Commiseration event - 1 year after the loss of anytime access.

[anchew]

I want to thank everyone for making me feel very welcome at my first F lounge run and AFF event. I had a wonderful time, especially seeing all the antics that goes on. I'm certainly going to try to attend more AFF events, and have Xmas in June penciled in. It was unfortunate that I couldn't make it for dinner as I had existing plans. But I did have an interesting conversation with my friend that night, which went something like this...

Friend: So where were you again when I called you?
Me: Oh, I was in the Virgin Lounge.
F: The Virgin Lounge.
M: Yep, at Melbourne Airport.
F: But I though you arrived Wednesday night.
M: Yeah, I did. I was just doing a day trip to to Sydney.
F: You flew Virgin to Sydney for the day?
M: Umm... not really. I caught a 9:30 Qantas flight to Sydney then checked into a Jetstar flight from the international terminal back to Melbourne.
F: Why?
M: Had lunch with a group of people in the First Lounge in Sydney.
F: The what lounge?
M: The First Lounge. You know that Qantas has a Business Lounge for international flights right?
F: No, but go on.
M: They also have a First Class Lounge, so we had lunch there.
F: So you can use this First Lounge because your work pays for it?
M:
F: You know, the Qantas Club thing.
M: No, you can only use the Business Lounge with the Qantas Club. You have to be Platinum for the First Lounge.
F: Oh, so it's through status.
M: Yes.
F: So you spent over $200 to fly up to Sydney for lunch?
M: Well... I only paid around $100 for my Qantas flight up, then $50 for my Jetstar flight down.
F: So you spent $150 to fly up to Sydney just to have lunch in the First Lounge.
M: Yeah, but the food's really good.
F: What? Wagyu beef or something?
M: No... I had eggs benedict, 3 lattes, champagne, salt and pepper squid, and some pavlova.

[A moment passes]

F: That's insane. YOU ARE INSANE! (Then walks off shaking his head)
M: :shock:

 

[reductionist]

By the way, I showed/mentioned this to a few people during the lunch. For those who didn't get to see it...

I've been building a replacement for the farecompare tool which was taken offline late last year. Here's a sneak peek.

instantupgra.de

I currently only retrieve data for these airports:

• LAX
• LAS
• HNL
• SFO
• SAN

The rest of the airports will be added to the data collection process this week.

After that there are still a lot of features I want to add; I got a lot of good ideas from you guys. But, if you have any immediate feedback maybe PM me?

 

[rockyroad]

By the way, I showed/mentioned this to a few people during the lunch. For those who didn't get to see it...

I've been building a replacement for the farecompare tool which was taken offline late last year. Here's a sneak peek.

instantupgra.de

I currently only retrieve data for these airports:

• LAX
• LAS
• HNL
• SFO
• SAN

The rest of the airports will be added to the data collection process this week.

After that there are still a lot of features I want to add; I got a lot of good ideas from you guys. But, if you have any immediate feedback maybe PM me?

Nice work.
HNL-PAP-HNL looks like a good SC run canidate.

 

[dfcatch]

I want to thank everyone for making me feel very welcome at my first F lounge run and AFF event. I had a wonderful time, especially seeing all the antics that goes on. I'm certainly going to try to attend more AFF events, and have Xmas in June penciled in. It was unfortunate that I couldn't make it for dinner as I had existing plans. But I did have an interesting conversation with my friend that night, which went something like this...

