Today's Learnings (MH Flexible Earn on QF & Combined Classic Reward Bookings)

[AustraliaPoochie]

Ideally, going out from BNE - SYD, I would do a rev/award tix the day before.
On the way back, maybe 4 to 5 to 6 hours buffer would be ok.
Hard to say what QFF would do, they might cancel flights, or change the timings.
QFF for the time being, despite the email from who we call AJ is about the wow factor, or how QF is doing, realistically, things can be/get cancelled, or retimed.
As the flights are on different PNR, the 6 alphanumercal code, QFF would not know of the 2 (of the link to your int flight), so that is why I say go down the day before, Rydges hotel at T1 is very close to the terminal, very good too, not cheap.
You will have to get from T3 if QF or T2 if JQ, down, and then use your credit card to get across to T1, by train or bus.
If you do want a cheap option, the Ibis Budget is ok, for overnight in SYD, but you would need to defo book a taxi for the trip across, don't do like what I did, ie, walk from Ibis Budget to taxi rank at T2/T3 SYD airport, thinking that there would be taxis at 5.30am there, none to be seen, none were at the rank or at the parking spot nearby.
Had to phone up a phone number, for Adelaide cabs, that I didn't know didn't have a presense in SYD, but lucky a white van came in the end, don't know if it was an uber, but the Adelaide taxi company I rang, must have passed my call to Sydney uber, I paid the driver, he had my mobile phone number, so I knew he was kosher.
Afternoon/evening flight down, and then to T1 that night, stay at Rydges, then go to T1 at dawn, or when check in opens.
Coming back from SYD - BNE, you will have to clear customs and immi in SYD, so 4/5/6 hours is best for unlinked tix from T1 QFi to T2 JQ/T3QFd.
***
What is your QFF status, for domestic flights, award upgrades can be confirmed immediately if there are award U subclasses, either coming down or going home, ie BNE - SYD/SYD - BNE.
Status is not so important on QFd flights, but on QFi flights, higher grade QFF status members will have first dibs at upgrades.
You will be flying with LATAM, not QF, so you will need to check in with LATAM in SYD.
Even if you can do OLCI, you will most likely have to still present your Aust/overseas passport to be swiped on the LATAM check in system, ...
If linked PNR, you can do this in BNE, but as its separate, you will have to do it yourself.
QF transfer bus at gate 15 needs a BP to get across, but as yours is the next day, it will be harder to get.
If you can bear with min bags, its best.
You can get the first flight from BNE - SYD at 5.30am, to get to SYD at 7am, and then go across by 11.15am for the LATAM flight to SCL, then EZE.
Your flight will be via AKL, just so you know, but AKL airport is an easy int - int transfer system.

 

[baarg]

Thanks so much AustraliaPoochie for such a comprehensive response!
I was thinking it'd be best to go the day before too, and had checked cost of Rydges cos it's just there at the int terminal, it's not cheap but cheaper than getting the flights from bne which would have increased cost of flights by 2k, for two people. Ridiculous. If I get the rewards flights it'll be around 180 for two pax return so it's still more affordable than a whole ticket from bne. So, if for whatever reason I have to change the reward seats though, is that possible with 6k points for each? Or at the airport, doesn't Qantas sometimes change them if you ask? I had a look at the terms and conditions and it looks like I can change them with 6k points but seeking for info cos I have no experience. Status is bronze, so it'll get me nowhere in terms of customer service but using the points would make the trip more affordable than getting separate fully flex tax (checked jetstar and it'd be about 600 because luggage is additional)...with reward seats this seems to be included.
Trip is with Qantas, qf27 and qf28, chose it cos these flights are direct to SCL from Syd. Latam has the option direct to Akl from Bne but missed on those, sold out the first few hours and don't want to do bne, syd, akl, scl and eze!
Cheers again

