Millions of Australians accumulate reward points with dollars spent on their credit cards, but the number of points needed for “free” flights or products is slowly climbing.

So what does the future hold for the tumultuous point economy?

Qantas and Virgin dominate the point industry with Frequent Flyer and Velocity, respectively.

Virgin recently announced it is again shaking up the industry with its 1 Point Rewards store, which will allow members to purchase expensive items with just a single velocity point in a one-time event.

Across three capital cities, members will be able to buy an $849 Dyson Airwrap or a pair of $549 Bose headphones with just one point.

“We are try to make it much easier to get to that reward rather than saving up for years for something you may or may get,” Rohrlach said.

“Our research says that 90 per cent of Aussies are members of a loyalty program.

“And rather than tying people up with points whispers and all the complexity, we’re just trying to make it much simpler and easier to use and that you know that you can get rewards really fast.”

Bunnings is following suit with a program allowing Flybuys members to turn their points into dollars spent at the hardware giant.

It will let customers use as little as $10 in Flybuys points to buy Bunnings products.

Payment Services managing director Brad Kelly is a point guru.

He doesn’t think the future of frequent programs is shaping up to be so peachy.

“The devaluation is already beginning,” Kelly explained to 9news.com.au.

“There’s a lot of people sitting on a lot of points post-COVID and they want them to burn those.

“That’s how they dilute the offers.”

Virgin last year lowered the amount of points needed for a one-way economy seat to 5900 velocity points.

But Velocity credit card customers had the number of points earned per dollar dropped in April this year, decreasing from five to four points.

It was the first time Qantas marked up its classic reward pricing since 2019 and the second time since 2004.

“A lot has changed in the last six years,” Qantas loyalty chief executive Andrew Glance said at the time.

“These adjustments will ensure we can continue to invest in enhancing the program for the long-term and continue to grow the levels of classic and classic plus reward seat availability for members year on year.”

Kelly said it is going to become even harder for point collectors to nab their dream flight on points alone.

“If you’re a bronze member, you’re going to see these Classic Plus seats everywhere and the occasional classic, but you’re not going to be able to redeem as much as you want or as easily,” he said.

He estimated valuable point earning is a game “for the top 20 per cent”.

“Your average Qantas member only spends about $30,000 a year on their credit card,” Kelly added.

“That’s going to get you 30,000 points if you’re lucky, probably more like 20,000 to 25,000. You are going to have a lot of difficulty getting anywhere for 25,000 points.

And even then, do you really want to go to Ballina on a Tuesday afternoon in August? That’s the reality. You’re not going to be able to say, ‘Oh, I’d like to fly business class to Bali’.

“That’s just not going to happen.”

Rohrlach said Velocity is looking at finding ways to accelerate non-credit card point earning.

He doesn’t want point whisperers to be the only ones who can find the best deals.

“There’s lots of different ways to earn points and it’s always nice when people find new ways to do that. But also, it’s not hard,” Rohrlach added.

“It’s not just about the points hacking.”

Qantas Loyalty chief executive Andrew Glance told 9news.com.au that the number of points earned through retailers has doubled in the past five years.

“We anticipate it will double again by 2030, as we expand our footprint across a growing range of retail categories,” he said.

Kelly’s prediction for the industry is the slow erosion of needing to sign up for a credit card to accumulate points.

He also said point earning may soon be largely attributed to spend instead of credit.

“What I mean by that is that a customer will sign up directly with a merchant or a bunch of merchants, and as they spend, those merchants will buy points directly from Qantas [or Virgin] and give them to the customer,” Kelly added.