jayneandmarty.com

I gave up on Fly Buys a while ago because unless you shop at Myer and only buy the bonus points items on your NAB credit card it takes forever to earn enough points to redeem them for something. Also the likelihood of you ever earning enough to redeem them for a flight (hence Fly Buys) is almost zero. Jayne, however, kept the faith, and smiled knowingly when our latest statement arrived showing that we had enough points for some of the items in the catalogue. I, on the other hand, was gobsmacked.

So. What to choose.

We made our way through the catalogue, and carefully considered (but ultimately dismissed) a year’s supply of caster sugar, half a dozen bags of unprocessed wool, a fully-installed automatic lawn sprinkler system, his and hers ice skates, an Ansett Airlines mystery flight (one-way) and a family pass to see The Tony Barber and Ian “Turps” Turpie Show at the Dandenong Workers Club.

Finally, on the last page, tucked away in the corner next to a huge promo picture for betamax video players, we spotted a suitcase deal. A three case set - and we had enough points. Bargain! Deal! Yahtzee!

Others must have spotted the same sweet deal as us, however, because 10 days after we put in our order Fly Buys sent us an apologetic letter explaining that due to the popularity of the only item in the catalogue worth having, they’d run out of suitcases. Luckily, the second half of the letter told us not to worry, as they would honour our order and send us even better suitcases than the original ones.

And they did. They came yesterday and we’re quite happy with them, actually.