Qatar Airways Privilege Club offers the greatest number of award seats for Qatar Airways flights amongst all loyalty programs.
Since Qsuites business class is such a competitive product, finding an award seat at the lowest “Saver” rate can prove to be quite difficult.
However, Qatar Airways Privilege Club also features “Flexi” awards, which offer access to more seats in exchange for a greater amount of points.
What Are Qatar Airways Privilege Club Flexi Awards?
In the Qatar Airways Privilege Club loyalty program, one unique feature available to members is Flexi awards.
With Flexi pricing, you get access to a greater number of award seats, albeit at twice the cost of the “Saver” off-peak award price.
It’s worth noting that this is much different than dynamic pricing, since the cost is always fixed at twice the amount of a standard, off-peak award seat, and doesn’t otherwise fluctuate.
When you search for an award flight on the Qatar Airways website, you may notice the word Flexi in the search results. This denotes that the price you see is twice that of the standard, off-peak “Saver” rate.
If you don’t see Flexi above the search results, then you know that you’re paying the lower “Saver” rate, which is a great deal.
For example, a “Saver” award for a one-way flight from Montreal to Doha costs 70,000 Avios on off-peak dates in Qsuites business class.
However, the Flexi price for the same flight is 140,000 Avios.
You may also see Flexi pricing displayed on a green flag with “Q2” written on it. Flexi tends to appear more often on the Qatar Airways website, and the Q2 banner tends to appear on the app; however, it may also appear on the website.
In either event, they both refer to the same thing.
Flexi pricing is only available for flights with Qatar Airways in economy, business class, and First Class booked through Qatar Airways Privilege Club.
You won’t find Flexi pricing for Qatar Airways flights booked with other loyalty programs, nor will you find Flexi pricing for other airlines booked through Qatar Airways Privilege Club.
Qatar Airways recently introduced peak and off-peak pricing to its loyalty program, with flights priced higher during peak dates on “Saver” rates.
Flexi prices aren’t affected by this distinction, and you’ll pay the same Flexi price whether you book a peak or an off-peak date.
Is Qatar Airways Privilege Club Flexi Pricing a Good Deal?
Ideally, there would be ample award availability on all routes at the “Saver” level. Unfortunately, this just isn’t the case.
Instead, Flexi pricing offers access to a greater inventory of award seats, albeit at a higher cost.
On the one hand, having access to more award seats that can be booked with points is always better than not having any seats available whatsoever.
Furthermore, since Flexi prices are fixed, they aren’t subject to the same fluctuation in prices that you’ll find with programs that use dynamic pricing. In this regard, pricing is still predictable, as long as you can find an award seat.
In comparison to the cash rates for Qatar Airways flights, you can still wind up getting a good return in value with your points on Flexi awards.
For example, a round-trip flight from Montreal to Doha in Qatar Airways Qsuites business class costs around $7,200 (CAD).
At the “Saver” level, those same flights would price out at 140,000 Avios, plus around $300 (CAD) in taxes and fees. After accounting for the cash component of the award booking, you’d have netted a value of around 4.94 cents per Avios (CAD), which is excellent.
With a Flexi award, those same flights would price out at 280,000 Avios, plus the same amount of taxes and fees. In this situation, and after accounting for the cash component, you’d still have come out with a value of around 2.47 cents per Avios (CAD).
We value Avios at 2.0 cents per point (CAD), and even with Flexi awards, you’re still able to redeem points at higher than our target valuation.
While it’s not nearly as good as what you’d get at the “Saver” level, your points are still punching above their weight, especially when compared to the cash fare.
Keep in mind that there are often transfer bonuses to both Qatar Airways Privilege Club and British Airways Executive Club.
Since you can freely transfer Avios between accounts, you could leverage a transfer bonus promotion to either, and then move them around from within the Avios ecosystem for a Qatar Airways redemption.
If you’re able to make the most of a transfer bonus, which usually results in 30–50% bonus Avios, then you’d be taking some of the sting out of Flexi pricing.
For example, a one-way flight from Seattle to Doha in Qsuites business class costs 140,000 Avios with Flexi pricing.
A 30% transfer bonus would effectively reduce the number of points required down to 107,700 points. Similarly, a 40% transfer bonus would bring the effective cost down to 100,000 points, and a 50% transfer bonus would lower it even further to 93,400 points.
At those values, it’s not an entirely unreasonable price to pay for one of the world’s best business class products.
It’s also worth noting that booking Qatar Airways Flexi awards may be the only way to secure award seats for a larger group on the same flight.
If there are more than two people travelling together, it can be rather hard, if not impossible, to find multiple “Saver” award seats with Qatar Airways. This is especially the case on routes to or from North America.
By combining Flexi awards with “Saver” awards, you’d have a much better chance of flying together, perhaps even in the Qsuites Quad.
Conclusion
Qatar Airways offers Flexi awards through its Privilege Club loyalty program.
In exchange for a greater inventory of award seats, Flexi awards are twice the cost of the “Saver” off-peak awards.
While it’s always a better deal to book award seats at the “Saver” level, it’s not always possible, especially on popular routes.
Flexi rewards give you a better chance of scoring a seat in one of the world’s best business class products; however, it’ll just come at a steeper price.
By transferring points during a transfer bonus event, you can effectively reduce the number of points required, which also takes a bit of the sting out of Flexi pricing.
