Virgin Australia jumps into the ‘points plane’ game

Virgin Australia is making every economy seat on every domestic flight available as a Velocity Reward Seat bookable at the lowest number of Velocity Points.

The offer covers travel from December 1 2021 to March 31 2022, although those seats must be booked by midnight Tuesday November 23 – so the clock's ticking, and you've got less than 48 hours to swoop on this deal.

Velocity Frequent Flyer CEO Nick Rohrlach says this effectively puts five million reward seats on the market, "and there's no blackout dates – not even for the night before Christmas."

"Velocity members will be able to choose their preferred flight, and any available economy seat that can be purchased with cash will also be available as a reward seat using points."

Virgin Australia's domestic Reward Seat redemptions are broken into several distance-based zones

Short hops such as Sydney-Melbourne and Sydney-Brisbane requires just 7,800 Velocity Points (plus taxes), while a flight between Melbourne and Queensland's Gold Coast will cost 11,800 points (plus taxes).

The longest domestic trips are those between the east and west coasts, which run out at 17,800 points (plus taxes) in economy.

(In addition, all of these Reward Seat bookings will earn 5-10 status credits per flight as part of an ongoing loyalty promotion.)

The offer will also let Velocity members make the most of the current points transfer promotion, which sees the conversion of your credit card's own rewards points to Velocity Points net you an additional 20-30% worth of points, depending on which card you're using.

ANZ cards headline the offer with a hefty 30% more Velocity Points, while transfers from Amex land you a solid 25% bonus; all other banks land at 20% extra Velocity Points.

Rohrlach says "a phenomenal result" from the points transfer campaign has seen "billions of financial services points transferred into Velocity, which is equivalent to pre-Covid levels."

Virgin Australia last week revealed plans to add seven more Boeing 737 jets to its fleet as the airline ramps up to a total of 84 aircraft ahead of not only the summer holiday season but a limited return to overseas flying, beginning with flights to Fiji on December 16 2021, with Bali and New Zealand to follow in early 2022.