michelderijk

Hi
I need one leg to get to my next status (although i already had 4 legs but can't claim them anymore with FB) so what's the cheapest way to do it out of AMS?

Of course i also need to get back home and i have no planned business trips scheduled which i can take with FB

Gajan

Cheapest would be to book a take-off fare to some destination where cheap fares are available (E90 range), but they do have a minimum stay of 3 nights or a Saturday night.
Another option would be a same day return, but these are normally more expensive as they are normally booked into M-fare which is 3 or 4 times as expensive as a cheap V-fare.

Gajan

troje

Really cheap and useful fares are DUS-CDG on Air France if you include a saturday night. EUR88 including taxes is not easy to beat from segment run point of view.

ex AMS you might opt for AMS-BUD on KLM. EUR130 with a saturday night included.

MichielR

Book a 99 EUR AMS-TXL return, include a Saturday night to get this cheapest price, but take the train back instead. Do enjoy a half day or day in Berlin, it's a nice place!

michelderijk

thanks for the options but i don't want a stopover, want to get back the same day.

thanks

Shesells

Do you need your status immediately or can you wait til the end if the year. Flying Blue have traditionally awarded status to people who are one sector short. I know that's how I first made silver a few years ago.

troje

Would not count on this too much, I've had some years with 14 segments but no Silver...

Bagehot

Same, don't bet on a spontaneous commercial gesture, but send them asking if you will get your level even if you are one segment short. Don't call them but use the online form to keep a written proof.

It's very probable they will tell you they don't do that kind of "upgrades" but it's sure more efficient than waiting for some miracle to happen.

MarkAMS

... can also try jumping on a train to Dusseldorf one Saturday in Dec - take the 18:40hrs KLM flight back to AMS. Book the flight from DUS - AMS with a return date later in Dec for the cheapest fare - roughly 138 Euros. Otherwise fly to Turin or Milan for one Sat night on Alitalia...

Bagehot

Actually the best option seems to be Italy from CDG. I found a same day flight from CDG to MXP in three weeks for 98€ and 562 miles Check Milan or Roma from AMS, you might have good surprises too

Xandrios

AMS-PRG on CSA can be had for 4 euro plus tax, which ends up to be 128 euro roundtrip. Saturday night included though.

If you wanna do it in one day, you will need to ditch the return part of the ticket in order to keep fares low. I have found Dusseldorf easy to reach by train, so AMS-DUS with a return in the far future should work very well. Just return the same day by ICE, which is 19 euro if booked properly ahead.

[edit]
Actually do it this way:
- ICE AMS-DUS in december: ~19 euro (nshighspeed.nl)
- KLM DUS-AMS roundtrip, with a weekend in between: 88 euro
- Ditch the return part of the KLM ticket

Book through klm.de to ensure you are not charged with booking or creditcard fees. So that would work out to be just over 100 euros for the whole thing.. AND doable in only half a day.

NickB

one way AMS-LCY start from approx €80 and one way LCY-AMS around €70. You could get an Easyjet flight to LGW for about €26 and a return from LCY on KL for about €70, although the change of airport is a little bit of a pain (but can be done cheaply with Southern advance fares from LGW to London Victoria sometimes as low as £3.

ixs

As I was just writing in another Thread. Cheapest outbound from AMS is Basel starting at 88 EUR. But this means a Saturday night stay.
If you are not willing to do that, book two tickets. One AMS-BSL-AMS and one BSL-AMS-BSL and time them to coincide with your flight. If you book the AMS-BSL-AMS one on klm.be and the BSL-AMS-BSL on klm.de, you'll not be stuck with the 10EUR booking fee but only a 3EUR creditcard fee.

There's a certain risk involved by flying this way as you might be stuck if your inbound flight is delayed and the outbound flight is leaving without you. You can minimize if not eliminate this risk by choosing your flights to be on the same plane. Turnaround time on the ground is about 30min. You'll most likely have to go through security again in BSL but this is not a problem as it is a very small airport.

I did exactly that last year and it was no problem at all. In the end I even got 4 segments out of it as I flew all flights and not just the outbound legs on the two tickets. Costs were about 190EUR or so.

Arthur Randolph

Note that back-to-back ticketing is frowned upon by airlines, although I don't really know the really risks here.

ixs

I know that certain American airlines do not like the practice but I have been through the KLM Terms and Conditions several times and did not find anything which would rule out back to back ticketing.

If you have different information, please give me a link. I'd be really interested in that.