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

24 hrs prior to flight, airport can't change things.
In BNE QFd checkin, they will not know through their system that you are going to go onto an int flight, as its on a different PNR, apart from you telling them.
Its minimum airport staffing with QF these days, its more or less DIY now.
Maybe if you are lucky, and things go pear shaped, someone can help, but from being on here for years now, and the sentiment of others, most of the time, you are left to your own devices.
If this trip to South America is important, just buy a flex tix, as early as you can to dep BNE, coming back might be, 2nd last flight, or 3rd last SYD - BNE.
With QFF, for dom flights, if there are U subclass tix, the earlier you book, the better, if reward upgrade/pure reward seat, points upgrade or upgrade me bid offer.
On the same PNR, QF/QFF will put you both on the first flight of the day, dep BNE at 6am, getting to SYD at 8.25am, *edit 7.35am* for the 10.45am flight to AKL then SCL, very tight squeeze as in regards to time to change terminals in SYD, but to QF, 1.5 hours is enough, to a person who has done it several times, 1.5 hrs is very tight.
Personally, I would buy a flexY tix or discY now, for the dom sector to fly up the night before, but if you want to save accom, you could get the first flight out of BNE and hopefully make the trek from SYD T3(QF), T2 (JQ/VA/ZL) to T1.
Both SYD T2 and T3 are the same distance from T1, so you could get ZL if you want el cheapo, or JQ, or VA, but in the end, you will still need to make the trek to SYD T1, very few JQi flight might fly from BNE - SYD T1, haven't seen a lot of late, but they used to have a few years back.
Ok, I have waffled on too much, to sum up, book the dom flights now.
Major edit: sorry.
Ah, I see, its the direct QF SYD - EZE, unless you are higher up QFF status members, if you try to call up to join the dom flights to the int sector, if you are unlucky, you will get a outsourced QFF agent, who might or might not be able to assist.
If you are WP/P1, you usually get HBA, or AKL, if lower QFF status, you get Fiji/Manila/South Africa call center answering.
Best of luck if you want to try and join the dom sector to the int, too complicated, they might have to cancel and restart.
Best these days, just to do what ever is easier, ie, just book a flexY fare the day before, and touch wood that you make it, the int sector that is.

 

[baarg]

Thanks so much, I didn't know I could call to join the sectors, it's useful info but I agree that with the way Qantas' call centres work nowadays it's a bit risky. I've had really bad experiences early last year with Qantas and its call centres. Still choosing Qantas out of the two options to South America (that don't go over 40hs flights) so will likely need to go for safest bet for the Dom flights and get fully flex to avoid headaches. I thought that reward flights allowed some flexibility and changes but if too hard and risky probably not a great idea. Thanks so much again

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

So long as you are aware that things can go wrong, if on a married sector, ie, joined PNR or same PNR, its up to QFF to "solve", but with no one on the outsourced side taking responsibility, neither is QF (its own staff, when things go deep pear shaped), its hard to know who to rely upon.
Ideally, we should have someone or at least a group at QF/QFF who will take ultimate responsibility or help, but with all the "bad" news of late, due to cancellations at QF, its just too scary to think about it.
Best of luck anyway.
Edit: years back, we used to have a QF liaison on here, and she was a great help, an inside ear, so to speak, when things go wrong, and QF listened to her, and did thing to solve problems when they arise, or she would at least make QF aware.
She left, the post on here, wasn't paid by QF, but she was here on their ok, she left, the post wasn't filled, and left it at that.
So when bookings now disappear, when the simplest request is made, you know who ends up facing it, yep, the member on here themselves, the horror stories might still be around, on some older post.
***
Not mine, but just have a read:

Qantas puts a 13-month-old baby on a separate flight to her PARENTS

A young couple was horrified when Qantas rescheduled their 13-month-old daughter onto a different flight - and then spent 20 hours on hold trying to change it.

www.dailymail.co.uk

 

[baarg]

Yes, unfortunately Qantas is nowhere near what it used to be. And customer service in general, everywhere, isn't either. Not enough staff and not enough training, lots of do it yourself for the client and zero accountability. The model seems to work for organisations and it's spreading. Anyway, that's a different topic ha ha thanks for your useful insights.

