If there’s one frequent flyer program whose stock improved in 2020, it’s Qatar Airways Privilege Club. In November, the program reversed its 2018 devaluation, restoring award prices to their original lower levels. This, coupled with the absence of fuel surcharges on Qatar Airways redemptions, made awards between Singapore and Europe/USA competitive once more.
For those thinking about coming on board, the airline has just launched a membership drive offering 1,000 free Qmiles, just for signing up.
Get 1,000 bonus miles when you join Privilege Club
This promotion is as simple as they come. From 1 February to 30 April 2021, members who sign up for Privilege Club with the promo code JOINPC21 will receive 1,000 bonus Qmiles immediately upon enrolment.
They can subsequently earn additional bonus miles from making online bookings by 30 April 2021:
- 1,000 Qmiles for making their first online booking
- 500 Qmiles for every subsequent online booking
The following T&Cs apply:
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For the sake of comparison, the last sign up offer we saw for Privilege Club (which expired on 31 December 2020) awarded 2,500 bonus Qmiles upfront, and a further 5,000 miles for taking a first Qatar Airways flight before 31 March 2021. While it was always highly unlikely that any of us in Singapore would get on a plane before this date, it was still a more generous upfront gift.
How long are my free miles valid for?
Qatar Airways miles expire after three years of inactivity, so it’s unlikely you’ll need to worry about this for a while. You can extend the validity of your entire balance by earning or redeeming at least one mile, and the following banks in Singapore offer points transfers to Qatar Privilege Club.
| Citi Miles | ThankYou Points | |
 Citibank | 1:1 | 5:2 |
| SC Rewards (Visa Infinite) | ||
 Standard Chartered | 3.5:1 (recently devalued) | |
| For a full list of transfer partners by bank, refer to this post | ||
New Privilege Club sweet spots
Thanks to last year’s program changes, Qatar Airways Privilege Club offers some attractive redemption rates from Singapore to Europe once again (provided you don’t mind a stopover in Doha).
| One-Way Prices for travel | Qmiles | KrisFlyer | Asia Miles |
| Doha | 50,000 | N/A | N/A |
| Athens/ Bucharest/Kiev/ Sofia/ Thessaloniki | 70,000 | N/A | N/A |
| Barcelona/ London/ Frankfurt/ Paris/ Zurich | 75,000 | 92,000 | 65-85,000 |
| *Assumes Qmiles redeemed for Qatar Airways, KrisFlyer for Singapore Airlines, Asia Miles for Cathay Pacific. Not all destinations served by each carrier. | |||
This compares extremely favorably to redemption on KrisFlyer and Asia Miles and remember, we can compare mileage figures directly as all three programs do not impose fuel surcharges for awards on their own metal.
I highly doubt that Europe will be on our radars for a while, but assuming these award rates remain unchanged (which isn’t a given for Qatar Privilege Club), it may be worth looking at when things get a bit more sane.
Conclusion
While 1,000 free miles are always nice, I’d advise you to wait for a better offer to come along. A quick Google search shows that past sign up gifts have ranged from 1,000 to 2,500 miles, so a bit of patience can reap dividends.
