After quite a lengthy break, American Airlines has announced that it will be returning to New Zealand. A new service, operating between Los Angeles and Auckland will begin in June 2016, and will be operated by Boeing 787 aircraft. While a start date for the service has not yet been announced, the timetable for the services are as follows: LAX-AKL Starting June 2016 Departs LAX at 10:45 p.m. Arrives at AKL at 6:35 a.m., two days later AKL-LAX Starting June 2016 Departs AKL at 1:20 p.m. Arrives at LAX at 6:30 a.m., the same day The announcement comes as part…
Author: Mark B
[Update] Qantas has announced that the Perth-Singapore service will go daily on a year round basis as from December 1st 2015. The additional services will operate on Tuesdays and Thursdays, increasing the year round service from 5 per week to 7 per week. Qantas had previously announced that the service would operate daily over the summer months, with seasonal services being added to the timetable. The latest announcement makes the additional service permanent. [Previous] There have been rumours circulating for several months, and now its official – Qantas is set to resume flights between Perth and Singapore. At this stage,…
[Update] Following a storm of protest on social media, Citibank is now in the process of reversing the change in the transfer rates to Velocity and Krisflyer. In messages being sent to customers today, Citibank has confirmed that the transfer rates that were in effect on 31 October will be restored. At this point, it is not clear how long the process of updating the Citibank website will take, but it is likely to take a few days. [Previous] Citibank has, without notice, reduced the transfer rate that points in the Citibank Reward program can be converted to Velocity or…
Malaysia Airlines has revealed details of the business class product that it will be installing in its Airbus A330 fleet. The upgrade will begin from April 2016, and Malaysia Airlines have indicated that the aircraft will be used for services between Malaysia and Australia, and other parts of Asia. The upgrade is expected to be completed by September 2016. The spacious fully lie-flat seats will replace the current A330’s angled flat beds. The room comes at a cost, and the seat count of the business cabin will reduce from the current 36 seats down to 27 seats. The configuration is…
Woolworths has confirmed that it is removing the earning of Qantas Frequent Flyer Points from its Rewards program. The Everyday Rewards Program in its current form, is to be replaced by Woolworths Rewards which will offer the chance to earn ‘Woolworths Dollars’ which can then be used as a discount at the cash register, The removal of Qantas Points will remove a couple of streams of Points earning opportunities. Firstly, the standard one Qantas Point that is earned for each dollar over $30 in a transaction, and any associated bonus points that may be offered. The Second stream to go…
Qantas has advised that it is set to change the way the number of Qantas Points earned while flying on partner airlines, such as its oneWorld partners, is calculated. In addition, there will be some adjusments to the way that Status Credits are calculated. Broadly speaking, the changes bring airline partner earning into the same structure as that being used for Qantas and Jetstar earning. That is, for the most part, Qantas will provide tables for earning based largely on the geographical regions that you are flying between, rather than basing points earn on distance. As it stands today, the…
Singapore Airlines is set to resume non stop services between Singapore and the U.S. The new services is set to begin in 2018, following a 5 year break from operating the service. The service will be operated by an Ultra Long Range variant of the A350-900 aircraft, an aircraft for which Singapore Airlines will be the launch customer. As a launch customer of the A350-900ULR, Singapore Airlines announced that it was upgrading seven aircraft that it had as a firm order for A350-900 aircraft to the upgraded model. In addition, it was converting 4 options on the A350-900 to firm…
The Commonwealth Bank has updated its offer of 40,000 Qantas Points for new cardholders of its Platinum Awards credit card. As an added bonus, for people taking up the offer, an annual fee waiver is on offer, saving $249 in the first year. Having said that, there is still a $10 annual fee for opting in to the Qantas Frequent Flyer Direct program. Note that the $10 annual optin fee is increasing to $30 per year in November. This opt in is required in order to earn Qantas Points with the Platinum Awards card. The basics of this offer are:…
As the commencement of the new Qantas and American Airlines flights between Australia and the US cities of San Francisco and Los Angeles approach, Qantas has launched a double points promotion on all QF coded flights to the US. This includes flights that are operated by American Airlines, although you do need to book the Qantas codeshare flight number. To take advantage of this offer, you will need to: Register at the page linked to above and make a new eligible flight booking between 12.01am (AEDT) 6 October and 11.59pm (AEDT) 19 October 2015 Travel between 18 December 2015 and…
[For more up to date information on earning points on Scoot, please refer to this article.] Singapore Airlines KrisFlyer program has announced that it will now be possible to earn bonus KrisFlyer Miles while using the service of budget carriers Scoot, and the Singapore version of TigerAir. This ability does not extend to the Australian version of TigerAir. There is a limitation in that the earnings are only for bonus miles, and it is not possible to earn elite miles that apply to status in Krisflyer. In both cases, you will need to book particular fares or bundles in order…