February 7, 2022

Everything you Need to Know About Our Partner Airline Points Schemes

If you’re a frequent traveller, signing up for an airline’s rewards program can offer great benefits. Depending on how often you fly, you can enjoy a range of perks, such as free flights, upgrades, lounge access, increased baggage allowance, and more.

However, each airline has its own loyalty program, which can get confusing. In this article, we’ll highlight six of our partner airlines’ points schemes, providing tips on how to sign up, how to accrue points, and how to redeem rewards.

Lufthansa and Swiss

Both Lufthansa and its subsidiary, Swiss Air, share the same loyalty program, called Miles & More. Several other European airlines also use the Miles & More scheme, including Austrian Airlines and Brussels Airlines. The two airlines are part of the Star Alliance, the first and largest airline alliance in the world.

Miles & More has three membership levels: Frequent Traveller, Senator, and HON Circle. To qualify for Frequent Traveller, you’ll need to earn 35,000 status miles or take 30 flights, whereas Senator status requires 100,000 status miles. HON Circle is the most exclusive level and requires 600,000 status miles over two consecutive calendar years (in first or business class and only on Miles & More airlines).

Each tier offers different benefits, but at a minimum, you can expect access to Lufthansa Business Class lounges, free checked baggage, and more qualifying miles on your flights. Even if you don’t earn enough miles to reach these tiers, you can still accrue miles and redeem them for award flights, hotels, and merchandise.

Finnair

As part of the oneworld alliance, Finnair has its own frequent flyer program called Finnair Plus. If you’re a member, you can earn tier and award points for flying with Finnair or other oneworld airlines, including Qantas and Cathay Pacific.

In addition to the basic membership, there are four status tiers within Finnair Plus: Finnair Plus Silver, Finnair Plus Gold, Finnair Plus Platinum, and Finnair Plus Platinum Lumo. You’ll need to accrue at least 30,000 points or take 20 flights in a year to be eligible for the lowest level of status. There are also two lifetime tiers (Gold and Platinum), which will never be downgraded after you earn them.

The perks of being a Finnair Plus status member include:

Priority check-in and free extra baggage (all membership levels).
Lounge access (Gold membership and above).
Upgrades for family members (Platinum membership and above).

If you’re a basic Finnair Plus member, you can earn award points and exchange them for free flights and more.

Qantas

If you’re an Australia-based traveller, you may be familiar with the Qantas Frequent Flyer program. It allows you to collect points from a range of activities, including domestic and international Qantas flights, hotels, hire cars, and everyday activities like fuel fill-ups and energy bills.

When you accrue enough points with the Qantas Frequent Flyer program, you’ll earn elite status in one of four tiers: Silver, Gold, Platinum, and Platinum One. (The free membership tier is called Bronze.) To qualify, you’ll have to earn at least 300 status credits in one year.

Your Qantas elite status entitles you to perks like priority phone service and preferred seating (Silver and above), priority checked baggage (Gold and above), worldwide first-class lounge access (Platinum and above), and complimentary lounge invitations for friends (Platinum One). At the Bronze level, you can collect points for qualifying activities and redeem them for travel.

These three frequent flyer programs are just a snapshot of Airfare Geeks’ partner airline points schemes. We also work with carriers like Cathay Pacific and Emirates, which operate their own programs as well.

To learn more about our specialty travel agency or round-the-world airfare deals, visit our website today or call us on (02) 9188 7823.