Just out of interest, did you check to see if AA could fly you to JFK? With Avios redemptions perhaps? That would have made an straightforward AUS-ORY at least, and from what I can make out, rechecking ORY to BCN isn't too bad, it's a fairly compact airport. I appreciate there is only one direct flight a day. Also, did you check with BA to see if they could do it on one ticket? IB services don't come up on BA.com unless codeshare but BA will happily sell them on the telephone. Maybe the NYC-ORY cheap business ticket is non combinable, but they usually can be combined.