Hi there,
i have the following question about BA scam charges:
i have a GVA-LHR-SFO business award on hold, with taxes/surcharges of $371. I know that it goes down by about $100 if you fly the short-haul in Economy, and I even managed to do the mixed class version on aa.com. However only with a 'multi city' booking and the miles price goes up from 57.5k to 70k because it counts as 2 awards (12.5+57.5)
i tried calling and getting them to manually price but they came up with the $371 even for mixed class. What is going on?
shouldnt I be able to voluntarily downgrade the short haul to save the surcharges and not be penalized with having to pay more miles for the downgrade?! Is there any way to do it?

thabks in advance!

You will not save money on the surcharges by downgrading the European sector to economy; you will pay the CHF263 (approx $265) GVA-USA business surcharge regardless. If you were able to separate surcharges, the business class surcharge for LHR-USA is $220 anyway

Of course , on top of that there are the genuine taxes of about $103 too

Just put SFO-MAD on Hold in May--- YQ is 478.00!!!!! Plus Tax is a total of $506.10!

Total BS... So much for this being a way to avoid ridiculous fees.

That route has been identified before as having same surcharge as BA has - others seem not to have gone that way yet

I also looked into booking IB to SFO but the taxes and fees were just as high as BA...why is SFO on par with BA when other routes have lower YQ?

Looking at LAX-MAD for the same day as my held SFO flight, the YQ listed on ITA is exactly the same.

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...439aab3449.png

I wish I could get my taxes on an award ticket down to $500. AA Plat line (and on AA.com) is pricing me ~$2,100 per ticket! I understand that LAX-LHR-JNB-LVI in J would require at least $1K but $2K per ticket? So, for my wife and myself and I am looking at $4,200 in taxes. I spoke to the AA Agent in November & December for travel in June and there was no IB (or any other partner) available. BTW, this is costing me 320K in miles. I am almost tempted to use one of those "We'll book-your-award-travel Services" for a $100. Bad idea?

Do you know whether the agent checked for award-seat availability on QR via DOH to JNB? You might then be able to add the JNB-LVI segment on BA/Comair on the same award, or just use BA Avios -- if you have or can get some -- to book JNB-LVI as a "Reward Flight Saver" redemption.

When do you want to travel? QR is scheduled to begin LAS-DOH service in June, 2018.

JNB is a cheaper location if you can use that instead

Checking ITA for LAX-JNB on BA, the one way business class surcharge shows as $779 plus taxes of $73 for a total of $852
If this is for a round trip ticket then it would be a total of around $1840

You can reduce the cost by booking 2 oneway tickets. Then the cost will be $852+$553 for a total of $1405 since the carrier surcharge for JNB-LAX is only $457.5 rather than $779

Going to Livingstone, however, the one way surcharge is $987.00 plus taxes of $119 for a total of $1106. Round trip cost total surcharge = $1974 plus taxes of $171 for $2145. Again you can save by booking 2x one ways and reduce cost by $420 down to $1725 since the surcharge for LVI-LAX is $567

I am not sure how a "we will book your reward" service would help - the price for the BA awards will still have the same surcharges ; the only way to reduce it is to find a another carrier such as QR

First, how is this costing you 320K miles (i.e., 160K miles per person)? A roundtrip should be 150K miles per person.

I second the recommendation to look at QR, connecting through DOH. With QR, sometimes your routing is limited. In this case, it looks like you can have JNB-LVI on the same award, since QR publishes a LAX-LVI fare, but looking at the fare rules, you might be limited to the LAX-DOH, BOS-DOH, and PHL-DOH flights across the Atlantic (although I've been able to book routings that EF suggests is not possible). In my experience, QR transatlantic business class is tough to find if you are looking to depart on a Friday, Saturday, or Sunday.

If QR doesn't work for you, a possible but more expensive option (in points) would be going via the Pacific (at least one way). It would be multiple awards, but CX, for example, generally has more flexible routing rules. It would be 125K one-way per person in J if you combine a NA-India with an India-Africa award, 140K miles if you want to skip India and go straight from Asia 2 to Africa (it's the same number of miles NA-India as it is NA-Asia 2 but more expensive going from Asia 2-Africa than India-Africa).

The FTer's final destination is LVI, not JNB. ;)

Good idea, though, about booking the roundtrip as two one-ways, unless award seats can be found on QR.

I did continue on to add the LVI information :)

Yes, she (AA Agent) did check that carrier and routing after I suggested she do so. No luck. Thank you for your input, regardless. Btw, I am looking at the high season (Jun-Aug).

Wow. I had no idea that LVI was adding that much tax. I will attempt what you suggest and report back. Thank you, too.