Coles Flybuys vs Everyday Rewards comparison

Coles Flybuys and Everyday Rewards both give you a way to earn points when you shop at the supermarket and with program partners. They also allow you to get frequent flyer points for your spending, as you can transfer Flybuys points to Velocity Points or Everyday Rewards points to Qantas Points.

But how do the other features of these two loyalty programs compare? Let's take a look.

Snapshot of Coles Flybuys vs Everyday Rewards

Coles Flybuys

The Coles Flybuys rewards program is free to join, with options to sign up online or in-person at participating stores. It has more than 8 million active members across Australia and over 20 program partners.

Below, we've covered the highlights of this program. You can also check out the full guide to Flybuys for more details about the program.

Earning Flybuys points

At Coles supermarkets (including online), you'll earn 1 point per $1 spent when you scan your Flybuys card before paying. The same earn rate applies when you're shopping at Liquorland, First Choice Liquor and First Choice Liquor Market, as well as Kmart and Target.

You can also earn points per $1 spent with a number of other partners, which could cover your spending in the following major categories:

• Fuel and cars. You can earn 1 point per $2 spent at Coles Express service stations and 1 point per $1 at mycar Tyre & Auto.
• Utilities. Earn points for your spending with AGL, Kleenheat or Optus when you have an eligible plan.
• Credit cards. Coles offers a range of credit cards that allow you to earn Flybuys points for your spending. These cards also double as your membership card, with the barcode printed on the back. You can also transfer points from a Citi Rewards or NAB Rewards credit card.
• Other banking and insurance. Earn points with a Coles personal loan, Coles insurance products, as well as other insurance partners such as HCF.
• Travel. Partners include Flybuys travel and Budget.
• Other shopping and lifestyle partners. This includes Garmin and Fitbit.

Using Flybuys points

With so many different partners, the Flybuys program also offers many ways to use your points. Popular options include:

• Money off your shop. With this option, 2,000 Flybuys points give you $10 value at a participating store. Redemption options are available for Coles and Coles Express, as well as the following partners: First Choice Liquor and First Choice Liquor Market, Kmart, Liquorland, Target and mycar Tyre and Auto.
• Frequent flyer points. Add your Velocity Frequent Flyer details to your Flybuys account and you'll be able to transfer 2,000 Flybuys points for 1,000 Velocity Points. Occasionally, there are also transfer promotions that can see you get an extra 10-15% more Velocity Points.
• Travel. Flybuys travel lets you put your points towards flights, hotels and packages, with each point valued at 0.5 cents.
• Retail items and gift cards. You can redeem your Flybuys points for a variety of items or gift cards available at the Flybuys store, including kitchen appliances, watches and wine.

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Name	Bonus points	Points per $ spent	Purchase rate p.a.	Annual fee
Coles No Annual Fee Mastercard Flybuys	Bonus points 20,000	Points per $ spent 0.5	Purchase rate p.a. 0% for 6 months, then 19.99%	Annual fee $0	More Info Compare	Get 20,000 bonus Flybuys points (worth $100 Flybuys Dollars) and 0% interest on purchases for the first 6 months.
Coles Rewards Mastercard Flybuys	Bonus points 75,000	Points per $ spent 2	Purchase rate p.a. 19.99%	Annual fee $99	More Info Compare	Get 75,000 bonus Flybuys points (worth $375 Flybuys Dollars) and 0% international transaction fees on purchases.
Coles Low Rate Mastercard Flybuys	Bonus points N/A	Points per $ spent 0.5	Purchase rate p.a. 12.99%	Annual fee $58	More Info Compare	Save with 0% p.a. for 15 months on balance transfers (with a 1.5% BT fee). Plus, earn Flybuys points on Coles spending.

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Everyday Rewards

The Everyday Rewards program is also free to join either online or in a participating Woolworths Group store. As of 2018, Everyday Rewards has 11 million members across Australia. Although Woolworths hasn't said whether these members are all active, it does suggest it has more members than Flybuys.

While you can get all the details of the Everyday Rewards program in our guide, here we've picked out the key features to compare with Flybuys.

Earning Everyday Rewards points

Everyday Rewards offers you points for your everyday spending at the following stores:

You can also earn bonus points on fresh fruit, veggies and Macro Wholefoods bought at Woolworths if you link your Everyday Rewards account to a Bupa health insurance account.

While these partners do give you a mix of ways to earn points, there are fewer partners compared to Flybuys.

Using Everyday Rewards points

Another major difference to Flybuys is that Everyday Rewards only offers three ways to use your points – two of which involve getting cash off your shop. The options are:

• Instant cash off your shop. With this option, 2,000 Woolworths Reward points will earn you $10 off a shop at Woolworths, Big W or BWS. Once you've earned enough points, you'll have the option of using this $10 off when you spend at least $10 in store. This rate is similar to Flybuys Dollars.
• Bank your points. With this option, you can save your Everyday Rewards points up and then use them to get money off a larger shop, such as during the Christmas holiday season. When you bank your points, you'll be given the option of using them on a quarterly basis (instead of whenever you've earned 2,000 points).
• Qantas Points. You can transfer 2,000 Everyday Rewards points for 1,000 Qantas Points. When you choose this option through your Everyday Rewards account, the transfer will be automatic whenever you reach 2,000 Everyday Rewards points. This rate is similar to that of Flybuys and Velocity Points.

