Qatar Airways Now A OneWorld Member Airline!

Sadly Qatar Airways awards cannot be searched on expert flyer

@caveman, but they can through BA Executive Club's website.

The AAdvantage website states the following:

Additional elite status bonus miles for AAdvantage Executive Platinum and AAdvantage Platinum members and AAdvantage Gold members
Additional oneworld airline recognition and benefits

Any idea what those might be? or the bonus mileage amount?

Also, I noted that the Premium Lounge in LHR is not available for OW Emeralds travelling in Economy, according to the lounge guide at oneworld.com

@ Michael -- That simply means that for flying Qatar Airways you'd earn the usual 25% redeemable miles bonus for being a Gold and 100% redeemable miles bonus for being a Platinum/Executive Platinum.

By the sounds of it, unless flying QR, anyone eligible to use a lounge can only do so in the main terminal. Does QR have any other lounges there or are they third party or another airline's even? I guess this makes sense, as people would only access the premium terminal if flying QR. I imagine the ferrying to and from aircraft won't be easy if mixing other carriers from the premium terminal. Remains to be seen how things will work out of the new airport. Will QR have a premium terminal there?

Qatar Airways has its own Business and First Class lounges in the main terminal, in addition to the dedicated Premium Terminal.

However, all of this will be a moot point soon since operations are shifting to the new airport in the not too distant future (inshallah!).

This is similar to what LH does with its FCT @ FRA

[…] Mile at a Time notes that Qatar Airlines is officially a Oneworld […]

do you think AA will imposed fuel surcharge on Qatar redemptions like BA does? or will Qatar redemptions be like Air Berlin - no fuel via AA, but fuel added via BA avios.

and is BA site the only way to search award availability for Qatar online?

@ Eric FD -- No, I don't think American will impose fuel surcharges for travel on Qatar.

BA is the only site I've found for searching Qatar award space.

Doha's location also makes it great for earning Tier Points on BA's Executive Club programme, as QR generally costs less than BA for business class.

Example: LHR-HKG round trip on BA gives you 280 Tier Points, + 2 qualifying flights. You'll need an additional roundtrip say to a cheap European destination to give you bronze status. LHR-DOH-HKG round trip on QR on the other hand gives you 560 Tier Points, but no qualifying flights. Take any 2 BA shorthaul economy flights for bronze, but even better, take 4 shorthaul cheap flights and you're already at BA silver, which is really good value, I think. Thoughts?

Wonder if anyone could help? My partner booked a return ticket with Qatar airways from London to Kuala Lumpur (via Doha) and he is a Silver member of British Airways with sufficient Avios points for an upgrade. He was told that although Qatar airways is now part of OneWorld, he won't be able to use his BA Avios points to upgrade to Business on the return journey as it's not a BA, AA or Ibera flights?

Thought it's weird considering how they are trying to promote crossover usage of points between the airways? Help anyone?

"if you’re a OneWorld Emerald in business class can you use the first class lounge? The above doesn’t seem to clarify that one way or the other."

Did you ever get the answer to this?

@ SK -- Yep, apparently no access unfortunately.

@ Sarah -- While you can redeem OneWorld miles for an award on Qatar Airways, you unfortunately can't redeem Avios for upgrades on them. Sorry!

I'm a novice at frequent flyer programs and have been searching for an answer to my query but haven't found it yet.
Can I use Qatar Airways frequent flyer points to get a flight upgrade (Economy to Business) on BA or American Airlines for a family member?

@ Sam -- Unfortunately you can't use Qatar Airways miles to upgrade on American or British Airways, though you can redeem them for an outright reward flight on those carriers.

[…] (in Dutch) Qatar Airways joined the Oneworld Alliance end of Oct 2013, which makes you can redeem your Oneworld miles for flights on the […]

Thanks Lucky! Love your blog and the expert advice you're giving here. Bless you!

Lucky,
I'm traveling with my wife by Qatar from Washington DC to Hanoi, do you know if we can make an upgrade by using AA miles? Her status on AA is Platinum and mine Gold... any tips??

@ Nick -- Unfortunately there isn't a way to upgrade on Qatar using American miles.

Can I combine my QMiles and Avios?

@ Kaushik -- There isn't really a way to combine miles from multiple programs, unfortunately.