Maelstrom

Hi all!

I apologise if this has been asked somewhere before, but I did a brief search and couldn't find anything. If there is a master thread for it somewhere, please do point me in the right direction. I'm quite new to all of this, and am eager to learn some tips!

I live in Australia and I've recently completed a short trip in Asia and have accumulated a little over 12k reward points. In the past, I've had my LCAH points automatically converted to my Qantas Frequent Flyer account, however I have currently got this disabled and have started banking up my LCAH points for the moment.

I realise that 2000 points can be redeemed for a 40 Euro voucher, and that there are also the "Dream Stays" available, but those are 50k+ points (which would take me a looong time to get to, I don't travel extensively because I'm still studying).

Converting points to the Qantas FF program is at a 1:1 rate, and doing some very rough research (please tell me if my maths is wrong):
1. a Qantas Business class redemption from Sydney to Shanghai is 72,000 points (plus fees), and a Business Sale fare is $3273. This is using data from the Qantas website, for an 8 March 2018 "flight".
3273 / 72000 = 4.55c per point

2. A 40 euro voucher is equal to (approximately) AU$58 (using the XE currency website).
58 / 2000 = 2.9c per point

Given that the conversion rate to the Qantas FF program is at a 1:1 rate (most programs seem to be 2:1 or higher), the conversion to QFF seems to present better value, assuming I use them wisely on routes with a good redemption value.

However:
- The airline point redemptions are, obviously, contingent to actually securing an available redemption, and these usually have to be booked months in advance.
- The 40 euro voucher can be used at any time

In conclusion, I am curious as to whether the seasoned LCAH travelers on these forums redeem their LCAH points for the 40 euro vouchers, or convert their LCAH points to airline miles.

Thanks in advance, and I look forward to reading and learning!

fransknorge

I always used my points for vouchers to reduce the rate when I want a specific hotel but the rate is too high for my liking or want to splurge a bit. I found them the best value this way. As it is essentially a cashback program, there is no arbitrage possible.
For all airlines program I could use, the transfer rate is poor.

gilbertaue

Just a data point as that has been discussed in recent days:

There are no more vouchers.
You can redeem the points online through booking a hotel and paying online or deducting the points automatically from the system when checking out.

savonarola

Personally, I use them for stays. It seems that it would be better value to use them for award tickets, but the convenience of redeeming the discounts is my stays has proved to be more suited to my travel habits. The time it would take for me to obtain a significant amount of points as to redeem an award ticket, plus the somewhat limited availability of such tickets, has led me to this decision, which I do not regret at all. I simply rake up some points and can use them at will.
In the past year, I've had free or heavily discounted (50% or more) stays in many fine hotels, some of which my travel habits and budget would probably never allow me to pay in full.

cowism

I will use them for miles during triple points promotions.

Usually, I will accumulate and use it for the next status year to clock nights

FGunawan

Let me start by pointing out that your valuation of Qantas miles (for business class redemption) doesn't take into account that redeeming miles for flight also cost dollar surcharges in addition to the miles spent. I don't have first hand experience but from what I heard, on Qantas particularly these surcharges can be hefty. In other words, the value of 72,000 Qantas miles in your instance is much less than $3273, although I don't know for sure how much less (or, how much the surcharge for that one-way redemption is).

There is not much discussion online on how much value people generally give to Qantas miles. But I found here an article that pegs 1 Qantas mile at around 0.7 Australian cent:

https://www.finder.com.au/frequent-f...as-point-worth


PS: Redeeming miles for business or first class seats always yields much higher nominal (multiple times better) value than using those miles in other ways. This is true for all airlines not only for Qantas. You need to subjectively weigh the value of these premium seats vs using the miles (converted hotel points) in some other ways.

FGunawan

The 40 euro voucher is not always availble to use at any time. Most of the time Accor won't let one use points to book sale or advanced purchase rates (i.e. cheapest rates on offer).

FGunawan

Now in response to the thread title, How do you use your LCAH points?

This is something that a lot of flyertalkers would discourage, but I'm one for hogging the points. Gimme gimme more points! Over the past couple years I've accumulated over 90k Accor points, and have so far spent a whopping 4k.

It's not that I'm actually for hogging these points. I will only use these points if I can get optimal values for them - which would be either for one of those 50k+ "Dream Stays" that you mentioned, or at a hotel which uses euro as their booking currency. Like many have shared in this forum, despite Accor T&C hotels use terrible exchange rates for these vouchers denominated in euros into the hotel currency.

Maelstrom

Thank you all for your insight! I especially like the sound of using the credit to allow myself to splurge a little bit for a luxury stay, or to clock up nights.
I think I'll let the points sit in my account for the moment and accumulate. I can always transfer or spend them later on down the track.

Thanks again!

IMH

I booked an excellent "Dream Stay" earlier this year for just 28,000 points. That got us four nights in a suite in Chicago, plus some genuinely valuable 'goodies' (including museum tickets and a $100 shopping voucher). More details here.

Otherwise, spend them whenever you need to stay at hotels at the lower end of the Accor scale. That way you're saving the same amount of cash but not missing out on as many points because the earning rates are lower.

skaya

I understand these vouchers are not produced anymore, but there should be a few around expiring soon printed before the change of rules.

Can I use these at restaurants without staying? I have done this in the distant past, but the t&c or practice may have changed.

Goldorak

This was not allowed before as per the T&C, but some properties did indeed accept them. So, today, I think this remains valid.

Castleford Tiger

My experience in using the points at check-out is this is more a theory than an actual practice. Novotel, East Midlands in July - no-one on site who was trained. Points deducted over the phone two weeks later. Novotel, York on Saturday, still trying to resolve this, as I have not received my code to authorise the points deduction. The lady on Reception still thought that the vouchers were in use. There does seem to be training issue here.

CT

matjes

The Novotel Melaka recention had no idea that there were no more vouchers and had to call to central booking t redeem my points. It tool a long time and at some point they said that backend will handle it and let me go. i have not received a proper invoice for the stay yet (and ca 6x the email/SMS for the code to use at redemtion. But by that time I was far away and still they managed to deduct some points from me).
I did tell them at check-in that I'd be paying by points, so it's not like a surprise