Via koika on Flyertalk you can fly from Sydney to Los Angeles for under US$1000 roundtrip on Air New Zealand (connecting in Auckland).
Brisbane departures work as well (and One Mile at a Time notes that Melbourne works), but you do need to originate in Australia. Roundtrips starting in the U.S. don’t price this way.
Here’s a sample Google Flights search.
If you don’t want Los Angeles as a destination it should price as an add-on with another city as the destination.
Air New Zealand in Sydney
This fare will not come up on the Air New Zealand website but it’s bookable on Expedia. It books into Z and is broadly available even during peak periods. Air New Zealand is a Star Alliance member so you can credit miles to United or other Star partners, and they have partnerships outside the alliance as well.
This certainly won’t last long at all. Just in case the airline decides they want to renege on such a deep discount offer, a case of seller’s remorse, I’d wait awhile after buying tickets before making additional non-refundable travel plans around the fare.
Update: it happens that Air New Zealand launched a fare sale for their Australia routes today, though I don’t think this deal will last as long as the planned sale.
This isn’t really news, unless you happen to live in Auckland.
Fares are always lower coming to U.S.
United— LHR to SFO business roundtrip is $800 less, all through October, than SFO-LHR round trip.
@RM not news?? under $1000 roundtrip business class?? Every Aussie I know is pretty excited about this.
They are mistake fares for sure… Most of them are not being honored these days. Waste of time.
@AI just a few weeks ago a $500ish business class fare to Australia was honored.
I booked on amextravel.com and am in first 12 months of biz plat so get 50% rebate. It ticketed in biz and i can change seats on anz website… 49,000 points! Will take it! Was going to be in southeast asia so positioned to sydney on thai 747 first class for 40k ual miles before the deval goes into place… then pushed return from lax to syd 60 days out and will decide if i use it or not! Gary, if amex has ticketed and i cam select seats do u think we in the clear or still chance of cancellation?