Velocity Points a scam? [How to Optimise award search]

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bean

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As someone who has close to 1 million points earned I am really starting to form the opinion that the whole thing is a scam. Unless I want to waste time every day trying to win the lottery of a business reward seat to L.A or Heathrow the alternative is to spend 1.3 MILLION points for just 1 single business ticket. What a joke.

Its outrageous and I think the whole marketing of the program is false advertising. They advertise x points as being able to fly you to all of these destinations-whilst omitting that they don't release adequate numbers of seats. They might as well promote you can fly to Paris for 50 points, so long as they offer a single seat for this rate in their opinion they aren't misleading the public?

Over the years I have been mindful to fly with Virgin as much as possible, earning status and points, but for what? In the end all it really gives me is a priority queue....leading to a 18 year old who is in a bad mood and takes her frustration out on me by claiming my family of 3 cant sit together in a domestic business class section of 8 available seats!!! Toping that off with ever diminishing service levels from the cabin crew who play hide and seek I wish I had just stuck with Qantas.

Reviews on the Velocity program are damming-it appears I'm not alone

Velocity Frequent Flyer Reviews - ProductReview.com.au

Time to burn these useless points and move on.
 
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I have close to 1M QF points and cannot use them 'effectively' either........
 
I had over million points and have used them j class to lax twice , Europe j class once , Abu Dhabi j class and have a j class to Muscat and return Johannesburg to Adelaide booked in for FEB 17 and never had a issue, I have booked anywhere from 10 months to 3 And 6 months out
 
I had over million points and have used them j class to lax twice , Europe j class once , Abu Dhabi j class and have a j class to Muscat and return Johannesburg to Adelaide booked in for FEB 17 and never had a issue, I have booked anywhere from 10 months to 3 And 6 months out

Gauging by the other thread and posts I have read echoing my experiences Im far from Robison Crusoe-you must be very lucky...

By all means please jump on line and try to find a reward seat to London or L.A...one for November (3 months) or Feb (6 months) or even June (10 months) would be lovely..
 
I would suggest converting over to Krisflyer, for better availability.

I agree though, Velocity has become a joke. I have 210,000 points which I'll try and burn ASAP - then switch to Krisflyer and Qantas.
 
sadly this is the reality of frequent flyer points: they are not real currency and are subject to 'revaluation' at a moments notice. personally i find it better to burn as I go to minimise any loss - that being said I am usually not looking for more than 2 reward seats and am willing to let availability dictate my timing and destination.

this is not unique to virgin but pretty much every FFP, they are both a marketers & an accountants dream.

you may wish to look at transferring some points to krisflyer as they tend to have more availability than virgin directly.
 
Just move them to Krisflyer. Usually you can get something of value there.
 
Re transferring to Krisflyer-that is a option but not the answer. Virgin are neglecting and misleading their customers about flights they should be able to redeem through Virgin.
 
Gauging by the other thread and posts I have read echoing my experiences Im far from Robison Crusoe-you must be very lucky...

By all means please jump on line and try to find a reward seat to London or L.A...one for November (3 months) or Feb (6 months) or even June (10 months) would be lovely..

I've had no trouble finding J seats to LAX for random dates I've picked in October and June. You have to be a little flexible but they are there. And SQ is definitely a good option; we've done Suites to Japan and have just booked to JFK after converting our VFF points.
 
Nah, they are not a 'scam'.

I have developed some rather efficient methods to search for awards online.

With that I have burned over 300K velocity in the last 24 months on transpacific business.

For example a quick check shows current availability BNE-LAX May 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 23, 25, 30 & 31 and June 1, 5, 6 & 8.
 
I have over 1M in Velocity points and the tally is growing daily.
I have no intention on flying VA with these points, better opportunities elsewhere ;)

Mind you, if the agreement was to end then I'm probably screwed.
 
I've had no trouble finding J seats to LAX for random dates I've picked in October and June. You have to be a little flexible but they are there. And SQ is definitely a good option; we've done Suites to Japan and have just booked to JFK after converting our VFF points.

I just checked (again...) every single day of October and cant find a single one-departing Melbourne.... Where is yours from?
 
I just checked (again...) every single day of October and cant find a single one-departing Melbourne.... Where is yours from?


Don't search MEL to/from LAX - search LAX to/from BNE or SYD. Then search BNE/SYD to/from MEL. You may have to call once you find a connection. Note that connections can be MEL-BNE/SYD in PM and BNE/SYD-LAX the next day (international under 24 hours).

They should waive any assisted fees as these valid routings are not showing online.
 
Nah, they are not a 'scam'.

I have developed some rather efficient methods to search for awards online.

With that I have burned over 300K velocity in the last 24 months on transpacific business.

For example a quick check shows current availability BNE-LAX May 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 16, 17, 18, 23, 25, 30 & 31 and June 1, 5, 6 & 8.

Thanks.

That's funny-I just checked your dates in June (from Bris) and again not a single fare under 400,000 points one way...?
 
Don't search MEL to/from LAX - search LAX to/from BNE or SYD. Then search BNE/SYD to/from MEL. You may have to call once you find a connection. Note that connections can be MEL-BNE/SYD in PM and BNE/SYD-LAX the next day (international under 24 hours).

They should waive any assisted fees as these valid routings are not showing online.

I've been able to find seats searching to MEL...
 
The Frequent Flyer Concierge team takes the hard work out of finding reward seat availability. Using their expert knowledge and specialised tools, they'll help you book a great trip that maximises the value for your points.

AFF Supporters can remove this and all advertisements

Don't search MEL to/from LAX - search LAX to/from BNE or SYD. Then search BNE/SYD to/from MEL. You may have to call once you find a connection. Note that connections can be MEL-BNE/SYD in PM and BNE/SYD-LAX the next day (international under 24 hours).

They should waive any assisted fees as these valid routings are not showing online.

June 4th:

Capture2.JPG

June 5th:
Capture1.jpg
 
I've been able to find seats searching to MEL...
That's due to there being more chance of a same day flight with Z availability after the VA8 / VA2 arrivals of 7am.

ex MEL, there's only a couple of morning flights that meet MCT before the departure of VA1/VA7 and if they have no awards, they won't show.

(Premium Economy will not show for MEL searches full stop as there is none sold domestically (e.g. between MEL and BNE/SYD).
 
Or is this another example of a Virgin IT glitch.....?

Can anyone else verify that they are seeing availability on the 5th of June Bris-L.A?
 
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