 

[PineappleSkip]

I have a similar situation to yours, @baarg. Booked on an 8:15 JL flight ex SYD and have separately booked a Y awards flight BNE-SYD the afternoon before, and a night in Rydges at T1, to save $1,000s on the JL fare. I fly BNE-SYD a lot and have been the subject of several award and revenue flight cancellations on BNE-SYD, and always been computer rebooked on a flight within an hour or two of the original. And of course no 5,000 point fee for an involuntary change.

I have called to insert a link between the two separately ticketed bookings in the past, but not this time as I rated QF call centre ‘avoid like the plague’ after covid.

With the large number of flights on that sector, the cancellation-missed connection risk is low if you fly down day before. There are few award seats in J but normally heaps in several flights in Y. The only exception would be if everything is booked on the day of cancellation, e.g. a key football game on, and you don’t have status and thus priority for reconnects. These dates can usually be discerned by looking at seat availability weeks before the flight.

Cheers skip

 

[baarg]

Oh, just read the article shared by @AustraliaPoochie Although not as bad as it happened to this couple, last time I flew with Latam in August, for one of the legs of our flights, they sat my son on a seat separate to mine, despite there being a spare seat next to me! On that occasion, I booked through Flight Centre and the TA had to call Latam and be on the phone for ages pleading them to sit my son next to me... and they still didn't do it! They said it was the cheapest fare and we needed to pay to choose the seat! Ridiculous. Flight Centre ended up paying for it, it wasn't much, but Latam's lack of common sense and flexibility was mind boggling. I understand paying for the seat, but not for a minor to be seated next to their parent! Luckily things went well after that, although their food is terrible.

 

[baarg]

Great info @PineappleSkip sounds reasonable. I did think of doing exactly that, because there is plenty of availability of flights and go the day before, etc. On the way back, I am not too sure what to do yet. In case something happens to the return flight and I am unable to change it while in transit or whatever.

 

[Qantas747]

Glad to read this thread and see others having the same issue. I had booked an MH Economy Flex to get the last few SCs to requalify, and hadn't realised that they would have 0 SC earn.

I have found that the best way (as far as I can see) that I can do some intra-Asian flights with some control over fare classes is by booking them as separate tickets, which is allowing me to get different fare classes to those that I would get if I booked in a single itinerary (e.g. CGK-KUL, KUL-BKK, rather than CGK-KUL-BKK).

I also note that MH will check baggage through on separate MH or OW tickets, which saves going through immigration at KUL.

Until I can find a way to select specific fare classes, it seems this might be the way to go!

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

With regards to MH and QFF earn, no way to play around it, or to work around it.
Earn rates of QFF points and QFF SC when it comes to MH has been low, like this for quite a long time now, and I don't see any changes.
Not sure as to at what point in the past, but probably when QF decided to put in a very big involvement with 3K ie, JQ Asia.
They want people to use 3K effectively, so MH earn rates have been low.
Even if you flew MH J around Asia, when it involves QFF, earn rates are quite low.
Fares probably in MYR would be a good thing, compared with Aud, Aud$ does buy a lot of MYR, advantageous if you earn your $ outside Malaysia.

 

[serfty]

With regards to MH and QFF earn, no way to play around it, or to work around it.

A good TA will be generally able to avoid non earning fares.

 

[kpro]

As far as I know all revenue J fares you purchase from the MH website will earn points and status credits. So that's a guaranteed way of purchasing an eligible flight.

It's a fair chunk more expensive though.

 

[jase05]

As far as I know all revenue J fares you purchase from the MH website will earn points and status credits. So that's a guaranteed way of purchasing an eligible flight.

It's a fair chunk more expensive though.

