As Virgin Australia Business Flyer celebrates its first year around the sun, members looking to jet abroad for work can now take advantage of new rewards and tempting discounts of up to 20% off international flights. This is on top of the usual program perks, such as the ability to earn Velocity Points for both the business and the traveller.
Initially, Qatar Airways, United Airlines and Singapore Airlines are the launch partners of Business Flyer’s new international offering. Businesses will earn points for each dollar spent on VA-codeshare flights booked with these three partner carriers.
Earn Velocity Points on overseas work travel
Ready to reap the rewards? As long as your business is registered with Business Flyer, you’re set to earn. Simply book work travel through the program on VA-coded fares, operated by Qatar Airways, United or Singapore Airlines.
Your business will earn Velocity Points based on which tier you’re currently on.
- Tier 1: 1 point per dollar spent
- Tier 2: 1.5 points per dollar spent
- Tier 3: 2 points per dollar spent
Your business can earn up to 1,000,000 Velocity Points in a membership year through Business Flyer. These points can then be transferred to your own personal Velocity account, or to your employees/contractors.
And that’s on top of the Velocity Points and Status Credits that the traveller earns on the fare.
Enjoy discounts of up to 20% off airfares
Headlining the new partnership is an array of hefty discounts when booking work travel. With United Airlines, your next jaunt to the US and beyond could be discounted by up to 20%. It depends on what fare class you book via Virgin Australia Business Flyer or your registered travel management company – these fares aren’t available on the public Virgin Australia website.
Virgin Australia Business Flyer discounts with United
| Fare type | Virgin Australia (VA) fare class | UA business discounts |
| Business | J | 20% |
| Business | C and D | 15% |
| Economy Flex | Y, B, W, H and K | 20% |
| Economy | L and R | 15% |
| Economy | E, O, N, V, P, Q, T, I, S | 0% |
Unfortunately, Virgin Australia does not sell a Premium Economy fare at the moment, including on codeshare partners. If your travel budget extends to Premium Economy as the cabin of choice for trans-Pacific treks, you’ll need to book your fare direct through United instead.
Virgin Australia Business Flyer discounts with Qatar Airways
| Fare type | Virgin Australia (VA) fare class | QR business discounts |
| Business | J and C | 5% |
| Business | C* (fare class I* in QR) and D | 0% |
| Economy | Y, B, H, R, O, N, V, P, Q | 3% |
| Economy | T, I, S | 0% |
There is no fare discount for Singapore Airlines.
Summing up
Virgin Australia Business Flyer is making the most of its partnerships with a compelling new offer for overseas travel. Through Singapore Airlines, Qatar Airways and United, business travellers have access to most major destinations around the globe through Business Flyer. Discounted fares and double-dipping on rewards – what’s not to like?
I have tried to access both United and Singapore bookings through the business portal and it can’t find the cities in the search function
Until Virgin start reciprocal lounge access for business class passengers on International travel, they will not get my money any longer. I flew in Business class from Fiji (Nadi) to Melbourne, paying full fare and Virgin provided no lounge access in Nadi.
That would have been a maximum of 8 fees to be paid to the Fiji Airways lounge in reciprocal access. How can they not provide something as basic as this for full paying business class access?
Anything you book on Virgin Business Flyer is effectively a travel-agency booking. If something needs fixing, for example a schedule change has invalidated your ticket, the Virgin call centre will infuriatingly refuse to do anything, they’ll tell you to call the Virgin Business flyer number. Which is only manned part of the time, and poorly. Good luck with that!