QFF is among the world's worst programs for awards and upgrades. No-one in their right mind would join Qantas Frequent Flyer unless they were forced to, as part of QF's captive market in Australia.

Just as a reminder to those unfamiliar with the QFF program
- premium class redemptions cost about double, in QF points, compared with AA miles for the exact same seat.
- international upgrades on Qantas are standby-only, a lottery on the day, but that doesn't stop QF charging like a wounded bull for the upgrade - often an AA award for that same seat would be fewer AA miles than the points for the QF upgrade.

What's more, in the past, Qantas upgrades were not allowed on normal fares. Typically you would have to pay double the normal fare to get into a class that was eligible for the upgrade lottery - like gambling on a UA "W" fare to try an SWU.

But recently as a "temporary" measure, upgrades are now available on all paid fares. And in another change, high-status pax on intenrational tickets have their upgrade-lottery drawn a few hours earlier. And for purely domestic itineraries upgrades can be confirmed in advance, there just needs to be award availability for business-class. The cost of the upgrade is still punitive of course, for example 16,000 QF points to upgrade SYD-PER to J, compared with just booking a J award seat with 17,500 AA miles.

But over here we are constrained into the QF program by some nasty collusive practices which would be illegal in many places (Australians are forbidden to join BA "EC", for example, and you won't find any creditcards offering AA miles over here, while QF ensures its normal Y fares earn nothing on AA).

So the confirmed domestic upgrades are perhaps the best value for those miserable QF points - buying a normal SYD-PER fare for $200 and upgrading immediately to J for 16,000 points.

As regards status and the "good" earnings for paid premium classes, this needs to be balanced against the laughable cost of premium seats on QF. Particularly in the protected domestic market where - thanks to "competition" from DJ - the price of a J seat has fallen from about 7 (seven) times the normal Y fare to about six times. International J fares are also out of whack, as many threads attest.

Who pays these fares - why, you and I of course, not for ourselves but as taxpayers for the public service officials in the J seats, and out of our superannuation for the cosseted mining and bank executives.