New rates are now in force [thread for discussions about the changes]
Apr 28, 2015, 11:49 am
#106
Join Date: Jan 2005
Programs: BA Gold, AA Lifetime Gold 1.8mm, IC Spire Ambassador, Hilton Diamond, SPG Gold et al
Posts: 4,350
Apr 28, 2015, 12:46 pm
#107
FlyerTalk Evangelist, Ambassador, British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Jun 2008
Location: Somewhere between 0 and 13,000 metres high
Programs: AF/KL Life Plat, BA GGL+GfL, ALL Plat, Hilton Diam, Marriott Gold, blablablah, etc
Posts: 30,553
Apr 28, 2015, 12:53 pm
#108
Join Date: Jul 2008
Location: All over the place often South Wales and Lake District
Programs: BA Gold for Life Accor Platinum
Posts: 4,553
I normally use BA to fly from Manchester to Kiev where I live, I looked yesterday for a one way flight from Kiev back to Manchester in mid May to see my elderly mother and the fare was £67.50 plus 4000 Avios, today for the very same flight it's £94 plus 5400 avios
. I called customer services who explained that it is flights within Europe that are falling under the changes, when I explained that Ukraine is not a European country she said as far as BA are concerned it is a European country. When I asked for a refund on my unused avios she laughed and said they don't give refunds and if I no longer want to fly with BA I will lose them
.
So in future it looks like I will be using Wizzair from Kiev Zhulyani or crossing the border to Poland and getting a direct flight to Manchester.
I can see BA losing a hell of a lot of customers because of their greed, it looks like they are now only interested in long haul flights.
. I called customer services who explained that it is flights within Europe that are falling under the changes, when I explained that Ukraine is not a European country she said as far as BA are concerned it is a European country. When I asked for a refund on my unused avios she laughed and said they don't give refunds and if I no longer want to fly with BA I will lose them.So in future it looks like I will be using Wizzair from Kiev Zhulyani or crossing the border to Poland and getting a direct flight to Manchester.
I can see BA losing a hell of a lot of customers because of their greed, it looks like they are now only interested in long haul flights.
Apr 28, 2015, 12:56 pm
#109
Suspended
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Apr 28, 2015, 1:18 pm
#111
Ambassador, British Airways; FlyerTalk Posting Legend
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: Leeds, UK
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Posts: 43,002
Mods please put this into the thread you feel is most relevant
Myself and Mrs AQ have held a reward booking (2 for 1) LHR-PVG in First and HND-LHR in Club for August. We also held a JL redemption PVG-HND in J.
Last week there was one F seat available to NRT on the day of our PVG flight, none in J. I checked 2 days ago and it was F0 J1, then last night it was F0 J0
As the changes were in I thought I'd give it another check this morning and it had changed again to F2 J1
Ran a quick post to confirm how many Avios it would cost to change. KARFA kindly replied and as we figured it was worth the extra to get a direct flight instead of a 6 hour layover in PVG, we tried to bag the NRT seats.
I rang the Gold line, answered within 15 seconds and said what I wanted to do. The very nice lady said it was possible, she'd block the seats while she checked the new protocol. She came back a minute later having checked with a supervisor and confirmed that as it was booked before 28/4, any changes are dealt with as though it was still prior to 28/4
This meant we could transfer to the NRT direct by changing it from PVG and cancel the JL flight. This cost us £70 each in change and cnx charges plus we got £77 taxes refund and 30K Avios.
I don't know if the NRT availability was due to the new changes but nothing else appears to have changed around those dates. maybe just lucky.
Hopefully this will be of use to someone looking to change a pre change booking.
Regards
AQ
Myself and Mrs AQ have held a reward booking (2 for 1) LHR-PVG in First and HND-LHR in Club for August. We also held a JL redemption PVG-HND in J.
Last week there was one F seat available to NRT on the day of our PVG flight, none in J. I checked 2 days ago and it was F0 J1, then last night it was F0 J0
As the changes were in I thought I'd give it another check this morning and it had changed again to F2 J1
Ran a quick post to confirm how many Avios it would cost to change. KARFA kindly replied and as we figured it was worth the extra to get a direct flight instead of a 6 hour layover in PVG, we tried to bag the NRT seats.I rang the Gold line, answered within 15 seconds
and said what I wanted to do. The very nice lady said it was possible, she'd block the seats while she checked the new protocol. She came back a minute later having checked with a supervisor and confirmed that as it was booked before 28/4, any changes are dealt with as though it was still prior to 28/4 This meant we could transfer to the NRT direct by changing it from PVG and cancel the JL flight. This cost us £70 each in change and cnx charges plus we got £77 taxes refund and 30K Avios.
