Book now: lots of Australia seats (up to 4 business per flight) open for Avios

Qatar Airways has been struggling for years to get greater access to the Australian market, in the face of substantial lobbying from Qantas.

It came up with a cunning plan which I will explain below. A whopping 28 additional weekly flights to Australia will be launched by Qatar Airways from June. These are now bookable with both Avios and, between Doha and Australia and in Economy only, Virgin Points.

This is the same number of flights that Qatar Airways was refused permission to launch in 2023, with the government citing ‘national interests’ (ie Qantas protection) as the reason.

The structure is elegant.

Current rules allow Qatari airlines to fly 28 times per week to Perth, Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney. Qatar Airways uses 100% of this allocation.

As a reciprocal deal, Australian airlines are allowed to fly 28 times per week from those cities to Qatar. Except, to date, no Australian airline has taken up this opportunity.

Blocked from launching its own 28 additional weekly flights, Qatar Airways has found a way to …. launch its own 28 additional weekly flights.

Qatar Airways bought a 25% stake in Virgin Australia from Bain Capital, its private equity majority owner.

Virgin Australia immediately announced flights to Doha from Brisbane, Melbourne, Perth and Sydney using the existing traffic rights for Australian-based airlines.

Except …. Virgin Australia doesn’t have the aircraft available to do this.

As luck would have it, Qatar Airways DOES have spare aircraft, together with full crews. What luck.

Virgin Australia is therefore paying Qatar Airways to wet lease its aircraft and crews in order to operate its new services to Doha.

These will, legally, be Virgin Australia flights, albeit operated on behalf of Virgin Australia by Qatar Airways aircraft and Qatari-based crew. They will also be codeshared with Qatar Airways.

How can you redeem points for these flights?

There is one additional flight per day between Doha and Brisbane, Melbourne, Sydney and Perth.

Services will start on 13th June (Sydney), 20th June (Brisbane), 27th June (Perth) and 1st December (Melbourne).

Cash tickets have been on sale for a while and reward seats dropped last night. It looks like there was a mad scramble in Australia to hoover them up using Virgin Australia’s Virgin Velocity points but some remain.

Redeeming Avios for these new Australia flights

Whilst you can book Qatar Airways flights via ba.com, this is not possible with these new services because they are technically codeshares with Virgin Australia.

However you CAN use Avios to book Virgin Australia flights via Qatar Airways Privilege Club. You need to transfer your Avios from British Airways to Qatar Airways as we explain here.

The good news is that the flights show in the main Qatar Airways reward booking engine. You don’t neeed to put in a manual request.

The bad news is that I struggled to combine a Qatar Airways flight (from the UK to Doha) and a Virgin Australia marketed, Qatar Airways operated flight (from Doha to Australia) in the same booking.

Four business class reward seats per flight were released

Yes, an impressive four business reward seats on most (all?) Virgin Australia-marked flights from Doha to Australia opened up last night.

Here’s an example, booking for FOUR people between Doha and Brisbane in October in business class:

Now, pricing is a bit messy.

It costs 180,000 Avios for a Qatar Airways business class redemption seat from the UK to Australia and back – virtually half the cost of flying on Avios with BA, in the unlikely event you could get seats.

However, I couldn’t get it to price a through trip because technically you are mixing carriers even though the Virgin Australia flights are operated by Qatar Airways aircraft and crew. You might need to book it as two flights (UK to Doha, Doha to Australia) if the onward leg is Virgin Australia.

If you have to book it as two separate flights, the cost would be:

• UK to Doha – 86,000 Avios + £500ish return in business class

• Doha to Australia – 140,000 Avios + QAR 2290 return (£500ish) in business class

This is obviously more expensive than paying 180,000 Avios return for a through ticket which is entirely on Qatar Airways-marketed services, but beggars can’t be choosers!

There’s a second issue for groups of four. You have a low chance of getting four business class seats between the UK and Doha. This might mean splitting your party on the UK to Doha leg and then meeting up in Doha to travel to Australia together.

Redeeming Virgin Points for these new Australia flights

Virgin Australia is a partner with Virgin Atlantic, and you can earn and redeem Virgin Points on Virgin Australia flights.

This article looks at how to redeem Virgin Points on Virgin Australia and other non-SkyTeam partners.

The bad news, however, is that since (I think) last May you cannot redeem Virgin Points for business class flights on Virgin Australia.

Pricing for Virgin Points is here. As you can see, it is only offering Economy flights.

In theory you can book Doha to/from Australia in Economy on Virgin Points on these additional 28 flights, although you’d need to get from the UK to Doha via another method.

If you can see Economy availability via Qatar Airways Privilege Club for a Virgin Australia service between Doha and Australia, Virgin Atlantic’s call centre should be able to book it.

The only risk ….

The only potential issue is that Virgin Australia has only been given ‘interim approval’ for the tie up. This allows it to start selling tickets now, in anticipation of full approval, on the grounds that long haul ticket sales from Australia tend to have a long lead time.

There is a small but not zero risk that the Australian Government finds a legal loophole to block this deal in its continued attempts to protect the market position of Qantas.

You can pre-order ‘The Chairman’s Lounge – The Inside Story Of How Qantas Sold Us Out’ on Amazon for £12.15 (click here). Out in paperback in the UK next month, it exposes the – erm – cosy friendship between the airline and various Australian politicians and how it influenced aviation policy.

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How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2025)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

In February 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points. These points convert at 1:1 into Avios.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital on Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, and the standard card is FREE. Capital on Tap cards also have no FX fees.

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

There are also generous bonuses on the two American Express Business cards, with the points converting at 1:1 into Avios. These cards are open to sole traders as well as limited companies.

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.