Rookie QFF Question About Economy legs on J Class Reward Flight

[homeister]

I want to thank members in advance for any helpful advice to my extreme noob QFF question:
I am exploring booking my first Business class flight using my points. I wish to travel Syd>Paris and return Rome>Syd
The website shows the Syd to HK flight will be in Economy while I will be in J (as desired and available) from HK to Paris. Similarly, there is J availability from Rome to Shanghai but from Shanghai to Sydney that leg will be in Economy.
Why can't my entire journey be in Y? Are there any tips or solutions to avoid making half the trip in Economy?

 

[Hvr]

This is a sad part of the QF booking engine and a well known fault. There have even been examples where the shortest leg is in J and the long leg(s) is in Y. Also, the whole journey will be charged as a J trip.

 

[homeister]

This is a sad part of the QF booking engine and a well known fault. There have even been examples where the shortest leg is in J and the long leg(s) is in Y. Also, the whole journey will be charged as a J trip.

Do you mean if I call them and do it over the phone it can be done? Or that the website is correct and half my trip legs will be in Y?

 

[oz_mark]

This is a sad part of the QF booking engine and a well known fault. There have even been examples where the shortest leg is in J and the long leg(s) is in Y. Also, the whole journey will be charged as a J trip.

So people keep saying, but can you provide an example of where it is charged fully as a J trip?

 

[serfty]

So people keep saying, but can you provide an example of where it is charged fully as a J trip?

It has been so in the past over different periods. Currently it appears to be using a pro-rata points cost.

 

[opusman]

It seems like the booking engine no longer offers domestic-in-J, international-in-Y which was the biggest problem with the old system.

 

[Pushka]

It seems like the booking engine no longer offers domestic-in-J, international-in-Y which was the biggest problem with the old system.

I’ve found that it might offer a short international leg in J and the longhaul overnight flight in Y.

 

[levelnine]

Are there any tips or solutions to avoid making half the trip in Economy?

It appears none of the responses have actually answered your question yet.

The reason that the Qantas website shows half of your flight in Business and the other half in Economy is because there are not Business class seats available for both flights. On the Economy flight, only Economy seats are left for redemption using points.

The only way to avoid this is to keep searching for a route where both legs are in Business class. To do that, search for different days and search for different routes. Instead of Sydney - Paris, try Adelaide - Amsterdam, Brisbane - Nice, etc etc etc.

 

[Pushka]

It appears none of the responses have actually answered your question yet.

The reason that the Qantas website shows half of your flight in Business and the other half in Economy is because there are not Business class seats available for both flights. On the Economy flight, only Economy seats are left for redemption using points.

The only way to avoid this is to keep searching for a route where both legs are in Business class. To do that, search for different days and search for different routes. Instead of Sydney - Paris, try Adelaide - Amsterdam, Brisbane - Nice, etc etc etc.

And that would be because we can’t work out how to get Qantas IT to do that either. It’s usually the getting out of Australia leg that causes the Y flight which is of course, the long flight if searching via Dubai and Doha. Qatar is scarce these days and I’ve had little luck on anything but CX out of Adelaide for flights in July next year and I started as soon as flights were released. They never appeared.

 

[Fergo747]

Not sure how you're searching but the best way I find to avoid this is to use multi-city tool and flexible dates. Then you can effectively 'filter' based on the days that are not showing J availability to avoid the disappointment of thinking you've found it and then find that 50% of your journey is in Y

 

[Hillbilly64]

Not sure how you're searching but the best way I find to avoid this is to use multi-city tool and flexible dates. Then you can effectively 'filter' based on the days that are not showing J availability to avoid the disappointment of thinking you've found it and then find that 50% of your journey is in Y

And you may have to book one leg when the seats are released and go back and book another leg later on.

In the past month I have booked BNE-SIN (Emirates F) SIN-NRT-SFO (JAL J/F)
But I had to book the SIN-NAR-SFO leg first (JAL releases them really early) and them come back and book the BNE-SIN leg a few weeks later.
Similar on the way home, I have booked my LAX-NAR (with SQ F) but have to wait until QF open up the award flights home to book those.

Once you work out what airlines release the award seats when you will get a good idea of when to book. I chose to go through Japan, but I have seen F/J awards with Emirates via Dubai to the UK - but it is easier to find them in a multi city booking.