SQjunkie

Hello all,

I have finally defected after 10 years of *A love to BA. The main driver of this was SAA deserting the CPT LHR route. I have since been coming to grips with the Avios programme. It's disappointing that for instance there are 0 CW seats on redemption from April until Feb14. Given that I can get a choice of *A seats around any date on the year. And before you jump down my throat - yes there are pros and cons to both programmes - and clearly with bonuses Avios are much easier to earn (part of the problem perhaps). Anyway I thought I would ask for some help with a simple maths problem.

We're a hungry startup so fly mostly economy/premium economy. I fly CPT-LHR around 12 times a year. My options seem to be:
Discount Economy: 12 x R12,000. 960 tier points; Silver; 288 000 Avios
Economy (YBH): 12 x R17,000. 1,920 tier points; Gold, 288 000 Avios
Premium Economy: 12 x R20,000. 2,400 tier points; Gold, 325 000 Avios

Now in all good conscience I can't expect the company to pay the additional costs for what will be a personal benefit. So let's assume I need to cough up personally for the additional fare difference. This means I would pay:
Economy (YBH): R60,000 a year (for Gold / no extra Avios)
Premium Economy: R96,000 a year (for Gold + 37,000 Avios). Obviously with an extra 100 TPs (which I would probably get anyway from other flights) I would get 2 x upgrade vouchers as well.

Apart from the defined benefits there are of course some soft benefits - particularly the potential for OpUps when overbooked. Although I am loathe to think of this as a potential benefit as you are sure to be disappointed.

Thoughts from the BAEC geniuses?

ColdWalker

There are people better qualified than me to answer your maths problem.

But welcome to Exec Club & to the BA forum. For what it's worth I wholeheartedly agree with you about availability, and I think most here would. And you are probably right about the ease of earning being a contributory factor. Many here get quite riled at all the credit card earning opportunities.

See, no jumping down your throat!

Horris

Your sums indicate that it will cost you an additional R60,000, or Ł4,300 to get from Silver to Gold.

You may or may not get a couple more upgrades, so the only real benefit I can see is access to a slightly better lounge. For Ł4k+ per annum, I'd say don't bother.

ColdWalker

...and the soft landing back to silver the following year

LCY8737

One thing to factor in is comfort, there is more to World Traveller Plus than just added tier points/avios.

Also might be worth to have a closer look at the prices. I seem to recall that discounted WTP is frequently cheaper than YBH fares down the back.

Sixth Freedom

Have the company pay for the fare difference and take a pay cut in return. You will be no worse off and the company will save money from the taxes that you would otherwise have paid.

Sixth Freedom

Correct. But you may lose flexibility depending upon the local fare rules ex-SA.

Pandor

Great suggestion. +1 ^

LHR-HUB

Anecdotally, a Gold flying solo in WT+ on a busy route like LHR<>CPT (or LHR<>JNB) will get op-upped to CW fairly regularly.
Out of, I think, 6 legs I've had booked in WT+, I've travelled in WT+ once. 1 x MfU (UUA) and 4x Op-Ups, IIRC.

Also, I know of a log standing gold who has only flown in WT+ once or twice out of about 14 or more legs over the last 2-3 years.

OP, I know the reason you're moving over to BA is for the direct CPT-LHR flight, but you could book CPT-JNB-LHR and scoop up those extra TPs in no time. Also, if you need to go to PLZ, DUR etc., adding these on to your LHR trips will potentially save money compared with buying local, stand-alone tickets.
Finally, you have a great option to boost your TPs with (relatively) low cost RTW tickets originating in SA.

David-A

Hello.

The programme you are talking about is BA Executive Club. Avios points are the millage currency of the scheme.

Avios points are a 'common currency', that is shared by three different loyalty programmes:
BAEC (BA's FFP), Iberia Plus (Iberia's FFP) and a thrid scheme a massmarket shopping scheme for the UK only that used to be called Airmiles.co.uk

All three are separate schemes, with their own rules and T&C, and different partners. With an address in South Affrica you could join both BAEC and IB+.
With an addres in the UK, you could join all three schemes.

Each account is separate, but you can move your Avios points between the schemes.

Rather confusingly, that thrid scheme (UK only massmarket) was renamed Avios.com - i.e. the thrid scheme shares the same name as the common currency.

As a result, calling it the 'Avios programme' can cause confusion! (And not knowing, can confuse people with what they read).

Note that you can NOT move status points (Tier Points) between the Aviod points using schemes, so credit flights directly to the scheem you want to focus on for status. (The Avios.com scheme has no concept of status, so nobody should be crediting flights there outside of any promos).

Minor point, but just to avoid any confusion.

Your doing longhaul flying, so the seat for your recurring flights is an important dimension. Compared with someone doing predominantly shorthaul, where status chasing by short Tier Point runs can make sense.

As a result, personally, I'd advocate a policy (this is unless someone else is paying) of booking Discount Economy (NOT YBH), or Premium Economy longhaul, and NOT YBH economy fares.

Reasoning as follows: The fare difference between discount economy and full fare economy is probably going to be far greater than the 'value' of the TP earned. And you won't get a differnece in seat/onboard product.

You could pickup more TP than the diffeence doing quick TP runs in a day from London. Or if you will pickup TP from other flying.

Note you can only upgrade one cabin class using Avios points.
So from WT to WTP, or from WTP to CW.
And importantly to upgrade from WT you need to be in an expensive fare. (Which I've just said I probably wouldn't book).
But from other cabins, such as WTP, any fare in that cabin can be upgraded one cabin using Avios if redemption seats are available in CW, or become avilable late on.

So, booking Premium Economy (WTP) and trying to use your Avios points to upgrade to ClubWorld might make sense for thouse flights where you want to sleep. If not, you are still in a better seat than WT.

Regardless, I'd always be asking for paid upgrades at the airport to CW. I don't know the details of the CPT route for how often these are offered, vs cost, etc. Althuogh you might have to retroclaim, if the base fare is money, and you upgrade with money, you should get the TP for the upgraded class.

Looking at your prices, YBH option looks bonkers.
(unless you would always be flying last minute, or someone else is paying for the YBH - B]I'm not clear on that bit. Would the company pay for any of these options, or only the cheapest?[/B])

axon

Clever thinking!!

continentalclub

Assuming that the OP is an owner/manager of the company, then the OnBusiness programme should form part of the consideration in terms of the effective ROI of a BA booking:

http://www.britishairways.com/travel...l/public/en_za

In terms of assessing the value of OB, the first thing to bear in mind is that the joining bonus usually offers a multiple earnings rate for the first six sectors flown by employees of the company following joining. This is six per company, not per employee. It therefore often makes practical sense to log an OB number for the first time against the longest, highest cabin class series of bookings possible.

dobba

And dont forget that once you make Silver/Gold levels you wioll start to earn extra Avios over the base level.

LCY8737

And people moan about Amazon and Starbucks moving to Luxembourg...

G-BOAC

Just to be clear - it's actually one voucher, good for up to two people for a single cabin return upgrade together (so you+1 from WT+ to CW for example on one trip, or you can use it just for yourself but it's still only for one trip).