Qantas removes points from ‘loyalty bonus’

Qantas has announced a sudden and completely unexpected change to the Qantas Loyalty Bonus awarded to frequent flyers.

As a refresher, the Qantas Loyalty Bonus kicks in for every 500 Status Credits earned on Qantas and Jetstar flights during your Qantas Frequent Flyer membership year (with the exception of extra Status Credits earned during Qantas double Status Credits promotions).

Every time you cross that 500 Status Credit milestone, up to four times each year, Qantas sends an email prompting you to choose if you’d like to take your loyalty bonus as 8,000 Qantas Points or 50 Status Credits.

However, as of 15 September 2025, the points option is being removed, and frequent flyers will see those 50 Status Credits automatically added to their account.

Qantas says the decision has been made “to better align with our members’ preferences”.

No more points, just Status Credits

It’s an interesting move from two perspectives.

Firstly, it reduces the ‘unredeemed liability’ of Qantas Points held by the airline. That’s a cost carried forward year after year, based on a valuation of the total number of Qantas Points held by members.

Remember, it effectively costs Qantas nothing to create a point: the cost comes when that point is used or redeemed against a flight, an upgrade or a product purchased from the Qantas online store.

Status Credits, on the other, have no intrinsic value.

And for Qantas Frequent Flyer members who didn’t make the choice between Qantas Points or Status Credits, the airline would automatically assign them those 8,000 Qantas Points.

So by giving away 8,000 points up to four times per year, Qantas was adding to the pile of points held by members and the overall ‘unredeemed liability’ on the books.

And while choosing 50 Status Credits may seem like the obvious option to many frequent flyers, to those likely to fall well short of earning enough status credits to gain or retain Gold or Platinum status, 50 Status Credits really won’t make much of a difference.

In that case, taking the Qantas Loyalty Bonus as 8,000 Qantas Points which can go towards an upgrade or a flight is a much smarter decision.

Removing the Status Credits roll-over

There’s another aspect to this change which will impact some of the savvier frequent flyers.

Currently, you have 90 days from triggering the Qantas Loyalty Bonus to make the ‘Qantas Points or Status Credits’ decision.

If this happens near the end of your membership year and you already have sufficient status credits for Gold or Platinum, you can delay choosing your bonus until your new membership year kicks in.

This lets you use those 50 extra status credits to kick-start your run for another year of status rather than getting zero benefit by ‘wasting’ 50 status credits when you’ve already achieved Gold or Platinum.

Under the new system, those 50 Status Credits will automatically be added to your account every time you hit a Qantas Loyalty Bonus milestone – so there’s no longer the possibility to hold off for months and roll them over into your new membership year.

How to check your Qantas Loyalty Bonus progress

Want to see how close you are to triggering your next Loyalty Bonus?

Log into your Qantas Frequent Flyer account and in the Frequent Flyer Status box click View Progress; if you’re using the Qantas App, select My QFF and click View Progress.

Both methods show not only your current status credit bonus and progress towards the next tier, but also the countdown to your next Loyalty Bonus.

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