Frequent Flyer Points

[PrincessBelle39]

Its almost time for us to book our outbound flight using our frequent flyer points. on Qantas. Only about 10 days to go. But I have a silly question. Does anyone know what tine if day the flights are released. For example, csurrently they are taking frequent flyer bookings to 20 July 2012. I'm wondering what time tomorrow seats will be released for 21 July. Midnight, 7am???? Anyone out there with any experience. I'm after 5 seats and want to make sure I'm online at the right time when the time comes to give myself a chance.

 

[5ofus]

Good question. Sorry, I don't have the answer, but I will be in the exact same position as you in a couple of years

 

[Travel Mum]

I don't know but I was in the same position as you last year. I do know that, when I turned my PC at 9am on the morning that they should have been released, they were there

 

[Travel Mum]

Actually only the Auckland to L.A. were there, as American Airlines loads about a month after Qantas which meant we couldn't do the L.A. to Orlando (or of course the return flights) so that was very frustrating!

Good luck

 

[Kangarucci]

If you hope on the australianfrequentflyer website and ask the question, someone will definately know.

 

[PrincessBelle39]

Thanks Kangarucci. I didn't know that existed. I will have a look for it. I'm starting to think the answer is 9am just from monitoring the site. But I'm not 100% confident yet as I haven't done enough monitoring. The site keeps going down.

 

[PrincessBelle39]

Just wanted to post this response that I received from the Frequent Flyer board that Kangarucci mentioned.

For Online bookings it actually does relate to Midnight UTC, so for Winter in Sydney it's 10am and 8am for Perth. (During summer it's 11am in Sydney.)

There are reports of award seats being available earlier than that on the same calendar day, but you need to call and wear the "assisted award booking fee" charge as well.

 

[ColinA]

Usually around 10 am but not always. I keep doing the search every few minutes.

 

[5ofus]

Just wanted to post this response that I received from the Frequent Flyer board that Kangarucci mentioned.

For Online bookings it actually does relate to Midnight UTC, so for Winter in Sydney it's 10am and 8am for Perth. (During summer it's 11am in Sydney.)

There are reports of award seats being available earlier than that on the same calendar day, but you need to call and wear the "assisted award booking fee" charge as well.

Thanks for that info PrincessBelle.

Let us know how you go next week

 

[Toy Story]

I joined the Australian Frequent Flyer forum last week, interesting to read.

 

[PrincessBelle39]

Thanks for that info PrincessBelle.

Let us know how you go next week

Ok, we are part way there. We booked our flights Melbourne via Sydney to Dallas Fort Worth yesterday. We had no problems getting all 5 seats. On Sunday the Qantas site allowed us to select 1 August as a date, but when we went to select flights, it wouldn't let us past the calender. So we tried again yesterday and it worked fine.

We haven't booked the Dallas - Orlando sector yet as they are not available for booking yet. We are looking at about another month for that as well as our return flight from New York.

I have a small problem though but I imagine calling Qantas can fix this. They emailed me confirmation and my eticket yesterday which I checked using bigpond webmail while I was at work. I did print some of it out but not the eticket. Problem is that I'm having trouble with my email at home and not all emails are coming through. Of course this is one that has chosen not to come through. Webmail thinks it has so it has deleted the email from there so I don't have a copy of the email anymore. I spent 40 minutes on the phone with telstra last night who have finally decided that its not their problem. So I'm not sure how to fix the email problem. Hopefully its as easy to fix as getting Qantas to email another. Of course that doesn't fix the email problem but we will work that out.

Gee the taxes are a killer though. Nearly $1800 for the 5 of us just for a one way flight.

I'm so excited. Its really starting to move along now. It feels great to be within a year. Its been almost two years since we were last there and I'm missing it.

 

[5ofus]

Ok, we are part way there. We booked our flights Melbourne via Sydney to Dallas Fort Worth yesterday. We had no problems getting all 5 seats. On Sunday the Qantas site allowed us to select 1 August as a date, but when we went to select flights, it wouldn't let us past the calender. So we tried again yesterday and it worked fine.


Gee the taxes are a killer though. Nearly $1800 for the 5 of us just for a one way flight.

