Qantas ff row ticket

[Mystic]

I have 280000 Qantas FF points which I would like to book a RTW tickets for 2 people but the taxes for the trip will be over$1000. I am wondering would we be better booking a return ticket to London/ Europe . We are planning cruising from Copenhagen then making our way to Rome for another cruise before returning home to Australia and up grading to business class for the flights. Any suggestions greatly appreciated
Gwen

 

[mannej]

You are aware that upgrading on QFi flights is a lottery.

As a NB, you are at the bottom of the priority upgrades wise, so don't get your hopes up.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

I have 280000 Qantas FF points which I would like to book a RTW tickets for 2 people but the taxes for the trip will be over$1000. I am wondering would we be better booking a return ticket to London/ Europe . We are planning cruising from Copenhagen then making our way to Rome for another cruise before returning home to Australia and up grading to business class for the flights. Any suggestions greatly appreciated
Gwen

Hi and welcome to AFF.

I would be looking carefully at available airfares compared to any savings with your FF points.

Considering QF had early bird specials to Europe for $1600 or so per person... your hard earned 140,000 points will save you around $600. Doesn't seem like good value.

Are you committed to a RTW ticket. your points may offer slightly better value for that. But not necessarily.

 

[Mattg]

The 280,000 point oneworld award is excellent value if you are planning a proposer RTW trip, not so much for just going to Europe and back. If you just want to fly to Europe then straight back to Aus, you are probably better off paying cash and trying to upgrade - although of course the upgrade is not guaranteed. You would be more likely to have success in off-peak travel times though.

If you want to book a oneworld award, why not travel home via North and/or South America? Or visit South Africa? All possibilities for only a little bit more than booking a return flight Sydney-London. And if you book in J, there's no lottery involved.

 

[Mystic]

Thank you for the suggestion of travel via Sth Africa/USA We would be happy to travel this way but travel insurance costs can be prohibitive when your age is over 70 yrs and have past Heart Surgery. I would love to go that way and go on a Alaskan cruise.
We will probable have a few days in China.

 

[Mattg]

Thank you for the suggestion of travel via Sth Africa/USA We would be happy to travel this way but travel insurance costs can be prohibitive when your age is over 70 yrs and have past Heart Surgery. I would love to go that way and go on a Alaskan cruise.
We will probable have a few days in China.

I see that you are based in North Queensland - Cairns?

The oneworld award allows for up to 5 stopovers and 35,000 miles. As long as you stick to the rules you can use it to go almost anywhere on oneworld airlines!

A return business flight from Cairns (or anywhere else on the Aus East Coast) to London will cost 256,000 points in business. However, for a 280,000 point oneworld award you could fly, in business class (as an example):

Cairns - Hong Kong - Beijing on Cathay Pacific (CX) - stopover in Beijing
Beijing - London on British Airways (BA) - stopover in London
London - Phoenix - Anchorage on British Airways/US Airways (US) - stopover in Anchorage (Alaska)
Anchorage - Dallas - Lima - Cuzco on American Airlines (AA)/LAN (LA) - stopover in Cuzco (for Machu Picchu)
Cuzco - Lima - Santiago on LA - stopover in Santiago
Santiago - Sydney - Cairns on Qantas (QF)


Purely as an example, the above itinerary would be a valid oneworld award as it has 5 stopovers and comes in at 34,522 miles. And all for 24,000 more points. The taxes might also be marginally higher but not too much. So if you want to use it to its full potential, then a oneworld award is definitely the way to go!

Finally, a quick tip: Avoiding BA and London Heathrow may reduce the taxes.

 

[Quickstatus]

Where can I get a 280k OW award?

 

[MEL_Traveller]

worth noting the OP is after two seats - not one. so that limits to 140k per person roughly - and while that's a fantastic itinerary...it's a lot of flying in economy!

 

[Mattg]

Where can I get a 280k OW award?

You can use the Qantas multi-city booking tool to search for availability but in most cases need to call Qantas to book.

Anyone who is not familiar with oneworld awards should check out this thread:
http://www.australianfrequentflyer....ogram/oneworld-award-140k-280k-420k-8228.html

worth noting the OP is after two seats - not one. so that limits to 140k per person roughly - and while that's a fantastic itinerary...it's a lot of flying in economy!

Good point - as noted the OP could buy two economy RTW awards (140,000 each plus tax). Not ideal if they wanted to fly in business. But if they didn't have enough points for 2 x J RTW awards, they wouldn't have enough for 2 x J trips to LHR either.

Another suggestion would be to book a cheap return flight to Asia and use the points on 2 x J seats Asia - London - Asia.

 

[MEL_Traveller]

Another suggestion would be to book a cheap return flight to Asia and use the points on 2 x J seats Asia - London - Asia.

that sounds like a pretty good solution!