Will this make frequent travelers happier?
Does dynamic pricing work for award travel?
If you've ever booked a vehicle through a ride-sharing app, you've probably experienced dynamic pricing. We may soon see more, with fast food chains and others investigating the practice. Given that dynamic pricing already exists in the world of air travel, it's not too surprising that it would expand to other elements of the industry. This helps explain why Qantas applies some of the same principles to its award travel program.
The program, known as Classic Plus Flight Rewards, will be more widely available than on Qantas' traditional rewards program flights. On the airline's website, the value of Classic Plus travel is stated as follows:[f]Typical airfares vary throughout the year. ” Another key difference between the two types of award travel is that Classic awards can also be redeemed on Jetstar and partner airline tickets, while Classic Plus travel can only be redeemed on Qantas tickets.
The new program will apply to international flights from 1 July 2024, and then to domestic flights within Australia. Qantas acknowledged the similarities between this award ticket and traditional airfare, saying:[t]The number of points required to reserve this award seat varies and fluctuates like commercial fares. ”
As The Points Guy's Ben Smithson observed in his analysis of the new program, the new award travel option was inspired by Qantas customers who were dissatisfied with the relatively small number of flights available on the Classic program. Looks like you got it.
“If Qantas cash fares are on sale and you have a lot of Qantas Points to redeem, this could be a decent deal,” Smithson writes. Given that traveling to Australia isn't cheap, whether you pay in dollars or points, the question arises whether Qantas award travel will increase that much once this comes into effect. But if you're planning on heading Down Under in the near future, there's one more thing to consider.
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