How I Flew My Family of 6 to Japan on Frequent Flyer Points 🤑✈️

Travelling is one of my all time favourite things to do but holidays can be so costly for a large family. Flights alone for 6 people can be thousands of dollars before even arriving at our destination so I’m always looking for thrifty ways to still maximise overseas adventures. One of my secrets? Airline loyalty programs. There is often a misconception that these points are solely earned from flying only and so the common family does not feel as though this is feasible for them. Well, I’m here to tell you that whilst this way does earn a significant amount of points, it is not the only way and is not how I did it! This is how we turned points into flights for our recent Japan adventure and earned them right here on the ground making smart but everyday choices. Time to turn dreams into plans for your own family!

Hakone Shrine Peace Tori

Earlier this year we visited Japan and flew return funded exclusively by Qantas Frequent Flyer points earned through means OTHER than flying. Being an Australian, I am a member of both Qantas and Virgin Australia loyalty programs and had decided to focus on earning Qantas Frequent Flyer points once we knew we wanted to visit Japan and fly Melbourne to Narita (Tokyo) which is a Qantas route. Once I had decided which program I wanted to focus on, my trick was to use all the tools at my disposal to contribute to these points. For Qantas’ program, this meant I did the following things to maximise points in the shortest possible time period-

1. Researched credit cards which were currently offering Frequent Flyer points and applied for the one with the highest incentive. This particular card offered a substantial amount of points at sign up and then a ‘booster’ once the card had been held for 3 months. It also awarded 1 point per AUD spend. Whilst we are not usually credit card users, this deal allowed us to achieve our goal of an overseas holiday by putting all our usual purchases and living expenses through this card and paying it off immediately. Please note-these deals change regularly and can be compared by a quick google search. 

2. Shopped at Woolworths and scanned our Everyday Rewards card. Ensured that the rewards were set to ‘Convert to Qantas Points.’  For every 2000 Everyday Rewards points, 1000 Frequent Flyer points would automatically transfer. These add up fast with a big family and large grocery spend. I would also make sure to always take advantage of the special offers and boosters to maximise points, particularly with items we regularly purchase. This is easily done via the Everyday Rewards app. 

3.  Shopped online via ‘Qantas Shopping’ which is accessible through your Frequent Flyer account. This ‘online mall’ hosts many online retailers and awards points by simply shopping through this platform and tracking your spending. The points and offers vary daily and are based off total spend. If I had certain items or retailers I wanted items from, I would just watch and wait and then take advantage when they had larger deals. Qantas Shopping also offers even more points by paying with a ‘linked card’ if you own and pay with one of the Visa or Mastercards specified. 
   

   

   Everyday Rewards notification when points hit your FF account

   

   Qantas Online Mall

These approaches can be aggressive if working with limited time, or can be used as part of a longer plan. Whatever works best for your individual circumstances and family. It does not have to be all or nothing and can still make a big impact on your points balance over time. This is how I personally did it in this situation, but there are also lots of other ways to earn points for individual programs. A few other ways include-

Insurance policies linked to the programs can offer sign up or bonus points. Worth looking into if your house/car is up for renewal or you are needing to take up health or travel insurance. 

Qantas Money (or alternative for other airlines) is a travel card you can load foreign currency and awards a ‘points per spend’ incentive. 

Hotel memberships can be linked and accommodation bookings can contribute to points. (And you can also use points to book accommodation!)

There are also many other different ways to earn and this is constantly evolving. It is always advisable to check directly with the program what the current offerings are to then capitalise on these! And be sure to not overspend just to get points or it defeats the whole purpose! We want to be working with money you are ALREADY spending, otherwise you may as well just pay directly for flights.

Once you have earned the points, then comes the fun part-booking the flights! For us, this was achievable in less than a year using my above method. When booking flights with rewards points, there are better ways than others to do this to maximise points and ensure you are getting the best deal. I made sure to book classic rewards flights for us to travel to Japan and back as a family of 6 with the least amount of points possible. We still did this without compromising on flights-we flew with Qantas on a direct flight without having to stop or fly on a codeshare of a subpar airline. I will discuss how to do this in another post but for now, get earning on those points! 

Tokyo Disneyland