I'm so excited. Its really starting to move along now. It feels great to be within a year. Its been almost two years since we were last there and I'm missing it.

Yay So glad you got the first flights booked! I hope you can get that email sent through with no problems. Ouch on the taxes, I knew they were going to be a lot, but not THAT much! Yikes!

 

[kylieh]

Ok, we are part way there. We booked our flights Melbourne via Sydney to Dallas Fort Worth yesterday. We had no problems getting all 5 seats. On Sunday the Qantas site allowed us to select 1 August as a date, but when we went to select flights, it wouldn't let us past the calender. So we tried again yesterday and it worked fine.

We haven't booked the Dallas - Orlando sector yet as they are not available for booking yet. We are looking at about another month for that as well as our return flight from New York.

I have a small problem though but I imagine calling Qantas can fix this. They emailed me confirmation and my eticket yesterday which I checked using bigpond webmail while I was at work. I did print some of it out but not the eticket. Problem is that I'm having trouble with my email at home and not all emails are coming through. Of course this is one that has chosen not to come through. Webmail thinks it has so it has deleted the email from there so I don't have a copy of the email anymore. I spent 40 minutes on the phone with telstra last night who have finally decided that its not their problem. So I'm not sure how to fix the email problem. Hopefully its as easy to fix as getting Qantas to email another. Of course that doesn't fix the email problem but we will work that out.

Gee the taxes are a killer though. Nearly $1800 for the 5 of us just for a one way flight.

I'm so excited. Its really starting to move along now. It feels great to be within a year. Its been almost two years since we were last there and I'm missing it.

Wow, those taxes. Giving me a headache

I've had no trouble before getting Qantas to resend emails to different addresses, and more than once! Give them a call.

 

[Luisa]

Can sympathize on the taxes- my flight to Tokyo was $235 return plus $700+ in taxes!

 

[PrincessBelle39]

Can sympathize on the taxes- my flight to Tokyo was $235 return plus $700+ in taxes!

Thats incredible. $700.00.

With ours, its only a one way flight so far Melbourne to Dallas. So we still have the rest of our flights to book with more taxes to go.

 

[Travel Mum]

It's the awful fuel surcharges pushing those "tax" rates up I think

 

[PrincessBelle39]

Ok we've now got our return flights so we can come home. They are not the date we wanted. We wanted 31 August but had to go for 29 August. We wanted to splurge and come home business class and the 29th was the closest we could get. We could have got economy class on the day we wanted but decided to go with the 29th and keep an eye out for availability on either the 30th or 31st to change to if possible. I rang frequent flyer and the guy there said that there is always an initial rush for flights and as time goes on, people to change and cancel so the chances are good. Fingers crossed.
Another $1800 for taxes for the 5 of us.

 

[WAMUMOF4]

Ok we've now got our return flights so we can come home. They are not the date we wanted. We wanted 31 August but had to go for 29 August. We wanted to splurge and come home business class and the 29th was the closest we could get. We could have got economy class on the day we wanted but decided to go with the 29th and keep an eye out for availability on either the 30th or 31st to change to if possible. I rang frequent flyer and the guy there said that there is always an initial rush for flights and as time goes on, people to change and cancel so the chances are good. Fingers crossed.
Another $1800 for taxes for the 5 of us.

Congrats on booking your flights those taxes are a lot are you going business class both ways and do you mind telling us how many frequent flyer points it cost?

 

[PrincessBelle39]

Congrats on booking your flights those taxes are a lot are you going business class both ways and do you mind telling us how many frequent flyer points it cost?

We are only doing business class on the return LAX - MEL. This was 96,000 per person one way. On the way over we are going MEL - DFW economy class which is 56,000 points one way. We still have enough points to cover economy DFW - MCO which I will book as soon as they are available. We will then pay for our MCO - NYC and NYC - LAX.

 

[WAMUMOF4]

We are only doing business class on the return LAX - MEL. This was 96,000 per person one way. On the way over we are going MEL - DFW economy class which is 56,000 points one way. We still have enough points to cover economy DFW - MCO which I will book as soon as they are available. We will then pay for our MCO - NYC and NYC - LAX.

Cool thanks that means i can go on points but DH and the kids will have to stay home
I cant wait to be able to have a whole trip paid on points and just taxes