Originally Posted by
NickB
Well, I do not know about others but my needs for business class redemptions on QF in Australia are probably as frequent as what I suspect to be your needs for second class bus tickets between Almaty and Ürümqi. I have a feeling that I am not the only BAEC member to be in this situation.
OTOH, intra-European RFS awards were pretty much my routine go-to redemption on BA before covid19 (I have not flown BA at all since March 2020), which tended to be, pound for pound, one of the most efficient use of my Avios since the programme was revamped many years ago and the sweet spot of very cheap avios upgrades from WT+ to J disappeared.
Seconded! Or possibly thirded as I'm late to the party, but RFS in Europe was always historically one of my favourites. Will be interesting to see if that returns in the post-COVID world, although if the low cash fares on a lot of routes persist, the value per Avios would be much reduced.
I still find good value in WTP to CW by the way...
To the OPs point though, I do find it a bit sneaky of BA that the default option is not one that gives the best redemption value per Avios - yes I get that there will always be people that will burn them to save a few quid (perhaps thinking back to the old Airmiles days where there were no cash fees, only miles), but I doubt many of us regulars on here would be among them, unless you literally had millions going spare.