Qantas announces major upgrade to Frequent Flyer rewards points program

Qantas frequent flyers will get access to more than 20 million seats on flights to international destinations as part of a $100 million expansion of its loyalty program.

The launch of Classic Plus Flight Rewards will give customers access to more international flights from July and will roll out to domestic flights by the end of 2024.

The airline hopes the $100m investment will help them achieve more than $500m in earnings, before costs.

Qantas Loyalty chief executive Andrew Glance said the new type of reward seat will usually require more points than existing Classic seats, but will be available to all destinations on the Qantas international and domestic network, across First, Business, Premium Economy and Economy cabins.

There are currently about 16 million Qantas frequent flyers — representing about 64 per cent of the national population.

Qantas Group chief executive Vanessa Hudson said frequent flyers now have more ways than ever to earn points and Classic Plus will open up more value for frequent flyers who want to spend their growing points balance.

“We’ve spent a lot of time listening to members about how we can better reward them,” Ms Hudson said.

“We’re adding over 20 million new flight rewards with the launch of a new type of reward seat called Classic Plus. It’s one of the biggest expansions we’ve made to the Frequent Flyer program in its 35-year history.”

The points required to book Classic Plus reward seats will vary like normal airfares, which means they’ll be lower during off-peak periods or when booking early, and higher during peak periods.

For example, a return business class flight from Sydney to London (during the peak period) would cost 638,000 points as a Classic Plus customer compared to just 289,200 on the Classic program.

While economy seats on the same return flight would cost 191,800 points on the Classic Plus program (during the peak period).

The Plus program seats will also be eligible for upgrades.

Classic Plus reward seats can be booked from Monday for travel from 1 July 2024 exclusively via qantas.com.

Qantas will continue to offer more than 5 million existing Classic rewards seats across Qantas, Jetstar and 45 partner airlines.

More to come.