Jetstar offers discounted airfares, Qantas to triple frequent flyer points

Australians are keen to get back in the air, judging by the response to Qantas and Jetstar’s fare and points sale.

Qantas has seen a doubling of passengers in its first week of increased services, in a sign Australians are embracing air travel again. Picture: Getty Images

The offer of cheap airfares and triple frequent flyer points has proven to be a winner for Jetstar and Qantas, with 10,000 $19 fares snapped up in four hours, and domestic bookings doubling.

The airline group launched the sale and points campaign on Friday in response to what it believed was a “huge pent-up demand for travel”.

The hunch proved to be on the money, with Jetstar reporting sales of 220 fares every minute, nearly 40-times the normal booking rate.

By 2pm, 70,000 of the 200,000 seats on sale had sold, with the most popular routes including Melbourne-Gold Coast, Melbourne-Cairns and Sydney-Gold Coast.

Qantas, which is offering triple points on domestic flights booked by June 24, saw its bookings more than double in the first few hours, with Perth-Broome and Brisbane-Cairns the most in demand routes.

Mobile readers to view full list of airfares and destinations click here

Qantas CEO Alan Joyce said in the past fortnight almost 400,000 seats had been sold on Qantas and Jetstar’s domestic networks as both airlines ramped up capacity to as much as 40 per cent of pre-crisis levels. “There is huge pent-up demand for air travel, with people wanting to get away after months of being stuck at home,” Mr Joyce said.

“We’ve already seen our flights from Sydney to Cairns fill up on the days after the proposed Queensland border opening date of July 10, so we’re adding more.”

With overseas travel still some way off, he said it was important for Australia’s tourism operators that Qantas played its part in driving domestic tourism.

“The entire industry, from hotel providers to small tourism operators, are struggling to make a post-pandemic comeback,” Mr Joyce said.

“We have a lot of aircraft on the ground … so if we can put some of them back in the air by offering special fares, it’s a positive for us, for our people, for tourism and for consumers.”

Already the airline was seeing evidence of “pent up demand” with passenger numbers doubling in the last week, from 32,000 to 64,000.

Virgin Australia also reported a promising upturn in demand particularly on intrastate Queensland routes and on the Golden Triangle of Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

Despite being in administration, the embattled carrier planned to add 30,000 more seats between now and early July, effectively doubling capacity.

“Demand for air travel is slowly beginning to return and while we are currently operating a reduced schedule, we’ll continue to add more services and frequencies as demand increases and restrictions ease,” said a Virgin Australia spokesman.

Both the Qantas Group and Virgin Australia have adopted a number of changes to service and pre-flight processes to increase the safety of passengers in the current pandemic.

These include contactless check-in and bag drop facilities, hand sanitiser stations throughout airports and the provision of face masks and antibacterial wipes on board.

A new “passenger safety protocol” for air travel devised by the federal government in partnership with the chief medical officer will also be published today to assist airlines and travellers.

The guidelines are similar to what Qantas and Virgin Australia have proposed, and stop short of enforcing social distancing on flights, only recommending passengers be spaced out where possible.