Friend: So where were you again when I called you?
Me: Oh, I was in the Virgin Lounge.
F: The Virgin Lounge.
M: Yep, at Melbourne Airport.
F: But I though you arrived Wednesday night.
M: Yeah, I did. I was just doing a day trip to to Sydney.
F: You flew Virgin to Sydney for the day?
M: Umm... not really. I caught a 9:30 Qantas flight to Sydney then checked into a Jetstar flight from the international terminal back to Melbourne.
F: Why?
M: Had lunch with a group of people in the First Lounge in Sydney.
F: The what lounge?
M: The First Lounge. You know that Qantas has a Business Lounge for international flights right?
F: No, but go on.
M: They also have a First Class Lounge, so we had lunch there.
F: So you can use this First Lounge because your work pays for it?
M:
F: You know, the Qantas Club thing.
M: No, you can only use the Business Lounge with the Qantas Club. You have to be Platinum for the First Lounge.
F: Oh, so it's through status.
M: Yes.
F: So you spent over $200 to fly up to Sydney for lunch?
M: Well... I only paid around $100 for my Qantas flight up, then $50 for my Jetstar flight down.
F: So you spent $150 to fly up to Sydney just to have lunch in the First Lounge.
M: Yeah, but the food's really good.
F: What? Wagyu beef or something?
M: No... I had eggs benedict, 3 lattes, champagne, salt and pepper squid, and some pavlova.

[A moment passes]

F: That's insane. YOU ARE INSANE! (Then walks off shaking his head)
M: :shock:

I resemble that conversation !!!

Although when I think about it.....

1 weekend
3 airlines
4 flights
6 lounges (CNS, SYD F, MEL DJ, MEL QF, BNE DJ, BNE QF... 7 if the HSW Exec Lounge counts)

Medhead convincing the CSM on JQ35 that Lawlass and Stark were engaged.....PRICELESS

 

[anat0l]

medhead convincing the CSM on JQ35 that Lawlass and stark were engaged.....PRICELESS

LOL indeed!


Does beg to reason why we could convince them to congratulate a (non-genuine) engagement but couldn't convince them to congratulate a birthday?!


Flew QF632 MEL-BNE J tonight. Priority boarding well and truly working at the gate, though for me had little effect as I'd boarded kind of late and got stuck in the aerobridge traffic.


Dinner was prosciutto salad; the other dish - some sort of chicken - ran out before I was served. Not a big deal, since I was heavily tossing up on selecting the salad anyway (no pun intended and for those with sick minds, not a word!)

Had the cutest baby sitting directly in front of me with mummy. Well, was probably cute until he messed up mummy with dinner (nah, who am I kidding, still cute!)

Left MEL on time but arrived in BNE about 10 minutes late thanks to BNE ATC - again!!!


Great weekend had by all; it was great to see all of you again!

 

[ozbeachbabe]

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
29 JAN 12	JQ 035 JETSTAR 28JAN12 SYDNEY/MELBOURNE	-	-	-	0	0

No magic squiggle next to JQ35 which some of you had already alluded to. Just waiting for QF8 to credit for BNE/SYD then will have to buy a cheap JASA one way or find the cheapest red-e-deal to somewhere ex BNE.

 

[Flashback]

All calls for flights right now are on the mark. In any case, we're spoilt here - which is why I'm more jumpy in most other lounges overseas.

On that note, I'd better move - my flight's at gate 8.



----------
Aust Freq Fly app: bringing this anat0l content to your mobile.

Exactly! Have just done 4 intra Euro flights and none had boarding calls in the lounges. Will be interesting to see what the AF lounge at CDG does when I head out on Tuesday.

Sent from my HTC Desire using AustFreqFly

 

[medhead]

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
29 JAN 12	JQ 035 JETSTAR 28JAN12 SYDNEY/MELBOURNE	-	-	-	0	0

No magic squiggle next to JQ35 which some of you had already alluded to. Just waiting for QF8 to credit for BNE/SYD then will have to buy a cheap JASA one way or find the cheapest red-e-deal to somewhere ex BNE.

Wow! It posted already! I'll have to check mine. There are some $69 qantas link fares available until tomorrow, IIRC.

Edit:JQ35 is there for me as well

 

[anat0l]

Wow! It posted already! I'll have to check mine. There are some $69 qantas link fares available until tomorrow, IIRC.

Yep, mine posted already as well.... also with 0 and 0 as expected.