What about Woolworths credit cards?

How can I decide if Coles Flybuys or Everyday Rewards is better for me?

If you want to focus on earning points through just one of these programs, asking the following questions can help you choose between them:

• Where do you do most of your supermarket shopping? If there's a Woolies just around the corner or a Coles close to work, you might find that you end up spending more with one supermarket brand. If you're not sure, check your credit or debit card transaction history and see where the bulk of your supermarket spending goes.
• Do you regularly shop with other program partners? Whether it's getting fuel at a Caltex Woolworths service station or picking up household bargains at Target and Kmart, looking at the partners for both Everyday Rewards and Flybuys will help you decide which one's going to earn you more points based on your current spending habits.
• Do you want Qantas Points or Velocity Points? If you're a member of a frequent flyer program – or if you prefer one over the other – this could be a key factor in deciding whether Coles Flybuys or Everyday Rewards offers you more value.
• What sort of rewards do you want? If you're looking for lots of different ways to use points, Flybuys might be the more appealing option. On the other hand, if you just want a simple way to get more value from your shopping, the three options Everyday Rewards offers could allow you to get rewarded without too much effort.
• Do you want a linked credit card? Currently, you can earn Flybuys with a Coles credit card or through point transfers from another eligible rewards credit card. But you can't earn Everyday Rewards points through any credit card.

While you can get more benefits and value from focusing on just one rewards scheme, it may be worth joining both Flybuys and Everyday Rewards so you can earn points when you shop at either supermarket. Just remember to keep your membership card or details handy so you actually earn points for your spending.

Australia's two largest supermarkets both have frequent flyer alliances for their loyalty programs. Everyday Rewards lets you earn Qantas Frequent Flyer points, while Coles' Flybuys lets you earn Virgin Australia Velocity points. Both partnerships let you earn 1 point per dollar spent in store, as well as running regular bonus offers. But which one actually offers better value for money? We've crunched the numbers to help you decide.

Coles vs Woolworths: How many frequent flyer points can you earn?

Both schemes use an indirect earn model: you don't score airline points directly, but can convert your supermarket points into rewards points. The details are essentially identical: for each 2,000 reward points you transfer into the relevant frequent flyer scheme and you get 1,000 points in return. So this means you earn this many points:

• 2,000 Everyday Rewards points equals 1,000 Qantas Frequent Flyer Points
• 2,000 Flybuys points equal 1,000 Velocity Points

Note that Flybuys often runs bonus points promotions that earn extra points when you make transfers. For Flybuys, there is an annual cap on how many points you can transfer of 138,000 points per calendar year. (Some promotions let you transfer points above that cap, however, so it pays to read the details carefully.)

With Velocity, your points are added whenever you make a transfer, which you need to do manually. With Everyday Rewards, you choose to opt in for Qantas Frequent Flyer points rather than Woolworths Dollars, and you'll have points transferred automatically each quarter. You can't control when this happens, however.

Realistically, how many frequent flyer points could the average Australian earn purely from supermarket shopping? As an example, say you spend an average of $250 a week on groceries, including any alcohol you buy. That works out to around $13,000 per year.

Using our reward points calculators for Flybuys and Everyday Rewards, spending this much would earn you 250 Flybuys or Everyday Rewards each week and 13,000 points each year. At an exchange rate of 2,000 supermarket points for 1,000 frequent flyer points, you'd earn around 125 Velocity or Qantas Points per week, or 6,500 airline loyalty points per year. (While both schemes will occasionally offer bonus points deals for buying particular products, we're sticking to what you're guaranteed to earn for this comparison.)

What are your points worth?

We're going to focus on using your points for flights, since that offers the best value. With Velocity flights start from 7,800 points and with Qantas they start from 8,000 points. (In both cases, you'll need to pay carrier charges.)

That could give you between $100 and $500 value for your points, depending on how much flights would cost to buy at the time.

To put this in perspective with other supermarket rewards, if you used 16,000 Everyday Rewards points to get cash off your shop, you'd get $80 value. But if you transferred those points to Qantas Frequent Flyer, you'd get 8,000 points – enough for a one-way flight from Sydney to Melbourne or Brisbane. It's rare to see a Qantas flight on these routes for less than $80, which means you'll typically get more value from a flight reward than cash off your shop.

The key lesson here? Supermarket shopping on its own won't get you a free flight quickly. However, if you're also accumulating points from flying, credit card activity or other options, it's a very useful way to supplement your total.

The verdict

Because the earn rates are essentially identical, there's no real reason to prefer one supermarket alliance over the other. But if you're already concentrating your points earning efforts on a single airline, it does make sense to shop in the "matching" supermarket, provided you have one that's conveniently located.

Whichever scheme you're in, using your points for flights definitely offers the best return. Both supermarket schemes will be, at best, a small supplement to what you can earn through regular flying or a points-earning credit card.