They just earn you a pathetic rate if crediting to QF

 

[AustraliaPoochie]

As Jase05 mentioned, its skewed to be disadvantageous to put to QFF.
Better to put to maybe Avios or Enrich, and then use either Aviso or Enrich points in their own airline.
If you look at it, within OW, MH is the only one that has a J cabin, you can fly 3K, but that has no J cabin, Air Asia D7 within Asia does not have a J cabin either.
So, if a person wanted to fly with a bit of "lux", MH is the only one.
But if you book an MH J seat, and put points to QFF, you will earn at flex Y rates, but if you buy a flexY fare, you earn nothing.
If you book an MH discY fare, you will earn discY rates in QFF.
For anyone reading this in future, and want to travel intra Asia with MH in J, and want to earn points, put to either Avios or to Enrich or to another OW program that you are a member of.
Or if wanting to earn in QFF, expect a very earn rate.
And its not only flights into or out of Aust that's like this, QFF have dictated that even routes with MH from Aust to KUL to LHR, will earn at low rates.
The QFF points calculator will show the low earn rates, if you pick MH as a partner airline.

 

[PineappleSkip]

if you buy a flexY fare, you earn nothing.
If you book an MH discY fare, you will earn discY rates in QFF.

???? This doesn't look right

cheers skip

 

[Vic]

The thread highlights a couple of things.
1. Personally, I will almost never book a return domestic flight. There's almost no need to do so since they removed things like stay Saturday night discounts. etc.

2. The MH earning was gutted around about simpler and fairer and when EK came on board.
I was getting decent earn SYD-xKUL-CDG in 2015 (60 + 80 SC) in D. In 2016 50 SC KUL- SYD D fare.
Now down to 30 SC on the same route.

MEL-KUL on L fare got me 0 in 2016 (but it was an award). The same award in 2015 got 15 SC on an L fare.

Those were the days earning on awards...

3. Using a generic 'J' for business can be confusing when it comes to the detail of ICDZJ fares.

 

[kpro]

With MH, there's so many factors involved that you really need to de-couple the cabin you're in, the fare type you selected on the MH website, and the earn category for QFF.

From what I gathered from this and other threads, MH isn't using the fare codes as a way to distinguish flexibility of your booking.

• Regardless of whether you book Economy Lite, Economy Basic and Economy Flex on the MH website, the airline may put you in a a non-earning economy code for QFF.
• Similarly, booking Business Basic or Business Flex on the MH website may only result in a fare code that earns as Flexible Economy on QFF.
• For flights where QF think they have a competitive route^, there are no fares at all for MH that will earn above Flexible Economy.
• It's not possible to tell what the underlying fare code is when booking on the the MH website.

^Flights between Australia and Malaysia, UK or Europe*; New Zealand and Malaysia, UK or Europe*; and Malaysia and UK, Europe* or Middle East
* Europe includes Turkey.

 

[kpro]

2. The MH earning was gutted around about simpler and fairer and when EK came on board.

Although the EK partnership probably has something to do with it, MH joining oneworld predates the QF/EK partnership by a few months.

The intra-asia points/status earn devaluation is a relatively new thing that was implemented in August 2022. Prior to COVID, there used to be many AFF'ers using discount MH J fares as status runs.

 

[Vic]

Although the EK partnership probably has something to do with it, MH joining oneworld predates the QF/EK partnership by a few months.

The intra-asia points/status earn devaluation is a relatively new thing that was implemented in August 2022. Prior to COVID, there used to be many AFF'ers using discount MH J fares as status runs.

I think that's my point, the earning was pretty ok initially. Then it reduced for "the kangaroo route" at about the same time as the EK partnership on "the kangaroo route". I agree 100% the cuts for MH was all about the EK partnership, or maybe that should be my opinion.

Moving I and Z in 2022 is just a refinement of the same cough... IMO.
I also note that P has completely disappeared from 1 August 2022. I know the existent is MH first is very questionable, but assuming it's still a thing* given A and F are still in the earning table.
Imagine buying First and getting ZERO.

As for fare classes, my recollection is that the MH website actually gave the fare class before you purchased. Maybe that's changed since they moved to Amadeus. But this was how I got MH awards that I knew would earn on QF, back in the day. Certainly devaluation of QF earning on MH can't have been helped by people earning on MH awards.

*I thought I saw an advertisement for their A380 restarting, or maybe it was an a350 to LHR