I don't know if the NRT availability was due to the new changes but nothing else appears to have changed around those dates. maybe just lucky.
Hopefully this will be of use to someone looking to change a pre change booking.
Regards
AQ
Good to hear I was wrong and you could do it as a change rather than a new booking ^
Apr 28, 2015, 3:29 pm
#113
Join Date: Feb 2010
Posts: 31
Bye bye BA, you were never my favourite airline after you left Manchester, I now use the American carriers and will forfeit my points. 3 days ago I actually found flights I could use my points on for first class flights, today that is history.
Apr 28, 2015, 5:24 pm
#115
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: Aug 2002
Location: London
Programs: Mucci. Nothing else matters.
Posts: 38,644
What you won't see is lots of CW award availability all over the network to pick and choose from at your leisure. Competition for these seats is intense, and I expect will always remain so.
Apr 28, 2015, 5:38 pm
#116
Join Date: Feb 2010
Location: London / Los Angeles
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Posts: 1,631
Weirdly they have just added a load of Club Europe availability for this weekend at least. Might just be normal close to flightime additions but it is before the usual 1am release. I checked about 10 routes earlier today and now 6-7 hours later, all the routes have significantly better availability for this weekend - but only in CE - nothing has been added in Y.
Apr 28, 2015, 5:40 pm
#117
Moderator: British Airways Executive Club
Join Date: Nov 2010
Location: TPA/ABZ
Programs: BA Lifetime Gold. GGL/CCR.
Posts: 13,252
Apr 28, 2015, 5:41 pm
#118
Join Date: Mar 2009
Location: UK
Programs: BA Gold / Hilton Diamond / IHG Diamond Ambassador / Marriot Bonvoy Gold
Posts: 2,537
Got 4 F seats to / from SEA for next year using up 2 x 241 vouchers which were about to expire. I did see noticeable improvement in availability but it was not universal. The 2 x club issue is very noticeable ex JFK but F is rare.
So have paid 100,000 more for seats but they were not there yesterday. Can't say am thrilled and having then tried to book some AA flights using avoid and AAmiles, it's clear crediting to AA is now a better option for me.
So have paid 100,000 more for seats but they were not there yesterday. Can't say am thrilled and having then tried to book some AA flights using avoid and AAmiles, it's clear crediting to AA is now a better option for me.
Apr 28, 2015, 10:30 pm
#119
Join Date: Apr 2012
Location: not far from MUC
Posts: 6,620
Weirdly they have just added a load of Club Europe availability for this weekend at least. Might just be normal close to flightime additions but it is before the usual 1am release. I checked about 10 routes earlier today and now 6-7 hours later, all the routes have significantly better availability for this weekend - but only in CE - nothing has been added in Y.
Apr 29, 2015, 12:03 am
#120
Join Date: Mar 2012
Location: Isle of Sheppey, UK
Posts: 322
There's definitely been some funny stuff going on with availability with Avios!
I'd been looking at JFK-LHR, 2 seats in First during the Easter holidays next year. Generally there were 10 seats released each day, then availability all but dried up once the Easter weekend came into view. It stayed that way for the following week and even into the week after that - although I was lucky enough to nab 2 seats for the 4th April.
Out of morbid curiousity, I kept an eye on redemption seats after that. 10 were released for the 5th, but availability was generally poor after that, including up to yesterday morning's releases. Then all of a sudden by yesterday afternoon loads of First seats suddenly popped up - including on dates (such as the 4th) that had had little to no availability before. Notably there were plenty of WTP seats released as well, whereas before they'd been almost entirely absent (or were being snapped up on the stroke of midnight GMT!)
I'd been looking at JFK-LHR, 2 seats in First during the Easter holidays next year. Generally there were 10 seats released each day, then availability all but dried up once the Easter weekend came into view. It stayed that way for the following week and even into the week after that - although I was lucky enough to nab 2 seats for the 4th April.
Out of morbid curiousity, I kept an eye on redemption seats after that. 10 were released for the 5th, but availability was generally poor after that, including up to yesterday morning's releases. Then all of a sudden by yesterday afternoon loads of First seats suddenly popped up - including on dates (such as the 4th) that had had little to no availability before. Notably there were plenty of WTP seats released as well, whereas before they'd been almost entirely absent (or were being snapped up on the stroke of midnight GMT!)