What are the rules and restrictions?
Cancellation penalties and stopover fees change from fare to fare and from country to country, although stopovers are usually Euro 200 each-way if you break your journey in London for > 24 hours. Also remember you need to factor in the cost of getting to your point of departure, and potentially the cost of a hotel if you are travelling too far to return in a day (e.g. Cyprus, Athens). whichbudget.com lists budget airlines flying to all major cities, and
www.skyscanner.net may also be useful.
In general, you will see the rules are much more flexible for the equivalent fare bucket ex-UK.
First fares:- Unlimited free changes
- Unlimited free stopovers*
- No cancellation penalty
- Return within 12 months
Club World fares
Again, taking the recent ex-AMS I7SALE fares, the rules are:
- Changes charged at €300 each
- Stopovers not permitted
- Cancellation penalty - net fare plus carrier imposed charges
- Return within 12 months
*A stopover is a transit of an intermediate point that exceeds 24hrs.
A neat trick for the Club fares – if you time your arrival into London and the departure of your long haul segment right, you can essentially have a free nightstop in London without having an 'official' stopover. For example, you arrive from AMS on a Monday at 21:15 and you can then book your long haul flight the next day (Tuesday) at any time up to 21:14 (< 24hrs) and it is NOT charged as a stopover. Book it for 21:15 or later and that'll be much more expensive fare please. Similarly, you can introduce overnight stays at intermediate connecting cities so long as your connections remain under 24 hours.
Note: BA seem to have clamped down on stopover rules, potentially in light of more widespread use of ex-EU fares. Check your fare rules carefully as lots of fares now limit you to a month’s stopover in the UK at most in either direction.