4 best ways to quickly earn Qantas Points and keep your balance alive

There are plenty of stories about travellers who have lost their hard-earned stash of Qantas Frequent Flyer points due to their expiry after 18 months of no earning or spending activity.

And while no Executive Traveller reader would have issues keeping their Qantas Points balance alive, the same might not apply for many friends, family and colleagues.

So if they turn to you for advice on how to keep their points intact when that use-by date is fast approaching, here are the best ways to quickly chalk up some activity on their account.

4 best ways to earn Qantas Points

1. A quick hit of points: The Qantas-BP partnership

By signing up to the free BP Rewards loyalty program and linking that to your Qantas Frequent Flyer account, you can earn points for buying petrol and most in-store products (such as drinks and snacks).

These points are very fast to land in your account, and they arrive at the following rates:

• 2 Qantas Points per litre of BP Ultimate unleaded
• 1 Qantas Point per litre of all other BP fuel (including diesel, LPG and regular unleaded)
• 1 Qantas Point per $1 spent on eligible in-store products (excluding purchases like gift cards, mobile phone recharge vouchers and tobacco)

Qantas offers an easy one-step way to join BP Rewards and link your QFF account at the same time – click here to get that done.

All you need to do at the BP checkout is scan your Qantas Frequent Flyer card, or fire up your Qantas app and scan the digital barcode to pocket those points, or use the contactless BPme smartphone app for iPhone and Android (as long as your BP Rewards and Qantas accounts have been linked).

Read more: Everything you need to know about the Qantas, BP partnership

2. Next business day points: Qantas Wine

Qantas Wine is an online shopping gateway that lets you shop for popular varieties of wines and other alcohol, including drops found in premium cabins and lounges.

20,000 bonus points is enough for a short business class flight.

Apart from the large points bonuses on some packages, you’ll pocket an easy one point per dollar spent (or three points per dollar if you sign up to be a premium member).

Best of all, points usually credit within 1-2 business days, although there are cases when it takes longer around peak holiday periods. Qantas officially says it can take ‘up to six weeks’ for points to credit.

3. Easy ongoing points: The Qantas Wellbeing App

The Qantas Wellbeing App is a free download for Apple and Android phones and links to the Apple Health or Google Fit apps respectively. It works without a Qantas Insurance health policy and uses your phone to record activity.

It's simple to use – just keep your phone with you during the day to track your steps. You'll get 0.6 Qantas Points for meeting the daily step goal and 5 Qantas Points for passing the weekly step challenge.

Want to earn points by sleeping? Set up a regular sleep schedule and put your phone down 30 minutes before bedtime. You'll get 0.5 Qantas Points for each night you sleep enough and don't touch your phone.

From L-R: Earning points as you walk and earning points while you sleep.

If you need some quick Qantas Points to extend your account, go to 'Check-Up' in the app and perform one of the simple activities to earn 5 or 10 Qantas Points. This could be as simple as working out your BMI or checking your tyre pressure.

Doing some quick check-ups can get you a few Qantas Points.

4. The Qantas-Woolworths partnership

The partnership between Qantas and Woolworths is another reliable way to keep your Qantas Points buzzing along and steadily – if slowly – building up.

There's a standard earning rate of 1 Woolworths Everyday Rewards point per $1 spent on most products at participating stores in the Woolworths group (which includes not only Woolies supermarkets but BWS bottle shops, Big W stores and Ampol fuel outlets).

Provided you've linked your Woolworths Everyday Rewards and Qantas Frequent Flyer accounts and opted for Qantas as your 'reward', then every time you've earned 2,000 Woolworths rewards points, they'll automatically and immediately convert to 1,000 Qantas Points.

2,000 Woolworths Rewards points can automatically transfer to 1,000 Qantas Points.

Thankfully, this doesn't mean you have to spend $2,000 at the supermarket: there are plenty of special offers at Woolworths to help you reach that goal even faster by earning extra Woolworths Rewards points on certain products, or across categories (such as meat or fruit and vegetables).

However, because you have to earn 2,000 Woolies points to have them become 1,000 Qantas points, this is more of a 'slow burn' or rather 'slow earn' approach than a quick 'give me points now!' tactic.

Read more: The complete guide to Woolworths' Everyday Rewards

Burn rather than earn? Spending Qantas Points

If it's going to be difficult to earn points in time, redeeming some points could be an easy last resort option, especially if the balance at stake is particularly large.

The best-case scenario is if you have planned travel and there’s a seat you can book with points. A minimum of 6,400 points will get you from Sydney to Melbourne in Jetstar economy, while the lowest-price Qantas business class seat on the same route will set you back 18,400 points.

Travel hack: How to book two flights for the price of one with Qantas Points

But if there are still no flights you want to burn your points on, consider making a small purchase through the Qantas Store. We don't usually advocate spending points through the store due to the low value you get out of each point, but desperate times calls for desperate measures.

The Qantas Store has a wide variety of retail gift cards such as David Jones, Myer, Apple, JB Hi-Fi and Westfield. On average, 4,600 Qantas Points gets you a $25 gift card.

Another suggestion is to donate some points to charity. It's not tax-deductible, but at 2,900 Qantas Points for a $25 contribution, your Qantas Points will do a lot more good than with gift cards.

Donating some Qantas Points to charity will reset the expiry date of your balance, and do some good in the world.

Regardless of how you do it, spending Qantas Points resets the 18 month counter on your whole frequent flyer account balance.

How to get back expired Qantas points

Of course, the worst case scenario is that there's zero activity on your Qantas account for those 18 months and you discover all of your Qantas Points have vanished.

But that doesn't mean they're gone for good. Qantas offers a mechanism for recovering all of your missing points: it’s called the Qantas Points Challenge.

As long as you contact Qantas within six months of your points expiring, the Qantas Points Challenge will reinstate all of your expired Qantas points provided you earn 2,500 Qantas points within three months – and earning 2,500 Qantas points in 12 weeks really isn't hard to do.

Read more: Qantas frequent flyer points expired? Here’s how to get them back