No points to upgrade

[Hvr]

Have done virtually all of my flying on the work dollar which means virtually no FF points. However, I will soon attain Gold status and will be paying to flying overseas.

Will be flying from Tokyo to either MEL or SYD in Feb 2008, will be a mid week flight. Is there any chance of getting on ODU or not?

Is it even worth asking with only about 20,000 points and noting that it requires 46,000 points to go from discount Economy to Business?

 

[NM]

ODU is only available for domestic flights. International upgrades need to be waitlisted. If you don't have the required points in your account, then you will not be able to upgrade.

 

[Hvr]

Ok another go at trying to get the upgrade.:mrgreen:

I'm in the process of accumulating some points (Earth + is looking good) but will still need to buy about 5,000 points (currently$182.50).

Is it worth buying them and applying to be waitlisted for an upgrade? I'll be at the SG level for sure by then (am hoping to make it by mid Sept).

Is there any way of finding out if other pax of the same or higher status have already applied for a waitisted upgrade? This would be to make sure I'm not wasting time and money buying points.

Thanks

 

[kamchatsky]

Ok another go at trying to get the upgrade.:mrgreen:

I'm in the process of accumulating some points (Earth + is looking good) but will still need to buy about 5,000 points (currently$182.50).

Is it worth buying them and applying to be waitlisted for an upgrade? I'll be at the SG level for sure by then (am hoping to make it by mid Sept).

Is there any way of finding out if other pax of the same or higher status have already applied for a waitisted upgrade? This would be to make sure I'm not wasting time and money buying points.

Thanks

Just get another relative to sign up Earth+ and get them transfer points to u ...... If not possible then sign up another credit card (Qantas Amex, ANZ QFF Visa) which gives u more points ...... And yes try to use those card to accumulate points.

 

[JohnK]

Is it worth buying them and applying to be waitlisted for an upgrade? I'll be at the SG level for sure by then (am hoping to make it by mid Sept).

Only you can answer that question. Personally I would not waste FF points on upgrades. As a Gold you would stand a reasonable chance of getting an upgrade as long as the waitlist is in the system early.

Is there any way of finding out if other pax of the same or higher status have already applied for a waitisted upgrade? This would be to make sure I'm not wasting time and money buying points.

I don't think so unless you know someone at QF with access to that information.

 

[NM]

I believe you can only purchase QF FF points in order to complete an award flight booking,and the points purchased cannot exceed a certain percentage of the cost of the award flight.

As such, i do not believe you can purchase points as a general top-up to your account or for an upgrade award.

Here are the relevant sections of the QF FF program:

17. Top-up Points

17.1 If Members do not have sufficient Points to redeem a particular Award Flight, they may purchase additional Points towards that Award Flight at the rates specified by Qantas, subject to the following:

(a) the purchased Points may only be credited to that Member's account;
(b) the Points may be purchased only to redeem a specific Award Flight;
(c) each purchase must be for a minimum of 500 Points and a maximum of 20,000 Points, and in such blocks of Points as Qantas may specify;
(d) the number of Points purchased must not exceed 15% of the number of Points required for that Award Flight, rounded up to the closest multiple of 500 points;
(e) each Member may purchase additional Points only once in each twelve consecutive month period; and
(f) once Points have been purchased, they cannot be refunded (although Points used for an Award Flight that is subsequently cancelled will be credited to the Members account, less any applicable Cancellation Fee).

17.2 The purchase of additional Points does not guarantee the availability of an Award Flight.

17.3 Points do not have a monetary value. They cannot be sold, transferred or exchanged other than in accordance with the Terms and Conditions. The prices for additional Points do not represent a monetary value for Points.

 

[Dave Noble]

I believe you can only purchase QF FF points in order to complete an award flight booking,and the points purchased cannot exceed a certain percentage of the cost of the award flight.

As such, i do not believe you can purchase points as a general top-up to your account or for an upgrade award.

Here are the relevant sections of the QF FF program:

I agree that those are the terms, however there seems to be no necessity to make the points purchase in conjunction with an award booking

Dave

 

[oz_mark]

I agree that those are the terms, however there seems to be no necessity to make the points purchase in conjunction with an award booking

Dave

It seems from what I have read that Qantas has no real way of enforcing the requirement. You can say it for xx_ award and that is it.

The only real way to enforce it, would have a booking engine that implemented it as a points + pay system, that did a conversion at booking time of pay to points then booked the award.

 

[Hvr]

Have just about accumulated enough poitns and will be there when the upgrade applications open but there's another twist I have just thought about.

I'll be flying NRT-MEL-CBR, am I able to just apply for the upgrade for NRT-MEL? Or do I have to apply for the whole trip i.e. the MEL-CBR leg as well?

The flight from MEL-CBR is on a DASH 8 and may not have a business class and given it is such a short flight I really don't care.

But if required to upgrade both legs then I may be needing to aquire some more points from somewhere.

 

[NM]

I'll be flying NRT-MEL-CBR, am I able to just apply for the upgrade for NRT-MEL? Or do I have to apply for the whole trip i.e. the MEL-CBR leg as well?

Each segment must be requested separately and you can choose which segments you want to upgrade. So no problems for your situation to just waitlist for the upgrade for NRT-MEL.

 

[Hvr]

Thanks for the very quick response. That's good news.

 

[lovetravellingoz]

I believe you can only purchase QF FF points in order to complete an award flight booking,:

While what you have quoted in point b/ in the t&c is true...in practice you can buy points without booking an Award flight.


For example I have a work colleague who was only flying on work trips and not private (ie with her paying) Qantas flights.

She wanted the 2 QC invitations that you can get with the QANTAS Amex Premium card...but needed qualifying QANTAS spend to get them....but did not want to pay fora flight that she did not need.

So I advised her to buy the minimum number of points which is 500 points of QANTAS for from memeory $20......which then gave her the 2 QC invitations...plus the 2500 points for qualifying QANTAS spend. Net result was 3000 points for & 2 Invitations for $20 . She would not have bought a flight before her 12 months was up.,,and would not have otherwise earnt the 2500 bonus points.

She has not redeemed for any flights yet.