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Virgin Australia is offering a handy shortcut to Velocity Gold status, thanks to a new promotion. As part of its “Fly Freedom and Get Gold” offer, Virgin Australia Accelerate members can nominate someone for Pilot Gold Velocity membership by booking just one round-trip Freedom flight.
This offer is available to members of Virgin Australia’s Accelerate program for small-to-medium businesses. The Pilot Gold membership on offer is additional to the two complimentary memberships available to new Accelerate members when signing up and spending at least $2,000 on Virgin Australia flights within the first three months. The Pilot Gold membership can be given to anyone that’s travelling for the business.
The Accelerate program is available to small and medium-sized businesses with an active ABN or ACN (except sole traders and businesses in the travel industry). Membership is free.
To earn a free Pilot Gold membership as part of the “Fly Freedom and Get Gold” offer, you’d need to be book a return Virgin Australia Freedom ticket on any domestic or trans-Tasman route. Travel must be completed by 28 February 2019. After the travel has been completed, you’d then need to complete a form on the Virgin Australia website. This form must be submitted by 1 March 2019.
Freedom fares are the more expensive flexible fare type, but they do come with more flexibility than Getaway or Elevate tickets. Upgrades from Freedom fares to Business Class also require fewer Velocity points.
The offer is limited to 500 Pilot Gold memberships, which appear to be available on a first-come, first-served basis. So, if you’re planning to use this deal, it may be best to travel sooner rather than later.
See the Virgin Australia website for more information and the full terms & conditions of this promotion.
Pilot Gold membership comes with most of the usual Velocity Gold benefits for a period of three months. Benefits offered include lounge access when flying with Virgin Australia and its partner airlines, where available. However, you won’t be eligible for certain benefits such as complimentary hotel and car hire status, or guaranteed economy reward seats, during the Pilot Gold period.
As a Pilot Gold member, you can extend the validity of your Velocity Gold status for another year by earning at least 80 Velocity status credits and taking at least one Virgin Australia-marketed flight during your 3-month trial period. A single one-way Business class flight between the Australian east coast and Perth – or a round-trip Freedom ticket – would be enough to meet this requirement.
If you are planning to take advantage of the “Fly Freedom and Get Gold” offer, be sure to check if there’s a current Virgin Australia discount code that could be used to get a discount on your Freedom airfares. The price of a flexible Freedom airfare does vary considerably by route. But Freedom fares on routes like Sydney-Gold Coast, Sydney-Ballina, Melbourne-Newcastle are among the cheapest with prices starting from around $239 one-way (before any discounts). Prices for Freedom tickets are closer to $700 one-way on longer routes like Sydney-Auckland or Perth-Brisbane.
