Thanks to a new partnership between Oneworld member Qatar Airways and SkyTeam airline Garuda Indonesia, you can now both earn and spend your Avios on Garuda flights. This is not only good news for Qatar’s Privilege Club members, but also for members of the British Airways Club, Iberia Plus, Finnair Plus, and even Aer Lingus’ AerClub, as you can transfer your Avios freely between those programs.
First class tickets earn 250% of the distance, while business class earns between 150% and 170%. Things are less attractive in economy class, as the four lowest booking classes earn no Avios at all, and the lowest eligible classes only earn 30%.
It should be noted that you cannot earn any status points on Garuda Indonesia flights. You will merely earn Avios. This, however, is quite common for non-alliance partners.
Feel free to use our miles calculator to see how many miles you’d earn:
Spending Avios on Garuda flights is now also possible (though Garuda flights are not yet displayed in Qatar’s online search). For these flights, Qatar’s general Avios redemption chart applies:
Their only flight to Europe is to Amsterdam. It’s 7,051 miles long and thus sadly falls into the most expensive tier (by only 50 miles, so sad). This being the case, spending over 300,000 Avios on a business class round trip hardly sounds like an attractive option.
One of the most attractive options is to fly business class between Jakarta and Tokyo for 62,000 miles per direction – a flight of over 7 hours. This option, however, already existed through Qatar’s Japanese Oneworld partner Japan Airlines (JAL).
Transferring Avios between Programs
We’ve gone into great detail about how to transfer the Avios to and from the different programs in the following article:
Conclusion
Even though Garuda Indonesia’s presence in Europe is tiny, it’s still good news that Oneworld members can now earn Avios with this SkyTeam airline. The earning rates in economy class aren’t great and the redemption options are mostly mediocre, but if you’re travelling within South East Asia, it’s better to earn a handful of Avios than not earn anything.
Source: Head for Points – thanks!
Cover Picture: Photo by Aldrin Rachman Pradana on Unsplash