• Guaranteed WHY seat purchase

Might be useful for some.

Dave

maybe for some but I have never needed it in all my time as a QF Platinum.

Wait a minute, I may have been able to use it this week. Going to SYD tomorrow and all flights after 2:30pm were sold out. I would have preferred to depart around 4-5pm, but instead had to book the 2:15pm flight.

But not being able to guarnatee a Y seat BNE-SIN and SIN-BNE for my next trip (zeros in all classes for 2 days either side of when I need to travel in both directions) meant I was more easily able to justify a DAS13 fare with a routing that meets the rules and has D available all the way ^. So you win some and you lose some. Overall I probably win with these two trips, especially when I consider that a Y return to SIN would leave me short of reaching EXP, while a DAS13 means I romp it in with 3.5K EQP to space.

mind my comment but then the question is how much it will cost for those EQP.

A few more:
- Priority waitlist when booking. I need this all the time
- Priority few on award. QF makes their awards available to QFF before anyone else. Not unimportant if the OP wants to fly to the US in a premium cabin
- Requesting award seats when none are available. About 50% of my award bookings are seats which were requested and were not available for anybody other than WP/CLs.
- Extra luggage allowance on QF. Maybe just me, but I use this all the time.
- Lounge access in the US.
- Credit card points
- liftetime status easier to get when flying premium cabin

So there are a few good reasons to change to QF when living in Australia.

Can't say Ive used it much, but OW status gives this anyway

given 125k r/t for J to US vs 192-256k plus >$200 in fines, the 330 days vs 355 seems a small sacrifice

never used it meself and even so from reports this seems to be being reduced in availability

rarely use it...on runs to US ( where OP is from ) 2*32Kg does pretty well imo

Available except on soley domestic travel. If just occasional, pay for admission

Available to AA on AMEX ( or US visa/mastercards )

Matter of opinion. Since *all* points count towards status, even CC spending helps to attain LT status on AA

Also of course for AA EXP, the eVIPs and complimentary domestic upgrades when travelling to US is worth a lot

Dave

Thanks so much -- an effort to sum up
 

First, you've all been incredibly kind to share your advice -- sincerely appreciated!

In terms of QF-only benefits, I've noted the following possibilities: (a) credit card points, (b) seat access, esp. exit row on intl. flights, (c) priority baggage handling, (d) extra luggage allowance, (e) access to OW lounges in the USA. Someone mentioned access to Qantas Club lounges in Australia, but I've always been admitted with AA ExecPlat to-date, and don't think this is a benefit I'd lose by sticking with AA. Or has there been a change?

In truth, though, I could get (a) by opening a QF FF account before departing North America and using same just to collect miles from credit card (and spend on eg. Australian short haul redemption). And while I would love to get (b)-(e), it sounds to me like those benefits are offset by what most of you are telling me are the upsides of sticking with the AA ExecPlat, namely:

(a) need to qualify from scratch for premium status if switching to QF;
(b) better earn/burn ration for awards.

The one point on which I am still a bit confused is the ease of requalification for top tier status. With AA ExecPlat, it's 100,000 miles, though reduced via the points method for flying in premium classes. But as someone pointed out, AA gives only 50% qualification credit for miles in some discounted economy classes (eg. my S class ticket to Madrid this week). Any advice on this fairly critical question?

One of you asked what I thought my flying profile would be like for the next few years. I'm guessing two 'round the world' tickets in business class each year + maybe 3 business class within the Asia-Pacific region + roughly 12 domestic runs, probably in economy (most of which in the Sydney-Melbourne-Canberra circuit). I've got enough AC points to get me back to Vancouver each summer in J class for the next 5 years or so, and also around 300,000 CO miles which could be used as a back-up for such trips (thanks for that tip, by the way). In terms of spending miles, I usually redeem only for international business class since that has always seemed best value to me.

Does this profile change anyone's view about what I take to be the consensus -- that I should stick with AA ExecPlat for now, even as I open a QF FF before coming to Australia and wait to see what the QF enhancements to be offered in 2008 look like?

Many thanks again to all for your advice. A wonderful start to my transition to Australia!

No. As an EXP member you will be entitled to Qantas lounge access, no worries. What was being referred to is that AA doesnt allow EXPs in the AA lounges when travelling "domestically" in the US


You would , imo, be better with an AMEX and crediting to AA thanks to the fuel surcharges that QF levies on most award flights. If you want to have a QF account for miles that couldnt go anywhere else, then get a QF account

Taking the examples given

With the SYD-MEL-CBR runs in economy. As long as you avoid N class , you will be fine n dandy. On the other red-e-deal/supersaver fares, you would earn 50% miles , however since the flights are < 500 miles anyway, you will still get 500 miles plus 500 bonus = 1000 miles vs 1000 miles on QF

With 2 ATW tickets in business class, you would have no issues maintaining AA EXP status and in business class, your earnings will be full miles plus 100% EXP bonus plus 25% COS bonus ( 50% on the AA domestics in A) whether you were QF Platinum or AA Platinum/EXP

The AP runs are just icing on the cake

Where you will gain with AA is when travelling on some other OW carriers. QF only offers the 100% status bonuses when travelling on AA/BA/QF/JQ whilst AA offers it on most OW partners other than (iirc) MA/JL.

So, if you chose to fly LHR-HKG-SYD on CX , for example, you would earn approx 10500 miles base plus 2625 business bonus crediting to QF whilst crediting to AA you would also get the 10500 EXP bonus

With the travel you note, I see no issues with AA credit. As you mentioned, some QF classes only earn 50% miles, but with your typical travel, I see that being a minor issue


If you end up having to take any Jetstar flights on JETFLEX fares, it might be worth having a QF account to dump miles from those flights

Dave

You are welcome for the CO tip.

With that flying profile I would do the following: Go for both AA and QF! One mediocrely optimised DONE4 RTW will give you QF Platinum. You then get all the benefits when on QF. Some people (like Dave) don't use any of them but for some people they are important (including lounge access when flying Virgin and the priority on QF waitlists is higher than any OW Emerald).
After that, put all your flying to AA. This way you will also qualify for AA and can use the much better earn / burn ratio for awards. Just my two cents.