The two J flights I had this weekend, however, have not credited. I suspect that'll be in a couple of days, with my bonus SCs to follow within a week and a half or so.

 

[Alanslegal]

Great event folks and I again apologise for my last minute cancellation, due to family related CNY stuff.

Congrats to lawlass on the big news and trippin for his big birthday milestone!

 

[awilcockson]

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
29 JAN 12	JQ 035 JETSTAR 28JAN12 SYDNEY/MELBOURNE	-	-	-	0	0

No magic squiggle next to JQ35 which some of you had already alluded to.

You should have paid the $10 for a plus fare

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
29 JAN 12	JQ 035 JETSTAR 28JAN12 SYDNEY/MELBOURNE	439	-	439	1,000	10~

 

[serfty]

You should have paid the $10 for a plus fare

I paid for a 'plus' fare but so far nothing! :-|

 

[ozbeachbabe]

You should have paid the $10 for a plus fare

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
29 JAN 12	JQ 035 JETSTAR 28JAN12 SYDNEY/MELBOURNE	439	-	439	1,000	10~

What you're talking about is a valid point when you're booking JQ35 on the JQ website. Nothing the matter with paying $10.00 when you paying for a fare however, I was doing a redemption on the QF site using the multi city tool which doesn't have those options.

Maybe if I was out of my cotton picking mind I would have but before making my decision I did a comparison between Starter & Max on the SYD/MEL sectors & came up with the following.

JASA on QF8 & Starter fare JQ35 - 24,000 points plus $113.34

JASA on QF8 & Max fare JQ35 - 24,000 points plus $357.34 - don't think so!

I looked at doing a JASA only on QF8 on QF website (& buying JQ35 on JQ website) however it would have cost points of 76,000 for the BNE/SYD opnly whereas using the multicity tool the BNE/SYD (& booking JQ35 on same pnr) JASA sector was 22,000 points which I got down to 16,000 using the slider.

 

[awilcockson]

What you're talking about is a valid point when you're booking JQ35 on the JQ website. Nothing the matter with paying $10.00 when you paying for a fare however, I was doing a redemption on the QF site using the multi city tool which doesn't have those options.

<snip>

Wow, those numbers are crazy!!

Interesting that a plus fare gets the wiggle but a starter fare doesn't ...

 

[ozbeachbabe]

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
30 JAN 12	QF 008 BUSINESS 28JAN12 BRISBANE/SYDNEY (ANY SEAT AWARD FLIGHT)	468	234	-	1,250	40

Guaranteed 1,250 point Business/First Class minimum point earn with Qantas

Eligible flight (Qantas, QantasLink or Jetstar segment) counted towards status attain/retain.

 

[Mal]

Date	Description	Base points	Cabin bonus	Status bonus	Total points	Status credits
30 JAN 12	QF 008 BUSINESS 28JAN12 BRISBANE/SYDNEY (ANY SEAT AWARD FLIGHT)	468	234	-	1,250	40

No magic squiggle?

 

[serfty]

No magic squiggle?

The "

" on the QF website comes from a .gif image file; it's not an ASCII character.

The images have not translated across correctly.

[noparse]https://www.qantas.com.au/img/icons/icon_wave.gif[/noparse]
[noparse]https://www.qantas.com.au/fflyer/images/dagger.gif[/noparse]

 

[ozbeachbabe]

No magic squiggle?

The second red cross is the magic squiggle but I don't know why it won't show as such. The first red cross is the symbol that says 1,250 is the guaranteed points earn for J class.

So just need one more squiggle flight to be SG.

 

[ozbeachbabe]

I have to say one thing that stood out is how consistently lovely the Virgin Australia Lounge Angels are no matter what city you're in.

 

[awilcockson]

I have to say one thing that stood out is how consistently lovely the Virgin Australia Lounge Angels are no matter what city you're in.

Unless you move the furniture