I’m pretty excited: for the first time in my life I’ve purchased a first class plane ticket – and it only cost a fraction of the usual price.

Next August I’ll be travelling to New York City in style in Japan Airlines’ highly-regarded first class product.

This amazing fare is actually being marketed by American Airlines on its Korean website. It’s a roundtrip between Seoul and New York, transiting in Tokyo. Because American Airlines codeshares with Japan Airlines on this route, you can choose to fly Japan Airlines’ superior product the whole way.

I paid $3,800 for the return trip – which I admit is a lot of money – but Japan Airlines is charging more than $12,000 on its own website, and just flying from Tokyo to New York roundtrip with Japan Airlines can cost up to $20,000 – so I’m really happy with the price!

As these airlines are members of the oneworld alliance with Qantas, I’ll earn almost 40,000 Qantas Points and 660 Qantas Status Credits, plus 5,700 points for paying for the fare with my AMEX card.

The fare is fully refundable, which is a bonus if something comes up.

There’s lots of availability throughout 2017.

I’m positioning myself in Seoul using Qantas Points, flying in business class  with Cathay Pacific and Qantas.

This hack illustrates my recent post about how you can save thousands of dollars by stopping over in Asia and then paying for a business or first class fare to your final destination.

However, it also illustrates another important point – that you need to be careful when booking tickets and always make sure you pay attention to the details.

For example, I was presented with flight options operated by both American Airlines (the first two rows below) and Japan Airlines (the bottom four rows).

In addition, some of the Japan Airlines flights were operated by a Boeing 787, which doesn’t have first class. Once you click on a flight, this becomes visible (see below where it states the fare and “cabin” type). It’s important to always check these details so you get exactly what you want.

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Qantas is again running a Christmas promotion offering 5 Qantas Points per $1 for gift vouchers purchased in December. You can buy these for yourself and redeem them for flights over the next 12 months – substantially boosting the number of points you earn in the process.

Using this trick, you’ll still earn points and status credit for the flights themselves. It’s a great deal!

Here’s what you need to know.

• vouchers are available in $50 increments from $50 to $500, as well as $1000 or $2000
• vouchers are valid for 12 months
• you can change the name on the voucher when you redeem it (i.e. anyone can use it to fly – no one person is locked in)
• you need to nominate the number of people the voucher is for when you buy it and you can’t change the number of people when you redeem it
• there are no credit card fees for buying the voucher, and when you redeem it you won’t be charged a fee on paying any cost difference with your credit card – this means you actually save money, as Qantas normally charges a fee for credit card bookings
• gift vouchers are redeemable for one-way or return domestic or international Qantas flights, but not Jetstar flights
• only one voucher can be redeemed per booking
• the promotion ends on 31 December 2016.

This offer has only come around once a year in recent years (every December). I’ve used it to buy vouchers to cover my known flights for the year ahead.

Click here to go to the Qantas website to buy a voucher or find out more.