Are Qantas Flight Reward Tables an “estimate” only?

boxjelly5

Junior Member
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Aug 7, 2014
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38
I would appreciate any advice on this advice I received in writing from Qantas.
In May 2022 I booked a Partner Classic Flight Reward flying only JAL and the one way miles are approximately 14000 (less than 15000). I used Qantas’s published Partner Classic Flight Reward Table and ensured I met the conditions. I have successfully made One World Classic Flight Reward flights and am familiar with the processes involved.

As I could not complete the entire booking online I rang Qantas and the assistant was helpful but put me on hold a few times to seek advice. I had personally found the J reward seats on the flights and dates I wanted and so I provided her with all the details she needed.

She booked the seats and calculated the taxes and points. She quoted the required points as 226200 points each for my wife and I. I pointed out that according to Qantas published Partner Reward Table I was meeting all the requirements of one partner airline and flying less than 15000 miles so according to the table the points required should be 159000 points each. She seemed unsure about this and no progress was made. I said I did not want to risk losing those seats so I said I would proceed with her calculation and that I would dispute the points charged separately with Qantas.

I immediately lodged an email query with Qantas on earning this matter and received a reference number. Six weeks later I have still not received a reply so I called Qantas today to re raise the question. I then received an email from Qantas stating “ the partner airline table is just an estimate guideline”.

I have read all the terms and conditions and can find nothing that suggests these quite specific tables are just “estimates” of the points required if conditions are met.

Does anyone have any knowledge on this or advice on how I can contact someone in Qantas who can confirm the tables cannot be relied upon?
 
I would appreciate any advice on this advice I received in writing from Qantas.
In May 2022 I booked a Partner Classic Flight Reward flying only JAL and the one way miles are approximately 14000 (less than 15000). I used Qantas’s published Partner Classic Flight Reward Table and ensured I met the conditions. I have successfully made One World Classic Flight Reward flights and am familiar with the processes involved.

As I could not complete the entire booking online I rang Qantas and the assistant was helpful but put me on hold a few times to seek advice. I had personally found the J reward seats on the flights and dates I wanted and so I provided her with all the details she needed.

She booked the seats and calculated the taxes and points. She quoted the required points as 226200 points each for my wife and I. I pointed out that according to Qantas published Partner Reward Table I was meeting all the requirements of one partner airline and flying less than 15000 miles so according to the table the points required should be 159000 points each. She seemed unsure about this and no progress was made. I said I did not want to risk losing those seats so I said I would proceed with her calculation and that I would dispute the points charged separately with Qantas.

I immediately lodged an email query with Qantas on earning this matter and received a reference number. Six weeks later I have still not received a reply so I called Qantas today to re raise the question. I then received an email from Qantas stating “ the partner airline table is just an estimate guideline”.

I have read all the terms and conditions and can find nothing that suggests these quite specific tables are just “estimates” of the points required if conditions are met.

Does anyone have any knowledge on this or advice on how I can contact someone in Qantas who can confirm the tables cannot be relied upon?
You’ve mentioned “partner classic flight award”, then later “one world classic flight award”.

These are different and have different pricing.

To offer advice, we would need to know which you’ve booked along with the routing and carriers.
 
You’ve mentioned “partner classic flight award”, then later “one world classic flight award”.

These are different and have different pricing.

To offer advice, we would need to know which you’ve booked along with the routing and carriers.
Yes. I mentioned that I have successfully used the One World Classic Flight Reward Tables before.
This enquiry relates to the Partner Classic Flight Reward Table and my itinerary is BKK- HND-CTS- - NRT- SEA- - SFO-HND. All flights are with JAL flying J class.
 
I suspect you've been charged for a points plus pay award not a classic award.
It would be helpful to have the itinerary and extra information, so we can work out the possibilities.
Can you see the fare class in the booking flight details? Next to "Travel Class" it will say something like "Business (I)" what is that letter?
The tables are most certainly not estimates.

I was wrong
You’ve mentioned “partner classic flight award”, then later “one world classic flight award”.

These are different and have different pricing.

To offer advice, we would need to know which you’ve booked along with the routing and carriers.
Well a one world classic flight reward for 14000 miles is 238,400 plus service fee is more than the 226000 quoted by the OP. The OP only referred to JAL, so I'm not sure how they'd meet the 3 airline requirement.
 
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Ahh. Thanks for that. So a major difference between the partner flight reward table and the one world is that any stopover on the partner one re-sets the calculation. Maybe I should just fly RTW then.
 
Ahh. Thanks for that. So a major difference between the partner flight reward table and the one world is that any stopover on the partner one re-sets the calculation. Maybe I should just fly RTW then.
Correct.

The other difference, although not applicable in your case, is that any swapping between partner award tables will re-set the calculation, even if a single ‘trip’… so AA ORD-JFK-LHR prices as a single award based on distance, AA ORD-JFK connecting immediately to BA JFK-LHR will price as two separate award components. With OWA there’s no penalty for swapping carriers.
 
I just booked a partner airline reward with BA from AMS-BAH and it was cheaper in business than premium economy
View attachment 284076
Looks like a pricing error in that they have used sector prices for business class AMS-LHR connecting to premium economy LHR-BAH. Those would be 20k and 48500k respectively, totalling 68500.

In theory the fare should default to the highest fare applicable, which would be 61.5k for business as determined by the AMS-BAH distance, but with a ‘downgrade’ to PEY for LHR-AUH. Or it should have priced at 48.5K with a downgrade on the AMS—LHR sector to economy,

But with either of those options, it makes sense to do business the whole way for the few extra points.
 
I just booked a partner airline reward with BA from AMS-BAH and it was cheaper in business than premium economy
View attachment 284076
In my experience when using the new booking engine (i.e. not the multi-city classic rewards one), if you actually had selected premium economy and pressed next, the system would've repriced your flight to the correct price, and you would've gotten a prompt like this. This usually happens when either your booking is mixed-class (AMS to LHR has no PE), or your itinerary could be priced as a OneWorld Award instead.

1657439816842.png
 

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