xenole

For the time being, I'll just stick to HBO fares or RFS if the prices are high.
Most of my short haul flights are to DUB, JER, TXL, AMS, CPH, OSL and ARN so a few are barely an hour anyway. If I'm positioning for long haul, I'll bring carry-on for that flight and I'm not that fussed where I sit during a 40 min flight to Jersey. 10-12 hrs, yes, but something akin to a bus trip across town, I'll survive.

They'll probably change carry-on rules at some point, but for now I'm not going to change my patterns.

stewaran

If pricing difference stays the same at about £15 then i do welcome this. although my guess (yes not worth much i know!) is that we will see a much larger difference between HBO and "with Checked" as it now include semi flex which from my experience needed approx £80 extra fare.

If that stays the same the difference between HBO and "with checked" could be £100.

Also, there are only a few airports with enough flights to make semi flex worthwhile, especially as you cant change route.
you could be sat in FRA on way to LHR, but they wont let you get an earlier LCY flight - if they opened this extra bit of Flex that would be a big step forward.

Ldnn1

Is that because you actually check in a bag, or do you still buy non-HBO even when you're planning to travel HBO? That would certainly put you in a very small minority even among FTers, I would think.

megaloman

I've flown HBO once (before seat selection for status holders was removed), then I always booked non-HBO as I value the flexibility. Most of the time I try to travel HBO, even when I fly CE.

Airprox

There is absolutely no way that BA are suddenly just going to add semi-flexibility to the current "with bag" prices. I am sure we are going to see the difference between HBO and the new mid-level fare become the same as the current bag + semi-flex addition.

For me, this is bad news. I want to be able to take a bag and I want to be able to choose my seat, so currently I choose the mid-level fare and get both for about £15/€20 depending on the route. I don't need the semi-flexibility so I don't choose to add that option. Under the new system it seems that I will either have to pay for a semi-flex fare, at much higher prices, for flexbility that I don't need, or I have to book HBO and then pay to add a bag and pay to choose a seat, which will cost more than the current difference between HBO and with bag.

Looking at my ususal route, DUS-LHR for a couple of months ahead when all the flights are the lowest price currently available:

HBO is €67 each way, and with a bag is €87 each way.

Both fares can be changed to semi-flex for €90 extra each way. There is no way BA is suddenly going to start passing up that €90 extra by giving everyone extra flexibility, what they are trying to do by "simplifying" is make more people buy the more expensive semi-flex from the outset.

I agree with others that we are likely to see the difference between HBO and the new mid-level fare go up to around £100/€120 for short EU flights, and more for the longer ones.

More BA customer-squeezing sold as an enhacement

chrisljo

Did some searches for OSL-LHR. The new economy with bags is 170 NOK (15 GBP) over HBO fares.

If this continues BA might get more of my business, as SAS Plus flexibility has been an important driver in selecting SAS. No refund/expensive change fees on the new fares is problematic but with free SDC (which I usually, but not guarenteed, sometimes get as a EBD at SAS) is great. Getting home early to the family when possible is important

radui

That is the "old" non-flex WCB, we will most likely see the new prices after 8th March.

To bring this thread to a more positive note, maybe BA is considering going the KLM route and give status pax one extra bag on the base fare (that is HBO for KLM as well?) and maybe even seat selection?

Foltan

That's the old/current fares. The new fares aren't out yet, as indicated in the original post, and hence all the speculation in this thread.

Ldnn1

It's also worth pointing out that the fares and differentials we see on 8 March won't necessarily stay that way for very long. As we know, the difference between HBO and non-HBO fares has changed (gone up) a lot since HBO was introduced, as have seat selection fees etc..

HIDDY

So it would seem it's only those with status that are getting hot under the collar about these changes?
The likes of me has nothing to worry about as I can just fly a low cost carrier instead if the HBO fare plus one bag deal is too expensive?

Kgmm77

Wirelessly posted (iPhone 3G: Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 9_2_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/601.1.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/9.0 Mobile/13D15 Safari/601.1)

Nobody knows how it will impact them yet until post 8/3.

But clearly unless there is route monopoly there is always the option of using another carrier, but then why bother commenting in the BA forum as that answers almost every issue/problem/change!!

PUCCI GALORE

So everything so far is speculative rather than reactive? Good Grief, when the new fares do get released, popcorn will not suffice the occasion.

Ldnn1

Well, no, the changes aren't speculative - they have been announced and much of the commentary is based on those facts.

It's clear that the changes will have more impact on status holders than non-status holders because the 'cheapo ticket with status benefits' fare class is the one that is being removed.

The speculation is about the actual pricing and how much it will impact us in practice.

Jpsartre

Again, since HBO fares aren't available on flights involving transfers it can't be that simple. I just can't imagine the cheapest XXX-LON-YYY return flights being £600-700+ after March 8.

HIDDY

Well I shall speculate and say this will be a positive change.