Should I be focusing my efforts in collecting Krisflyer/Velocity points vs Qantas for business class family trip to Europe?

Frequent Flyer Programs
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Hey team,

I am a bit new to all of this and was hoping someone could help. I am looking to go to Europe in June 2025 with my wife and 2 kids and was hoping to use points to book business class flights.

I have accumulated 360,000 velocity points over the years which i was thinking of converting to Kris flyer points with Singapore airlines. I think the rate is 1 velocity point equals .65 Kris flyer points. Does anyone have any experience transferring points between velocity and Kris? Is it hard to do, capped at a certain number of points etc.

Looking on the Singapore airlines website a reward business class flight to London from Melbourne is approximately 232,000 Kris flyer miles which i have. I was wondering if anyone has any experience with any credit cards that have promotions to earn Kris flyer points or if i should sign up to another velocity one and keep accumulating points that way. Does anyone know if you need to have a certain status to be able to book a business class reward flight with Singapore even if you have the points?

The alternative is signing up to a promotion with a Qantas affiliated credit card and start accumulating points that way. There is currently one that has upto 150,000 points for first time card holders. The return points for a business class flight to london is 289,000. A friend of mine recently flew with qantas business class and said they did not require a certain status before being eligible to book.

In your experience, which program provides the best value for money or points?

I am also aware that the transfer between Velocity and Singapore airlines is currently paused but am assuming it should be back up and running soon.

Thanks for your help!

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Hi and welcome.

Based on my personal opinion, if I were in your shoes, I would be leaning towards continuing the accumulation of Velocity points directly and for transferring to Krisflyer miles.

You have approximately 24 months to accumulate sufficient points/miles to book for June 2025 (open for booking as early as June/July 2024).

If all things remain the same (things are quite dynamic in the frequent flyer program world), your best bet to be able to find 4 business class seats on the same flight would be to stick to Singapore Airlines.

Singapore Airlines usually offer more award space for its own Krisflyer members. However, if space is available for booking via Velocity points, (at today’s rates) it costs less points for you to book using Velocity points vs transferring to Krisflyer and using Krisflyer miles to book.

So it may be a case of booking 2/3 seats via Velocity pts and booking the rest using Krisflyer points.

Alternatively, (not ideal), you could consider flying 1 adult + 1 child on the same flight on 2 different days if redeemable with Velocity pts this way.

There are not many ways to earn Krisflyer miles directly in Australia. One would need to collect flexible points like Amex Membership reward pts or bank points (e.g. Amplify points) to transfer to Krisflyer pts.

I would personally focus my main efforts in collecting Velocity points, whilst a secondary effort in collecting flexible points (you can transfer to Velocity or Krisflyer). If you have excess opportunity, thirdly, collect some Qantas pts too.

The key to being able to increase your chances of getting award seats on the route and dates that you want is to be flexible and have multiple point options at your disposal. However, it is important to stay focus at the start to accumulate enough on one program to have a useful balance instead of half useful balances in a few program.

Utilise both your name and your partner’s name to apply credit cards for signup bonuses if she is eligible as well. This allows you to earn sign up bonuses at twice the rate.

Hope that the above is useful. It seems like a bit of a brain dump at 12am.

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Thanks Warren. really appreciate your input.
Do you happen to know if you need to reach a certain tier or status to book Business with Kris? I am not sure how i would ever earn them as i don’t usually fly Singapore airlines

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Hi @souheilelkhoury

You don’t need to have any status with KrisFlyer to book Business class. Ditto with using Velocity points to book Singapore Airlines. If you’ve got the points, they’ll let you book!

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thats great @sixtyeight , thank you so much

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Unlike Qantas, where you get earlier access to Qantas (aircraft) business/first class award seats, if you have Qantas status.

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Thanks guys. out of curiosity, how likely is it to be able to get 4 business class flights together to Europe? or even 2 and 2 on separate flights?

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Hi @souheilelkhoury

I’d definitely focus on finding 2 and 2 on separate flights, especially considering that the time of year you’d like to fly (June) is a peak period in Australia (because of school holidays) and Europe (because it’s Summer). Airlines won’t release 4 business class seats on the same flight in advance.

My strategy would be to find and book 2 flights for 2 people each. It’s just possible that at the last minute (weeks or, more likely, days before the flights), Singapore Airlines will release an extra 2 seats on one of the flights you’re booked on. At that point, you could decide whether it’s worth paying cancellation fees for 2 people and re-booking on the same flight so you’re all flying together.

As an alternative, you could consider booking 4 people on the same flight, 2 in Business and 2 in Premium Economy. From my experience, kids of a certain age don’t mind being up the back of the plane while the parents are at the front: in fact, some will see time in the air without parents as a golden opportunity!

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Hi @souheilelkhoury

Having written all the above, the Point Hacks Facebook page is currently saying that KrisFlyer is releasing up to EIGHT Business Class reward seats per flight. So what do I know. :wink:

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HI all, This may be a stupid question, but have the points required for business class flights skyrocketed? I had a look at some pricing for next year just to get an idea of cost and return from MELB to Rome was 800k-1 million velocity points! Is that normal? I priced it out earlier in the year and it was maybe half that.
Is it a short term spike or does the points cost usually mirror real life price cost due to demand?

thanks

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You want to be looking for “reward” seats, which are limited in supply but cost a fixed and generally much lower point/mile costs.

The ones you see all the time and like in your case are anytime seat or a term I can’t exactly remember because I try to avoid it if I can. These anytime seat costs are not fixed as it depends on the revenue fare (cash fare) and convert to point/mile costs at a very low rate (~0.6 cents per point). As long as the flight has a seat bookable with $, you will find there would be these anytime seats available. Just imagine for these seats, you are essentially paying for the seats with a type of currency (your points). Not unlike paying using USD or in this case, more like Indonesian Rupiah.