Originally Posted by
Ballard
I was looking for London to Buenos Aires business class return through Avios with an Amex 2-1 voucher (half price rather than 2-for-1). I couldn't find seats LHR-EZE but found some LHR-MVD which was close enough. I don't have the exact figures to hand but it was around 75,000 Avios and £550 which I was happy with.
I then discovered that open jaw tickets are available if you ring and this worked for me LHR-MVD then EZE-LHR (Iberia via MAD). When it came to payment I was quoted 75,750 Avios and £1,300+. I thought that this might be because of the open-jaw flights but asked him to check. After 10 or so minutes on hold he quoted the same Avios and £478 fees. I was working and had spent long enough on this so regretfully I didn't query why the difference.
I'm simply posting as a warning to anyone else that might be calling to book tickets in this way. In my rush to get the call over with I was tempted to just pay it but I thought that I'd prefer to go in and out of Montevideo at the expense of a few hours travelling but for a significant saving.
Thanks for this Ballard and apologies for such a late reply. I’ve experienced this on a few return flights to India using a 241 (the main entry points so Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai) and the ultimate payable taxes were completely different to what was showing in the “quote”. I needed the flights and they go quickly (and/or I get paranoid they’ll go) so I took screenshots of the “quote”, paid the daft taxes and then called to query it the next day and after an awful lot of faffing around (on 3 separate occasions), the difference in tax was refunded. I’ve never had this with any other country, just India. All very odd but the end result is that it is fixable but do take screenshots.