No, Qantas Classic Rewards to Los Angeles Don’t Cost a Million Points

If you’ve tried searching for Qantas international Business Class reward flights recently, you may have been surprised to see that a seat could cost you more than a million points. Indeed, many Qantas Frequent Flyer members have complained about reward flight pricing in recent submissions to a senate inquiry.

But don’t panic! Qantas has not massively increased the cost of Classic Reward flights. You’ve probably just been looking at “Points Plus Pay” redemptions, rather than the great value Classic Reward seats.

It costs 108,400 Qantas Points + $339 for a one-way Qantas Business Classic Reward from Sydney to Los Angeles. That number of points hasn’t changed since 2019. The Qantas-imposed carrier charges also haven’t changed in four years, although the third party fees and taxes may vary slightly from time to time.

It’s true that Classic Reward seat availability is limited. Qantas could probably also make it easier to find Classic Reward seats when searching for flights on its website. But those Classic Reward seats are there, including on partner airlines, if you know where to look!

The Qantas website shows Points Plus Pay awards by default

When searching for flights on Qantas.com, you can select “Use Points” to show flight prices in Qantas points instead of money.

On the results page, the Qantas website will then present Classic Flight Reward seats – if any are available – as well as regular airfares converted to Qantas points using “Points Plus Pay”. Qantas marks Classic Rewards with a red ribbon.

But if no Classic Reward seats are available, the Qantas website will only show Points Plus Pay options (with the entire airfare converted to Qantas points) by default. This often happens when looking for Business Class seats on international routes, due to the limited availability of Classic Rewards.

A Points Plus Pay booking is not a Classic Flight Reward. With Points Plus Pay, Qantas simply converts any available airfare to Qantas Frequent Flyer points at a rate of approximately 0.61 cents per point. That’s why seats are available on every flight, but are usually more expensive than Classic Rewards.

Using the example of the Sydney-Los Angeles flight shown above, a regular Business Sale airfare would cost $8,748 one-way. This works out to be 1,433,881 Qantas points, once converted at the Points Plus Pay rate.

Points Plus Pay vs Classic Flight Rewards

Unlike Classic Rewards, every seat on every Qantas flight is available to book using Points Plus Pay. The trade-off for that flexibility, most of the time, is the terrible value.

Classic Reward seats cost a fixed number of points, as set out in the Classic Flight Reward tables on the Qantas website. But Classic Reward availability is limited. Seats can sell out quickly and they are not available on every flight.

Another advantage of booking Classic Rewards – if you can find them – is greater flexibility. You can cancel an international Classic Flight Reward ticket for a refund for any reason, and you’d just pay a penalty of 6,000 Qantas points. You can also change your booking for just 5,000 points.

But Points Plus Pay bookings are basically just commercial airfares bought using points. You wouldn’t necessarily be able to cancel those for a full refund – just change your dates or cancel for a Qantas travel credit, unless you’ve bought a refundable fare. Points Plus Pay bookings could also be more expensive if you’re booking a one-way flight.

How to find Classic Reward seats on the Qantas website

If your search for reward seats only brings up Points Plus Pay options, it could be because there simply aren’t any Classic Flight Reward seats available on a Qantas flight on that date. But don’t give up just yet!

If you’d rather fly Business Class to Los Angeles starting from 108,400 Qantas points, instead of over a million points, you’ll need to look specifically for Classic Reward seats when searching on the Qantas website. There are two tricks you can use to do this.

Method 1: Classic Rewards slider

After searching for flights, click on the “Classic Rewards” slider above the search results:

This will change the search results so that only Classic Flight Reward seats are shown. Not only this, but the website will show you Classic Reward seats in all classes of travel on the same screen – rather than having to open each cabin class in a new tab.

In “Classic Rewards” mode, the Qantas website may also show you Classic Flight Reward seats on partner airlines that do not display when Classic Rewards is not selected!

The China Airlines option was not shown without selecting the “Reward seats” filter. Unfortunately, the pricing shown on the Qantas website in this example is incorrect (the quote is too high). But the website will correct itself on the next page.

See our guide to calculating Classic Flight Reward pricing to learn how to work out the number of Qantas points needed for any itinerary.

Method 2: Use the multi-city booking engine

If you prefer the old Qantas website layout with an award availability calendar, use the multi-city search tool.

If you wanted to book an itinerary online with multiple flight sectors, such as a Oneworld Classic Flight Reward, you would need to use the multi-city search anyway. But you can still use the multi-city tool when you’re just searching for one flight.

The crucial thing, when looking for Classic Flight Reward seats, is to select “Use points – Classic Flight Rewards only” at the top of the page.

To view a calendar with an overview of available Classic Flight Reward seats across a whole month, select “Flexible with dates for all flights” when entering the date of any flights in your multi-city search:

This will then bring up a calendar showing which dates have Classic Reward seats available on Qantas and its partner airlines. No Points Plus Pay seats in sight!

If you’re having trouble finding availability, you could also use a third-party tool such as Seats.aero to hunt for those elusive Classic Reward seats.

Matt Graham

The editor of Australian Frequent Flyer, Matt's passion for travel has taken him to over 70 countries… with the help of frequent flyer points, of course!
Matt's favourite destinations (so far) are Germany, Brazil & Kazakhstan. His interests include economics, aviation & foreign languages, and he has a soft spot for good food and red wine.

You can connect with Matt by posting on the Australian Frequent Flyer community forum and tagging @AFF Editor.