What is the best airline program to join for seat availability if starting earning points from scratch for a RTW trip?

Frequent Flyer Programs
1

After many years of saving my husband & I accumulated enough points to book a business class RTW ticket. We were fortunate enough to create an amazing itinerary and booked departure for this once in a lifetime trip in September of 2020…alas covid wiped that dream and our trip was cancelled and all points returned.
We have since used all those points on non travel rewards as we didn’t have much faith in future travel opportunities.

I’m daring to dream again and planning another trip for our combined 100th birthday in 2025.
As we have very few QFF points we are in a position to build again with any program or supplier to see our dream realised.
My husband and i don’t travel a lot so don’t accumulate a lot of points from flights, however we do have significant points earning ability from spend as we have a business.

Given that we are unlikely to reach any tier of significance in a FF program from flights, limiting our access to those elusive ‘Reward Flghts’ what is the best program or avenue to pursue that will give us the most access to business class flight availability?

Are there programs that have greater reward flight availbaility than others?

Are there affiliate programs that increase availability?

We’d love to do another business class RTW ticket but would also happily just do business return to somewhere in Europe and travel independently from that base.
Getting those reward flights (x2) is the main game!

Any and all advice much appreciated!

Cheers

2

Hi @cath

If you’re starting from scratch and you’re looking to accumulate enough points for a business class RTW trip, the two programmes I suggest you look into are KrisFlyer and Cathay (Asia Miles).

KrisFlyer Points enable you to fly RTW with Star Alliance. In my experience, it’s generally easier to find availability on Star Alliance airlines, especially for long-haul flights out of Australia (eg. on Singapore Airlines).

Cathay is in Oneworld and will more-or-less have the same availability as Qantas, but for far fewer points.

For both programmes the easiest way to accumulate these points is via American Express Membership Rewards points. With KrisFlyer points, you have the added advantage of being able to convert points from Velocity.

Let us know how you go!

2 Likes
3

Hi Sixtyeight.

Thank you so much for your response, this was incredibly helpful and i’m now looking forward to creating a plan to execute the strategy!

Thanks again! Cheers, Cath

1 Like