KurtBJC

One thing that's always been handy for me in booking award travel on BA is that my schedule is flexible, and this means I can book very close to the day of a flight -- I've taken several trips that weren't booked until just a few days before departure. In the past, BA has had a fairly reliable practice of releasing available seats anywhere from a few days to two weeks before the day of flight, and so while there's a certain amount of checking-every-day-to-see, seats have usually been available for longhauls from the US to the UK in First or Business, at least in the offseason (and frequently, though less consistently, at busier times).

This year I am seeing a radically different picture. From Seattle they seem to be releasing almost nothing, and as I check around from city to city, the near-term availability is likewise generally nil. Has BA changed its policy? Have they decided they'd rather fly seats empty than get last-minute award bookings? I've never seen so little availability in February, ever.

corporate-wage-slave

BA had a particularly successful sale in January in some markets, selling more tickets than in any previous sale. So it wouldn't surprise me if SEA is running fairly full. SEA has never been an easy route due to the tech industries.

It's always difficult to look at one route, with only a few services, and then try and get an impression out of it. There are something like 150 redemption seats available from JFK today and 300 or so for tomorrow, plenty of them in CW.

Dorsetboy

I can't comment on your SEA situation but I have been looking for two upgrades from Club to F from Syd-sin for Feb 2017 for several months and then hey presto a lot become available in a short time within two weeks of the flight departure. In fact there were 7 available for 14/02/17 released last week and that followed two seats released every day for the week previous. This route is normally jammed in all classes so I am not sure what's going on on this route. In fact at OLCI tonight there are still five seats available in F

sammyg901

Slow season and midweek SIN flights can be surprisingly empty - to the point that BA have started trimming the A380 schedule on very slow days

BAAZ

Out of interest, how do you know that?

corporate-wage-slave

I went online and added them all up. OK. it's imprecise, since if there are 9 seats in WT and 9 seats in WTP, the actual number of seats would be 18 on my count but the actual amount could be anywhere from 9 to say 50.

fourspoons

I must admit, I have noticed the same. Last year I had a fairly high (>50%) hit rate of booking WT+ and UuA either at the time of booking or a few weeks before departure.

Since later last year and so far all of this, I've not had any CW seats become available between booking and flying, even with ExpertFlyer saved searches looking for me. The routes I have been on are YYC, DXB, MCO and KWI, so a fairly random (but admittedly small) sample...

Jordan D

I was able to book Avios seat LCY-EDI last week at just under 48hrs notice, for a Friday night departure, which was a pleasant surprise, considering the cash price of a ticket ... I think there is still last min availability to be had.

Nuster

Have they? When?

hugolover

BA is still dumping seats like crazy, at least in Economy/Domestic. There is nearly always some way to get a deal, whether its G-class for car hire, last minute Avios or the favoured Flyertalker ex-EUs.

corporate-wage-slave

Yes, and with a slightly late Easter I suspect this will continue until at least mid March. February (and November) is always a good time to go ferreting around the inventory and this year is no exception.

barboyz

I have been monitoring BAs last minute reward availability in F going to HKG, during the whole of August, a day or two before departure if seats in F were available they would open them up for reward redemption. since the beginning of Sept there has been no reward availability even though most days there have been plenty of F seats on BA31 and 27.

Does anyone know why this is?

KARFA

When you say there have been plenty of seats what are you looking at to determine this?

barboyz

seat alerts/expert flyer

Flexible preferences

Might this have anything to do with the current sale, and cutting back on reward inventory until it finishes later this month?