I don't think BA will get much sympathy over this!! The vast majority of punters are fully aware of how much we are ripped-off in Britain on car prices, but very few know the same applies to airfares. And before Nick jumps in about routing through non-home bases which has been debated recently, I'm talking about tickets such RTW Explorer and *A RTW. I am also not only blaming BA but all the Ailines operating direct out of the UK as they are all guilty of ripping us off. The differences are huge. In the oneworld explorer Business Class examples below I've converted from local currency to GBP.

United Kingdom
3 Continent £3699
4 Continent £4499
5 Continent £4899
6 Continent £5299

Sweden
3 Continent £2795 (£904 cheaper)
4 Continent £3105 (£1394 cheaper)
5 Continent £3477 (£1422 cheaper)
6 Continent £3976 (£1323 cheaper)

Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Greece, etc. (Euro Zone)
3 Continent £2759 (£940 cheaper)
4 Continent £3065 (£1434 cheaper)
5 Continent £3433 (£1466 cheaper)
6 Continent £3923 (£1376 cheaper)

For those paying out of their own pockets the inconvenience of hopping across to Europe is more than compensated for in the financial savings available. For those prepared to venture further a field to places such as South Africa (although prices have increased there considerably) the benefits are even greater. Mrs Gaza and my FIRST CLASS oneworld 4 Continent Explorer, cost £2,800 inc taxes. There is no way we could have afforded to pay the £6599 + Tax ex-UK price. With starting in SA we also get the benefit of more segments and stopovers in Europe! Granted we have the hassle of getting to JNB but a BA Miles WT+ ticket is covering that and the best thing is we get a year worth of holiday flying on one ticket!! It works out at approximately £128 per segment. I could drink that in Krug on some flights.

I will have no hesitation in the future of venturing outside the UK to purchase either longhaul returns or RTW's. Depending on the ticket type I can pop-over to somewhere such as AMS for a weekend and come back on the first segment my cheap ticket. At the end of the trip so long as the ticket allows a break of journey I can stay in the UK and use the final portion to take me back to my original boarding point to start the process again!!!

Until I joined FlyerTalk I did not realise that things like this were possible. I am eternally grateful to the fellow FT’ers who have shared this information. I could bet it won’t be long before Which? or the likes publish a guide to beating the ticket system. In fact I’m sure it would be a good business idea for someone to set-up a Travel Agent in a Euro Zone country offering just such a service including organising transport from the UK to collect the tickets. Not much the airlines could do about that!!