get some info about various flights/airlines.

I was all set to be joining the Emirates Skywards program but since looking I have heard about the Qantas partnership so I am wondering which will be best.

We would be looking to use the points for upgrades when going back to the UK, either to Glasgow or Dublin and driving up to N. Ireland.

We are also looking at using partner credit cards etc to gain the maximum amount of points as we plan to go home at least once a year.

So, which program should we concentrate earning points.


edit: could getting an Amex and putting as much of the emigration cost on them be helpful?