I did a little bit of digging a couple of days ago when I first saw that article.
TP has gutted their partner awards with massive and unannounced devaluations in the past few years. Nevertheless, based on my research, the only decent points redemption for Ozzie’s is one-way to/from USA in Business with Emirates for 130K. And they don’t pass on fuel surcharges like Qantas does. I got excited when I discovered this, until I read further on FT that Emirates has been blocking long haul business awards to TP for a few years now.
There are some good business redemptions elsewhere, but not cracking deals. TP seems to be paying for the lowest level awards (ala Lifemiles) hence very limited availability with the decent Star Alliance carriers and destinations you want to fly to.
I didn’t look into the Star Alliance Gold status as this doesn’t interest me that much.
On the surface it seems like a great deal. But I just don’t trust TP, their booking engine, their customer service and more importantly the lack of award availability (which btw you can’t check until you have miles in your account) to take the plunge. If any anyone else does, please keep us abreast of your efforts.
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