Yesterday and today, Australia's national airline Qantas has announced good news for its 14.7 million loyal frequent flyers. Yesterday Qantas announced it was expanding its partnership with Taiwan's China Airlines, and today is giving customers an extra year to use their COVID credits.

More choice for QF frequent flyers

Before yesterday's change, Qantas frequent flyers could only use their points to travel on China Airlines flights between Australia and Taipei. In a significant development, Qantas points can now be used to book reward seats on all China airlines flights. This adds more than 75 worldwide destinations that frequent flyers can travel to on China Airlines using their points.

Qantas said that members can travel from Sydney to Da Nang (Vietnam) in economy using 37,800 points, from Melbourne to Amsterdam in business using 159,000 points or Sydney to Taipei in business using 75,000 points, plus the usual fees and taxes.

From its base at Taipei Taoyuan Airport (TPE), China Airlines operates long-haul routes to North America, Europe, and Australia and has an extensive network throughout Asia. In Europe, it serves Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Rome, London Heathrow (LHR) and Vienna, while in North America, it flies to Honolulu, Los Angeles, Ontario (ONT), New York (JFK), San Francisco and Vancouver. Including codeshares, it offers 179 destinations in 29 countries.

At the end of February, Air China operated a fleet of 66 passenger jets and 22 freighters. These included 14 A350-900s, 20 A330-300s and ten A321neos from Airbus and ten 777-300ERS, 12 737-800s, 17 747-400Fs and five 777Fs from Boeing.

Qantas has a network of more than 45 partner airlines, which gives frequent flyers around 1,200 destinations worldwide to choose from with their points. Qantas Loyalty CEO Olivia Wirth said:

"We receive great feedback from our members who have traveled to Taipei with China Airlines, and we know that having access to their full and expansive network will be welcome news. There are more than five million reward seats available for booking over the next year on Qantas, Jetstar and our partner airlines."

Another year to use COVID credits

At times complaints have surfaced from passengers of various airlines unable to use COVID-era flight credits before they expired. To ensure that all its customers can use their credits, Qantas and Jetstar have added another twelve months to their expiry date. This is Qantas's third extension since 2020, although today, it said this would be the last one.

Photo: John Mackintosh | Shutterstock.

Before today, customers had to book and complete their travel by December 31st, 2023, and bookings will still have to be made before the end of the year. However, Qantas has added another year for the travel, meaning it must be completed by December 31st, 2024.

During the pandemic, Qantas Group issued AU$2 billion ($1.33 billion) in flight credits over more than two years, both for when the airline canceled a flight or when a customer elected not to travel. Qantas said today that passengers who hold credits from an airline cancelation remain eligible for a cash refund if they prefer.

By the end of 2022, around AU$1.2 billion ($800 million) had been refunded or used for travel, so now Qantas is keen to clear the AU$800 million ($532 million) balance by the end of 2024. According to Qantas:

• 76% of COVID credits are worth less than AU$500 ($333)
• 24% of COVID credits are worth between AU$500 and $5000 ($333 - $3330)
• Less than 1% of COVID credits are worth over AU$5000 ($3330).

What do you think about these developments at Qantas and Jetstar? Let us know in the comments.