Author: Matt Graham
Hard Sell: Velocity Still Encouraging Members to Earn Points
Even though Virgin Australia has been in voluntary administration for the past two months, and Velocity Frequent Flyer redemptions remain severely limited, Velocity has been really pushing its members to continue earning points lately. Velocity Frequent Flyer has been ramping up the marketing emails in recent weeks, with offers such as bonus points at the … Continued
Queensland Border to Reopen on 10 July, But Not to Victorians
Queensland will proceed with its plan to reopen the state’s border on 10 July to travellers from all Australian states and territories except Victoria. It comes as the Victorian government announces lockdowns of 10 Melbourne postcodes for four weeks, starting from tonight, following a localised COVID-19 outbreak. In addition, Queensland will not allow even its … Continued
Qantas Reopening Domestic Lounges from 1 July 2020
After being closed for more than three months due to COVID-19 restrictions (and a lack of passengers), Qantas will begin to reopen its Qantas Club and domestic Business class lounges from tomorrow. But the experience will be a little different, with social distancing and other health measures in place. Qantas will initially reopen 11 of its … Continued
Qantas Says Final Goodbye to Boeing 747 after 49 Years
Update: It appears that VH-OEJ, the last Qantas 747, is now scheduled to leave Australia on 22 July. Before this, Qantas will operate 3 domestic joy flights – one each from Sydney, Brisbane and Canberra. Tickets are expected to sell out quickly. The decision to put on the 3 joy flights was made at the last … Continued
Podcast #39: Noise Cancelling Headphones & US Credit Cards
On long-haul flights, sometimes silence is bliss. That’s why so many frequent flyers use noise-cancelling headphones to drown out the noise of aircraft engines and fellow passengers. Noise-cancelling headphones may seem like magic, but there’s some very sophisticated science that goes into providing the perfect listening experience. Many years ago Hossein Seif Zadeh, who has a … Continued
How Noise Cancelling Headphones Work – AIR039
For frequent flyers, noise-cancelling headphones are the ultimate travelling companion. But have you ever wondered how they actually work to cancel out noise? In this episode, aerospace engineer Hossein Seif Zadeh (a.k.a. hossein_au on the Australian Frequent Flyer forum) explains how noise-cancelling headphone technology works and the difference between a $100 and a $600 pair … Continued
Bain Capital to Buy Virgin Australia
The search for a new owner of Virgin Australia is finally over with Bain Capital, a U.S. private investment firm based in Boston, announced as the successful bidder. The other bidder in the running, Cyrus Capital Partners, reportedly withdrew this morning after submitting its final offer last Monday. Virgin’s administrators have now entered into a … Continued
COVID-19 is Accelerating the Transition to a Cashless Society
Many frequent flyers prefer to use credit cards for every possible transaction in order to earn points. But there are still around half a million Australians that don’t have a debit or credit card, preferring to pay for everything with cash. Slowly but surely, this number has been decreasing. Over the past decade, cash transactions … Continued
Qantas to Axe 6,000 Jobs, Raise $1.9b Equity
Qantas Airways Limited entered a trading halt on the ASX this morning as CEO Alan Joyce announced a three-year COVID-19 recovery plan that’s harsh but necessary. The cost-cutting and job losses are far greater than those announced in the last major shake-up back in February 2014, when 5,000 jobs were cut. Today, Qantas announced 6,000 permanent … Continued