GARUDA: Skyteam Status Match for Qantas premium flyers

The national airline of Indonesia, Garuda, and a member of the Skyteam alliance, is offering a status match to the top tier of its Garuda Miles program for Qantas frequent flyers with Gold, Platinum or above status.

The promotion has been running since 1 January 2024 and runs to February 29, 2024. If your application is successful, you will have premium status with Garuda Miles for three months, which you can extend into 2025 (by 9 months) if you take one flight between Australia and Indonesia.

Fancy a short break in Bali?

Matching and application process

If you are currently Qantas Gold, then if accepted you will be matched with GarudaMiles Gold VIP, if Qantas Platinum or Platinum One, you will be matched with GarudaMiles Platinum VIP.

Garuda is calling your application an ‘Expression of Interest’. You will need to email them at: marketing@garuda-indonesia.net.au along with the documents requested in the chart below. Garuda staff will review and respond once they have confirmed your eligibility.

Document	Member of GarudaMiles
	New Member	Existing Member
Qantas Frequent Flyer Card	√	√
Flying Mileage Transaction Record	√	√
Joining Form/Online Registration click here	√	X
GarudaMiles Card	X	√

Head over to the Promotions tier matching page on Garuda’s website for further details.

Benefits

The benefits of premium status with Garuda and SkyTeam are fairly standard but nonetheless worthwhile. They include an extra 20kg of luggage and free Excess baggage, 25% Bonus Award Miles, a separate check-in counter, and lounge access for Platinum. Benefits are slightly different for Gold and Platinum, but you can see a complete list of them here.

The SkyTeam alliance has another 18 members including Air France, China Eastern, China Airlines (Taiwan), Delta Air Lines, ITA Airlines (Italy), KLM, Korean Air, Vietnam Airlines and Virgin Atlantic, where your new status will also be recognised. In the SkyTeam alliance, your GarudaMiles Gold will equal SkyTeam Elite Plus, and Platinum will give you SkyTeam Elite Plus.

Terms and Conditions

There are a few terms and conditions that don’t seem too onerous:

• The tier matching offer applies only to qualifying airline Gold and Platinum statuses earned through flying
• Status obtained through gifting, pooling of Status Credits, or complimentary status does not qualify.
• The matched tier remains valid for 3 months starting from the date of matching approval.
• Members can extend their tier for an additional 9 months by flying with Garuda Indonesia at least once from Australia to Indonesia or via Indonesia during the initial 3-month period (either one-way or return flight).
• The matched tiers in GarudaMiles through this program are Gold VIP and Platinum VIP.
• If the member fails to meet the requirements within the first 3 months, their status will revert to their original tier.
• After 12 months, GarudaMiles members from the Tier Matching program will be assessed based on GarudaMiles’ standard qualification policy.
• Each member can participate in the tier matching program only once.
• GarudaMiles reserves the right to reject the Expression of Interest and/or revoke the Tier Matching membership/status if the submitted documents are deemed suspicious or fail to meet our stipulated requirements.

2PAXfly Takeout

Status Match promotions can be valuable if you plan to travel with the airline offering the promotion, or another airline as part of that alliance. They can kick-start your status. I wouldn’t go out of my way to travel with Garuda to extend my status for a year. But then again I have no plans to travel on a SkyTeam airline in the near future. If you do – this promotion might be well worth it.

Garuda plans to resume daily flights to Sydney and Melbourne in April 2024. In partnership with Qantas, it has submitted an application to Australia’s International Air Services Commission, proposing they cooperate on Australia-Indonesia flights.