Qatar Airways Privilege Club Massive Qmiles Devaluation May 27, 2018

Qatar Airways made an announcement the other week about changes to the Privilege Club (read more here) that would also include award chart changes on May 27, 2018. The airline didn’t give any advance notice, however, what these changes or how drastic they might be.

Privilege Club mostly/close to doubled the required Qmiles that award now require on its flights in addition to the segment fee of $25/$50/$75 for economy/business/first that was disclosed earlier.

You can access Qatar Airways Privilege Club here.

Here are some examples of Qmiles required for one-way awards:

LHR-BKK

JFK-BOM

SIN-EZE

LAX-BKK

ARN-DPS

Conclusion

Qatar Airways has been devaluing its Privilege Club left and right over the past few months. It first instituted email/web form only award requests (you cannot phone in partner awards), instituted per sector fees on its awards, adjusted the number of Qpoints earned based on the fare and abruptly ended the entire Qbiz program without zero advance notice.

Difficult to see any value left on the Privilege Club on its current form with these award tickets that now require 300,000 miles between Europe and Asia in business class.

Qatar Airways business class is great and I have been crediting the flights to BA’s Executive Club. One another option is AA’s Executive Club that still have competitive partner awards (better than BA’s) mostly without fuel surcharges. Privilege Club members that have been crediting Qatar flights to the program should explore alternate options.

Qatar Airways is able to decrease the cash value of its outstanding miles and perhaps take accounting gain. This may benefit the airline in short term. It won’t in long term, however, when fliers in increasing number are crediting the flights to other program and there is less loyalty.