Long gone are the days when virtually all airlines would check through bags on separate tickets as a courtesy. Some airlines – I’m looking at British Airways here – won’t even do it when the two different bookings are with them.
This can cause quite a bit of irritation for those frequent flyers who are using points for part of their trip. Usually it means allowing more time between flights to make sure baggage can be collected and re-checked for the next flight.
Check Through Bags on Award Tickets at Qantas
Australia’s Qantas is a little bit more sensible than British Airways. You can check through bags on separate bookings Qantas to Qantas or Qantas to their close partner Emirates.
When it comes to their oneworld alliance partners, connecting Qantas to a partner on different PNRs is not permitted. It is also not permitted to non-alliance airlines.
I have done this myself, when I used an award ticket to fly Sydney to Auckland on Qantas, connecting to a cash ticket on Qatar Airways from Auckland to Doha. The agent did not know it could be done, so I had to point out this was the only exception and eventually she found I was correct.
Overall Thoughts
The Qantas policy is listed at the bottom of this page on the site for travel agents. It’s definitely one to keep handy if you’re going to do this. As it is little used, check-in agents probably won’t be immediately familiar with it.
Award tickets are great value when redeeming British Airways Avios for Qantas flights. Therefore it makes sense to offset the cash fares and book a reward flight instead. Now you know your baggage can be checked through too.
Did you know about this obscure policy at Qantas? Do you think all airlines should check through bags? Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
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Featured image by EamonM25 via Wikimedia Commons.
