Advice re best use of my award points.

[mutant]

I apologise if I get the terminology wrong, or if the post sounds confusing. It is my first post on this site.

My husband and I are planning to fly melb-new york early april '12 to celebrate our 10 years anniversary. Was hoping to have enough points for an upgrade to business or even the point and pay option. In the past, I tend to keep my award points and not automatically convert it into QFF until needed. It used to be 1 for 1, but this evening when I went on the website, it has been changed to 2 award points for 1 QFF. We have the platinum award where 1 dollar = 1 point. Currently I have a bit over 200,000 award points with CBA and about 8000QFF. What would you recommend to be the best way of utilising the points now that they are only worth half the usual value? Are there better cards? Your opinions would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Moopere]

I apologise if I get the terminology wrong, or if the post sounds confusing. It is my first post on this site.

I tend to keep my award points and not automatically convert it into QFF until needed. It used to be 1 for 1, but this evening when I went on the website, it has been changed to 2 award points for 1 QFF.

Mmm. I got caught in a similar way. Wasn't paying attention and suddenly realised that my ability to convert CBA award points to QFF points was gone. As things stand now, I don't think you can convert your awards points to QFF at all. You can still convert to Velocity I believe, but only at 2:1 as you mention - please correct me if I am wrong, haven't checked in a while and have a stack of points in CBA awaiting a new home.

We have the platinum award where 1 dollar = 1 point.

I've got the gold version. I've now opted for direct sweep to QFF ($10 a year for the pleasure) and that gives me 1QFF point per $ spent on the partner Amex or 0.5 points per $ on the VISA. In any event, are you talking of 1:1 for CBA points there? If so, speak with the bank as that doesn't sound right. So far as I knew the Platinum CBA Awards card should return you 3:1 CBA awards points for the amex partner card.

Currently I have a bit over 200,000 award points with CBA and about 8000QFF. What would you recommend to be the best way of utilising the points now that they are only worth half the usual value? Are there better cards? Your opinions would be greatly appreciated.

There are much better cards out there. A proper AMEX should be giving you in excess of 1QFF per $ spent. Some are up to 3:1. On the VISA/Mastercard side, you should be able to grab a 1:1 earner from someone, probably the Everyway Rewards Credit Card is still the best value for a mastercard with 1:1 QFF earn (16K free points upon join right now, $89 / yr)

I only keep my gold card because I already paid the yearly fee and I've not found a better card insurance yet. Given the caveats and general difficulty in keeping on top of the different terms and conditions of the various card insurances though I'm tempted to pay for a yearly all encompassing travel insurance and not worry about the cards. I'll probably dump my CBA card by the end of the year before renewal.

As for what to do with your 200K CBA awards, there is a thread running at the moment where some folk seem to be having good results using the CBA's rewards travel agent, who I think is currently flightcentre (if the thread can be believed). Alternatively, convert your Awards points to one of the FF programs, but the conversion is usually rubbish. I'm waiting for a 'special' to dump all my CBA points into Velocity as 2:1 is just too much to take. Velocity points are only worth about 0.7c / point to me, so at 2:1 from CBA rewards it effectively halves the rates again, 0.35c/point ... yuck!

 

[yo yo ma]

Currently I have a bit over 200,000 award points with CBA and about 8000QFF. What would you recommend to be the best way of utilising the points now that they are only worth half the usual value? Are there better cards? Your opinions would be greatly appreciated.

Moopere is correct that you are unable to convert the points to Qantas FF. You will have have use CommAwards to purchase Flight Centre vouchers if you want to use the points for travel. You need to directly sweep the points to QFF each month (costs $10pa) but you cannot sweep to 200k points... the are stuck with CommAwards which isn't necessarily a bad thing as they are not halved.

All the best with it.

 

[nickfromeastryde]

I have the CBA Platinum though just upgraded to the Diamond card (free for the first year). The CBA normally cuts my fees in half anyway. I also have the Woolworths Everyday Rewards Card which costs $89 per year. I only carry the CBA AMEX and the Woolworths Everyday Rewards Mastercard in my wallet and always use the AMEX where possible. That way I get 1.5 QFF point on the AMEX and 1 QFF point on the Mastercard for all my purchases which I think is a pretty good earn rate. I've looked around and these are pretty good points earn for the fees paid. There is probably better but it is an easy and convenient arrangements that suits me