After cutting its daily service between Auckland and Sydney back in July, travellers from Auckland will no longer be be able to fly Emirates to Melbourne and Brisbane from March next year.

While we only got about six weeks’ notice last time, this time we have five months to make the most of one of the best uses of Qantas Points, flying Emirates’ excellent First or Business Class across the pond.

In this guide, we explain why using your Qantas Points on Emirates flights to Australia, Southeast Asia, Dubai and beyond is a great option.

And it isn’t hard – here’s a quick look at the Emirates route network, the kind of pricing to expect, and how to go about researching and booking points availability with ‘EK’.

Update: Emirates axes Auckland to Melbourne and Brisbane flights and Qantas takes over

From 25 March 2018, the daily Emirates flights between Auckland and Melbourne/Brisbane are being discontinued due to lack of demand.

These flights were one of the easiest ways to redeem 54,000 Qantas Points one-way for an excellent First Class experience with access to the Qantas First Class Lounge in Auckland and Melbourne, or Qantas International Lounge in Brisbane prior to your flight (depending on which way you are flying), plus an individual suite, onboard shower and inflight bar in the air (although some report the shower hasn’t been in operation due to the short duration of the flight.)

Emirates A380 Trans-Tasman First Class overview

The Business Class offering was a spacious, stylish and comfortable product for the short hop across the Tasman, costing only 36,000 Qantas Points.

Emirates A380 Trans-Tasman Business Class overview

If you’re booked on one of these flights from 25 March 2018 onwards, contact Emirates to be re-accommodated on a Qantas flight, which will be increased on both Boeing 737 and the more modern Airbus A330 aircraft.

This A330 is a fantastic product and you can read more in our review of Qantas A330 Business Class.

Whilst Emirates were quite steadfast that they would not be cutting any more Trans-Tasman flights back in June when they announced the Sydney cut, they have gone against their word.

So, the only remaining Emirates flight from March 2018, an A380 service between Christchurch and Sydney, could be on the cutting board too.

If you have enough Qantas Points for a redemption (54,000 First/36,000 Business), you still have five months to book in a flight. After that, you’ll want to aim to redeem for Business Class in one of Qantas’ A330 Business Studios from Auckland, which will cost the same at 36,000 Qantas Points.

The Emirates Route Network

Emirates have an extensive route network relevant to flights departing from New Zealand.

• Auckland to Dubai direct
• Auckland to Dubai via Melbourne, Brisbane
• Christchurch to Dubai via Sydney
• Sydney to Dubai via Bangkok
• Melbourne to Dubai via Singapore

The functionally excellent Emirates route map can be found here.

Every flight originating from New Zealand to Dubai is operated by an Emirates A380 which features Economy, Business and First Class cabins. Note that some Emirates A380 flights in other regions can sometimes operate a configuration without a First Class cabin.

Emirates First and Business Class products

Emirates First Class is one of the best in the world and there isn’t much difference between the actual seat on the Airbus A380 and Boeing 777 but the latter does lack an onboard shower and bar.

The tradeoff is that there are only eight First Class seats on the 777 compared to almost double that (14) on the A380, so you may receive more attentive service on the older aircraft.

Emirates A380 First Class overview

Business Class is where there is a big difference. The A380 is set up in a 1-2-1 configuration and all beds are lie-flat:

Emirates A380 Business Class overview

whereas the 777 has angled-flat seats in a much more cramped 2-3-2 configuration:

Emirates Boeing 777 Business Class review

Qantas Point Pricing for Emirates Flights

Emirates is a key joint venture partner for Qantas so the points pricing for Emirates flights when using Qantas Points is the same as if you were flying with Qantas on the same route.

Of course Qantas don’t fly many of the routes that Emirates fly – that’s why they are partners – but that pricing is equivalent, unlike many of Qantas’ oneworld airline partners like Cathay Pacific or British Airways, who would be comparatively more expensive.

You’ll need to look at the Qantas Point redemption tables to see the full list of prices – look at the “Qantas Classic Flight Reward” which is valid for Qantas, Airnorth, Air Vanuatu, American Airlines, Emirates and Fiji Airways flights.

