Final Day To Book Awards Before Qantas Program Devaluation; Updated Comparison Award Chart For Travel On El Al To Israel

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Update: The new award chart will go into effect 9/17 at 10am EDT. Book your premium cabin award tickets now before rates go up! For example, a one-way NYC-Tel Aviv business class ticket on El Al will go up from 78K to 90K points.

Originally posted on 6/20 (The June AMEX transfer bonus mentioned in the original post below is no longer valid):

Related post: Everything You Need To Know About Booking El Al Awards With Qantas!

For years I ignored the Qantas frequent flyer program. It was overpriced in both miles and fuel surcharges and didn’t have good transfer options.

In recent times though they have aggressively added transfer options as AMEX, Barclays, Capital One, Citi, and Marriott can all transfer points to Qantas. They also added the ability to book El Al awards, which have good availability, but have been tied to the poorly managed and very overpriced Matmid program.

The Australian Business Traveler has a rundown of Qantas program changes.

In short:

• Qantas has added new partners in Air New Zealand, China Airlines, Bangkok Airways, and Air France/KLM Flying Blue, though some of those are restricted to select routes.
• They are also lowering fuel surcharges on their own flights starting on 9/18.
• They have released new Qantas and partner award charts here.
• Economy prices have been lowered effective immediately.
• Premium, business, and first class prices will go up starting on 9/18. They justify the increases with the reduced fuel surcharges, but as they never collected fuel surcharges on El Al there is only a devaluation at hand.
• Qantas is also adding additional award space on their own metal. The best way to book awards for Qantas flights is actually with Alaska miles, followed by American miles and hopefully that additional award space will be available to those programs as well.
• Qantas is adding a lifetime Platinum level.
• The coolest addition is that in December Qantas will start a points club that will be awarding elite-style benefit program for people that earn at least 150K miles from non-flying earnings and there will be higher tiers in this program as well. Let’s hope this starts a trend among other airlines!

On the one hand, some of these devaluations make it pretty pricey for awards. On the one hand I’m just happy that they still have award charts. The trend these days is to get rid of award charts and switch to dynamic pricing and things certainly could have been much worse.

Luckily, the 44% (or more!) stacking transfer bonus from AMEX to Qantas is still working! Now that we know Qantas’ plans you can make an educated decision about whether to transfer points for El Al travel.

You can read this post for all about the Qantas program and redeeming on El Al.

Here is a look at what is changing.

Here is the old Qantas partner award chart:

Here is the interim Qantas partner award chart with the reduced economy prices:

Here is the future Qantas partner award chart effective 9/18 with the increased premium cabin pricing:

Sample destinations to/from Tel Aviv:

• Zone 1: Larnaca
• Zone 2: Athens, Sofia
• Zone 3: London, Madrid, Moscow, Paris, Venice, Warsaw, Zurich
• Zone 4: Mumbai
• Zone 5: Bangkok, Beijing, Johannesburg
• Zone 6: Boston, Hong Kong, JFK, Newark, Toronto, Tokyo
• Zone 7: Chicago, Miami
• Zone 8: Los Angeles, San Francisco

Here is a comparison for how many points you’ll need with Qantas (regularly or during a transfer promo period) or with El Al Matmid.

There are 2 of these charts below. Chart #1 is the old chart, which is valid for the current pricing on premium economy and business class awards. This chart has the old higher pricing for economy, which is no longer applicable.

Chart #2 is the new chart, which is valid for the current pricing in economy and will be valid for future pricing on premium economy and business class awards starting on 9/18.

In other words, if you want to book round-trip travel from NYC to Tel Aviv before 9/18 for travel anytime in the next year, you’ll need 75.6K Qantas points in economy, 126K in premium economy, or 156K in business.

If you transfer points from AMEX with a 44% bonus that means you’ll need about 52.5K points in economy, 87.5K points in premium economy, or 108,333 points in business class. If you need a one-way ticket now you’ll need 26,250 points in economy, 43,750 points for premium economy, or 54,167 points for business class.

If you want to book round-trip travel from NYC to Tel Aviv as of 9/18, you’ll need 75.6K Qantas points in economy, 141.6K in premium economy, or 180K in business. That’s a 10% decrease from previous economy rates, a 12.4% increase in premium economy, and an 11.5% increase in business class.

If you transfer points from AMEX with a 44% bonus now and want to hold that for future use, you’ll need to transfer about 52.5K points in economy, 98,333 points in premium economy, or 125K points in business class. If you need a one-way ticket for future use you’ll need to transfer about 26,250 points in economy, 49,167 points for premium economy, or 62.5K points during the current promo for business class.

• You will need to round-up to their nearest 500 points for AMEX transfers to Qantas.
• The chart below includes rates for round-trip travel, though both programs allow for one-way travel at half of the round-trip rate.

Chart #1:

Chart #2:

What are your thoughts on the Qantas changes? Will you use El Al or Qantas points to redeem for award travel on El Al?