Earn Bonus Points or Status Credits with Qantas Green Tier

Qantas Frequent Flyer members can earn bonus points or status credits, and other exclusive rewards, for making sustainable choices when they fly and at home. It’s all thanks to the Qantas Frequent Flyer Green tier, which launched in 2022.

Qantas Green Tier sits alongside the traditional Qantas status tiers, rather than replacing them. It’s also completely separate to Points Club membership, which you can get by earning a minimum amount of Qantas points each year.

To become a Green Tier member, you would need to complete at least five activities such as offsetting carbon emissions, purchasing solar panels or buying wine from an eco vineyard.

Many Australian Frequent Flyer members aim for Green Tier as a way to relatively easily earn an extra 50 status credits each year. Those bonus status credits count towards Qantas Silver, Gold, Platinum or Platinum One status.

Qantas CEO Alan Joyce said that he expected the incentive of Qantas points or status credits would encourage Australians to make greener choices.

“Our customers are concerned about climate change and so are we. There’s a lot of action we’re taking as an airline to reduce our emissions and that means we have the framework to help our customers offset and take other steps to reduce their own footprint,” Joyce said.

Rewards for Qantas Green tier members

In return for their contributions to the environment, Qantas Green tier members can choose from one of three rewards:

• 50 bonus Qantas status credits,
• 10,000 bonus Qantas points, or
• Qantas will purchase 3 tonnes of carbon offsets on your behalf

If you were to purchase 3 tonnes of carbon offsets for Qantas flights, this would cost you approximately $54 (at the time of writing).

Qantas Frequent Flyer members can achieve Green tier membership on an annual basis. You’ll receive a new choice of reward during each membership year that you complete at least five of the six required activities.

After completing the required actions, you’ll be able to select your preferred reward on the Qantas website.

In addition, Qantas Green Tier members can get a unique digital Qantas Frequent Flyer membership card.

Qantas also promises invitations to sustainability events and experiences, such as the inaugural Green Tier dinner that took place in October 2022 in Sydney.

That said, that inaugural dinner was the only such event that Qantas ran during the first year following the launch of Green Tier. It was only open to the first 50 members to respond to the email invitation and reached capacity within about five minutes. So, realistically, most Green Tier members won’t make it to any events. With this in mind, the main reason to aim for Green Tier is to get the bonus 50 status credits or 10,000 Qantas points.

How to earn Qantas Green Tier membership

To earn Qantas’ Green Tier, you would need to complete actions in five out of the six categories below during your Qantas Frequent Flyer membership year:

1. Offset flying

You can complete this goal by adding a carbon offset to a flight booked on Qantas.com. This may only cost a few dollars for domestic flights.

Qantas matches all Fly Carbon Neutral contributions, which go towards environmental projects designed to reduce carbon emissions. Qantas Frequent Flyers can also earn 10 Qantas points per dollar on carbon offset purchases. In 2021, the airline said that 11% of customers chose to offset their carbon emissions.

In the future, you’ll also be able to complete this objective by contributing to sustainable aviation fuel.

2. Sustainable travel

To meet this requirement, you would need to book a stay at an eco-accredited hotel in Australia through Qantas Hotels. There are currently around 26 eligible hotels in Australia and you would just need to stay a minimum of one night.

All Qantas Frequent Flyer members can earn 3 Qantas points per dollar for booking any hotel through Qantas Hotels. After achieving the Green tier, you’ll also earn an additional 150 Qantas points per night when booking an eligible eco-accredited hotel.

There are a few eligible hotels with rooms available for under $200 per night, but most are not particularly cheap. Therefore, this category would likely cost the most money to achieve compared to the other five “Green tier” earning categories. However, you can redeem Qantas Hotels vouchers towards a booking, including the vouchers given to Points Club members.

3. Sustainable lifestyle

There are two ways to achieve this category:

1. Purchase carbon offsets for your home and car from the Qantas Rewards Store, or
2. Purchase solar panels or other products from Solargain

The cost of a home & car offset package depends on the state where you live, the number of people in your household and the number of cars owned. For a household with one person and no car, an offset would cost anything from $20 for Tasmanian residents (previously $15) to $85 for Victorian residents.

You’ll also earn 10 points per dollar for carbon offsets if you choose to pay using money, or alternatively you can redeem Qantas points towards this.

4. Choose sustainable

This can be achieved by purchasing a designated “sustainable wine” from Qantas Wine, or taking up the option to purchase a carbon offset on any delivery from Qantas Wine or the Qantas Rewards Store. (Qantas says that this option will make your delivery “climate positive”, going beyond just offsetting the emissions generated from your delivery.)

Qantas is working with Sustainable Winegrowing Australia to identify wine producers who adopt sustainable practices in six categories: land and soil, waste, energy, water, biodiversity, people and business. Existing Qantas Green tier members will also earn 250 bonus points with any sustainable wine purchase.

5. Reduce your impact

This action can be completed by taking a free sustainability quiz within the Qantas Wellbeing App. By doing this, you’ll also earn 100 Qantas points.

The Qantas Wellbeing App is available to download from the Apple App Store or Google Play store within Australia.

In the future, Qantas plans to add more actions to the Wellbeing app.

6. Give back

Finally, you can complete the “Give back” criteria by donating Qantas points through Qantas Marketplace to a project or charity that is focused on sustainability. The minimum donation amount is 3,200 points, which is equivalent to a $25 donation. There is no longer an option to complete this step by donating money.

There are currently four eligible organisations that you can donate to:

• Great Barrier Reef Foundation
• Kimberley Land Council
• Ozharvest
• UNICEF

Check your progress

You can check your progress on the Qantas website, by logging in and going to the new, dedicated Qantas Green tier page.

Note that there is normally a delay of 1-2 days between completing the activity and your Green Tier progress appearing on your Qantas Frequent Flyer account.

Is it worth going for Qantas Green status?

The short answer is… it depends.

If you’ll be completing many of the actions like purchasing carbon offsets or donating to charity anyway, the rewards on offer with the Qantas Green tier may be worthwhile.

10,000 Qantas points is enough for a one-way Qantas flight of up to 600 miles (e.g. Sydney-Melbourne), excluding taxes & carrier charges. Alternatively, if you go for the 50 status credits, this could make it easier for you to earn or renew Qantas Frequent Flyer status.

But it’s not for everyone. Most of the eligible activities require you to purchase something from Qantas, so it may end up costing you a reasonable amount of money to complete the required objectives. Many of the activities are good for the environment anyway, so there is a “social good” involved. But there’s no point spending money to achieve the Green tier if you don’t value the rewards on offer.

Here’s what a few AFF members had to say when Green Tier first launched…

Most of the tiers seem to be for buying something from the Qantas store. I’ve already offset some flights, so with a donation and home carbon offset I have 3/6. I think I then need to complete a quiz and buy something from the Qantas store with carbon neutral shipping and I’ve completed it. It’ll probably cost $100 all up for 50 SC so probably worth it.
– FishFood, 9 March 2022

I think this means you could get 50SC (which counts towards lifetime) every year you havent qualified for Green for quite a low price if you do the bare minimum. Worth it with a low cost strategy I reckon.
– http_x92, 9 March 2022

I have already accepted this one does not stack up for me – even if I could do a cash donation to the charity. I would not want to book the accommodation or do a QF revenue flight – and I have quit alcohol. Just by the bye, I compared the cost of five nights in Fox Resort Jaffna booking through Qantas Hotels and elsewhere – the Qantas Hotels rate was more than double the price available elsewhere. No wonder they can dole out the points.
– Mr H, 9 March 2022

You can read lots more comments and tips, and join the discussion, on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum:

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.