Qatar Airways raises Avios surcharges substantially

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• Paul says:

  15 Sep15 September 17:19

  Avios is yet another cartel. If things weren’t so bad I say we desperately need a full investigation by the competition authorities not just into Avios but JVs and the whole anti competitive nature of aviation.

• Lee says:

  15 Sep15 September 17:30

  DP: DUB-BKK J+F last week booked for 175 euro, this morning was 375 now back to 211

• Charlie says:

  15 Sep15 September 18:09

  One thing that has not been reported on HfP is the proliferation of award search tools across all alliances, which have developed leaps and bounds in the past 12 months from several places (Google them). Want to book Doha to Amman in first class with Qatar? Unsure whether to use points or cash? Pay cash or buy 15k miles with Alaska or spend 56k mikes with BA or Qatar or Finnair, and that’s just one example of many across all alliances. The question is whether these tools will move towards greater alignment by airlines, either within or across alliances, or greater competition.

  • Rob says:

    15 Sep15 September 18:21

    For the average UK person they don’t have much use – it’s better aimed at Americans who have multiple sources of convertible points (Amex, Chase, Capital One).

    I promise you that less than 1% of our readers would buy Alaska points to avoid using BA Avios (and Alaska would pay us for selling their miles, so its not as if there’s not a commercial reason for doing it). You need to remember how mainstream we are these days.

    I admit that with the multiple Avios schemes now there may be some value, eg whether a Cathay route is cheaper via BA, Finnair or Qatar.

    • Charlie says:

      15 Sep15 September 18:30

      Fair enough, especially considering the recent confusion RJ ‘Why Am I Not BA Silver’ Sparrows created. Maybe your general readership is not as smart as you think 🙂

• Alex says:

  15 Sep15 September 20:04

  How do folks find any Avios flight availability with Qatar. Searched manually for several days next year but no availability at all for BC other than Economy. Is there a similar tool such as seatspy available?

  • Rob says:

    15 Sep15 September 20:25

    Doesn’t sound right (if using the Qatar site) because it will usually offer ‘double Avios’ if no standard seats.

    Remember Qatar uses married segment availability so far more likely to find seats from cities where tickets are cheaper for cash (Dublin, Glasgow, Amsterdam etc).

    • Peggerz says:

      15 Sep15 September 21:17

      @Rob
      Glasgow?
      Tsk Tsk! The very thought.😎

    • LittleNick says:

      16 Sep16 September 07:10

      Am I the only one that searches for availability by leg? So if I want to go to SIN I will search DOH-SIN and then find a reward flight from Europe to DOH with a corresponding arrival time into DOH. It doesn’t seem to me that the DOH-SIN flight will open up as a result of where you start in Europe?

      • Rob says:

        16 Sep16 September 07:24

        It doesn’t open up but the Qatar website shows the leg as unavailable when actually it is.

        Searching by leg gets around this.

• Carl says:

  15 Sep15 September 22:19

  Is this just for flights out of the UK? Or is this for flights in and out of the US?

  • Rob says:

    15 Sep15 September 22:23

    All flights.

• R says:

  16 Sep16 September 00:32

  Booked Doha to Brisbane one way as booking BA using RFS from London to Doha. Staying in Australia for a bit. Booked for sept 2025. Booked 360 days in advance. Literally last week. Business class was 70k avios plus £100 roughly. Haven’t checked what it is now but based on 1p = 1 avios that’s roughly £800 for a 14 hour business class flight. If it has changed I’m so glad I don’t have to pay the extra taxes. What luck I’ve had in booking it last week

• Nina says:

  16 Sep16 September 11:40

  For comparison benefit, in April I booked LHR > DOH > MEL for 90k Avios + £405, and return from ADL for similar pricing.
  Was lucky to get the 90k bargain tickets thanks to HFP insight and advanced planning!

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