Flights to America - How Can I Do This Most Efficiently?

bluedufflecoat on 08/09/2016 - 10:05

Hi all.
I'm considering a trip to America in April / May next year… (is this a good time to go?)… and I have 168k QFF points up my sleeve. I've heard people here talk about getting a bigger bang for your buck with those points, if I use them to upgrade instead of redeeming flights with them. Can anyone tell me, what the quantum of points / $ would be required to do this?

Other considerations: travelling with my 4 year old daughter.
Places we'd probably be going to: Seattle, LA, NY, TX. We have friends / family in those places, so it would be nice to see them.

Thanks.

Travel

Comments

  • bdl on 08/09/2016 - 10:25
    +1

    Go to airport and jump on plane is most efficient way :)

    but…Points required for update depend on availability and when you want to fly. When checking prices - ensure your fare type (red e-deal, etc) conditions say the fare you are interested in is upgradeable with points. Sometimes you have to pay more than the lowest fare to even have a chance at an upgrade.

    Do you have status (Silver, Gold, Platinum, etc) with Qantas? The higher your status the more likely you will get an upgrade.

    • bluedufflecoat on 08/09/2016 - 10:28

      no unfortunately, just the lowly bronze? :P

      • bdl on 08/09/2016 - 10:32

        Are you travelling by yourself and daughter or will someone else and daughter? If you require two upgrades and you are both bronze or lower, your chances become even slimmer for an upgrade and it may not be worth paying the extra in base fare to have an upgradeable fare.

        In other news, Air NZ is very nice in economy, you could always go Melbourne -> Auckland -> Vancouver and then make your way down the west coast, Seattle, SF, LA, then across to Texas and NY. Breaks the trip up which may be good for your daughter.

        Or go Melbourne -> Auckland -> SF and get your Seattle family to travel down to SF if they care about you. :) Although Seattle is pretty awesome, I'd recommend it.

        • bluedufflecoat on 08/09/2016 - 10:41

          At the moment, it's me and my daughter, maybe my mother-in-law. My MIL probably has a higher membership grade. She travels a fair bit (but lately, I think more with Virgin than Qantas though). Will have to check with her.

          Going via NZ sounds interesting… more food for thought. Thank you!

        • bdl on 08/09/2016 - 10:47

          @bluedufflecoat: If your MIL does have a higher membership grade, make sure you are all on the same booking (with whatever airline you fly) - that way everyone on the booking receives the same benefits!)

          AirNZ will feed points into a Virgin frequent flyer membership too if that helps

        • bluedufflecoat on 08/09/2016 - 10:51

          @bdl: I have about 48k Velocity points… I could probably bump it up by about 7.5k with Citibank?

          I will sign up to Air New Zealand emails for flight deals. :) Thanks.

      • kiribatian on 08/09/2016 - 11:00

        As bdl stated above- as you are bronze you are unlikely to get an upgrade. Around 24 hours before a flight, Qantas goes through who has requested a points upgrade and goes from Platinum down. As the LAX legs are very popular, Bronze frequent flyers (and even Silver) will basically have no chance. I just recently came back on this leg, my mate had platinum so it was no issue.

        Another way you could think about it was to use the QFF points to go via another One World airlines. eg. American Airlines via Sydney or Auckland or Cathay Pacific via Hong Kong. Could even add in a stopover there.

        If you do manage to get the upgrade though, it is definitely worth it!

  • inherentchoice on 08/09/2016 - 11:32

    You can get bigger bang for buck by using points for upgrades. But business class and premium economy seats are overpriced to begin with, so that's why it represents "better value". Personally I would rather fly to Sydney on Tiger for $50, and instead use my $160 worth of points plus $35 of "taxes" for something other than a short-lived nicer seat.

    You could get about $1680 if you sell those points on the OzB classifieds. Personally I think that's better value, however it is against the T&Cs and Qantas may suspend your account.

    I would wait for a sale fare and you should be able to get a return ticket to USA for under $1000 easy, or possibly under $900. Whereas

    Another alternative is to wait for a Jetstar sale to Hawaii, and then book a separate flight to the mainland USA. Allegiant often has fares from Honolulu to LAX or Vegas for about $300 one-way.

  • parismeow on 09/09/2016 - 23:11

    I am going overseas at the end of the year and decided to use my points for domestic flights within the US. we are flying in and out of Hawaii using the cheap jetstar flights, and then flying from there using the points to Las Vegas, NY, Orlando, San fran.
    You might be able to get cheap flights to your first location and then use your points for travel within the US.

    • bluedufflecoat on 10/09/2016 - 06:56

      Which American Airlines are connected to qantas for domestic flights?

      • parismeow on 12/09/2016 - 10:39

        Most of mine are with American Airlines. I also waited until there was a 20% off awards bookings to save more points :)

        • bluedufflecoat on 12/09/2016 - 10:41

          20% off awards bookings with AA through Qantas?

        • parismeow on 12/09/2016 - 15:03

          @bluedufflecoat: Yep! every now and then Qantas do a sale on awards bookings, so you save points when booking. I booked all my awards flights then to save money. Just checked, all my flights i booked on award points are with AA.
          I knew i wouldn't have enough points for all of the legs of my trip, so i went through and looked at what flights would be the most expensive, and calculated the combination to save the most amount of money. I then used the Hopper App to track my flights to find the cheapest possible flight.

        • bluedufflecoat on 15/09/2016 - 22:29

          @parismeow: hi. Did you try to book multi-city legs with frequent flyer points? I was a bit enthusiastic and tried 4 different legs in the one search and I kept getting booted off the system, with them saying it's too hard?

    • Donaldhump on 14/09/2016 - 22:19

      i got flights for $5.60 this way… using about 20k-40k points a go is wicked

Login or Join to leave a comment
Login Join