The simpler way to calculate points pricing though is to use Qantas’ own points calculator, which you can find here.

Here are some of the price-points for the key routes mentioned above:

With Emirates it can absolutely make sense (in terms of redemption value, travel time, and connection options) to fly beyond Dubai for onward travel to Europe (definitely), Africa (especially North and Central African countries), South or North America (especially to the US East Coast).

For the longest multi-flight itineraries (over 9,601 miles, up to 15,000 miles) you will spend a maximum of 128,000 Qantas Points in Business Class or 192,000 Qantas Points for Emirates First Class.

That is NZ to Europe on Emirates A380 in business or first class for only 16,000 or 24,000 more points respectively than the points required to NZ to Dubai alone.

So that’s for itineraries (with no stopovers) such as:

• Auckland – Dubai – New York
• Christchurch – Sydney – Dubai – London

Taxes and fees are comparable to what you’d pay for a Qantas flight redemption – so they’re not cheap.

When you shouldn’t use Qantas Points to fly with Emirates

Where you may not be able to use Qantas Points effectively to fly with Emirates is, of course, where it doesn’t make ‘economical’ sense to do so in terms of time and points spent. Outside of Bangkok and Singapore, travel to North and South East Asian destinations or China, or from the New Zealand to US West Coast, for example.

As a result, if you spot a good deal on a paid Economy fare, that’s probably going to be better value than using points for Economy travel (as it will include the taxes in the price you’re paying). That’s not to say using points for Economy flights is never good value – in some cases it definitely can makes sense, when paid fares are high on a particular route or in seasonal peak periods.

But this is why we focus our best uses of points on Business and First Class – as paid fares are much, much higher in those cabins, so while you need more points to redeem for them, you’ll get a much higher cents per point (cpp) value out of your redeemed points – not to mention it’s a much more fun way to travel too, if you can earn and save the points with this in mind.

How to research and book Emirates flights using Qantas Points

All this information is well and good, but you need to be able to act on it and make the purchase. Thankfully, Qantas.com is generally an excellent search tool for Emirates award flights.

I prefer starting by going straight to the Qantas.com multi-city search tool here, regardless of whether I am searching for a multi-city itinerary.

Make sure you check the box to show “Classic Flight Reward cities”, and to “Search Classic Flight Rewards”.

If you want a flexible date search, check that box too – but this can be annoying if you aren’t actually flexible with your dates, as it adds an extra step to get to the actual flight results.

On clicking Search, if not already logged in you’ll be prompted to log in with Qantas Frequent Flyer account credentials, and then you can start seeing flight results. In this example I am looking at Auckland to Dubai in just a few weeks time.

Flights that begin with the EK airline code, e.g. EK435, are operated by Emirates. Qantas.com also clearly states this, and has a small Emirates logo icon in the results too.

Something you should look at closely when searching for Emirates’ Auckland departures, is the number of stops on the routes returned. This is in small text near the flight details.

With Emirates operating three flights from Auckland to Dubai daily, only one is direct while the other two also stop in Melbourne or Brisbane enroute to Dubai (until March 2018). Flights from Christchurch will always be via Sydney.

If direct flights are important to you then these extra stops are not desirable – unless you feel like ‘maximising’ your time and fun in Emirates Business or First Class, or you’re in Christchurch and don’t have a choice!

From here, if you have enough Qantas Points in your account you can then get a quote for the taxes and fees along with the required points. If you don’t have enough points in your account yet, give Qantas a call to find out and scope out the additional costs so you’re fully informed and prepared.

Summing up

Qantas, to their credit, have made using Qantas Points for Emirates flights very simple and attractively priced inline with their own flights as a key Qantas Frequent Flyer partner.

Targeting your points earn strategies and redemption goals toward Emirates flights to Asia, Europe, Australia or even the US is a great way of maximising your return from every Qantas Point redeemed.

Have you had any great experiences from using your Qantas Points from Emirates? Let us know in the comments!