Globaliser

If there is availability now in F outbound and J inbound, then you know that at worst you can travel in those cabins. Changing to F later is very easy.

However, if you dont book now and wait for F availability to open up on the inbound half, you may find that it never happens. And you could find that by the time it does, or by the time you give up, you can no longer get F on the outbound half or J on either half.

allturnleft

I have 2 F returns from SEA next summer booked at standad avios
Is there any way of converting this to a 2 4 1 at a later stage? Especially if outward seats open upen up?

obduro

As per the wiki you will need to cancel your existing booking and rebook with the voucher, noting there is no guarantee the seats will be released back into the inventory.

allturnleft

Thanks ; sounds very risky!
Wondred whether the guys in the at the call centre have any more access; sounds like not

mediamonkey

Hey All

Has anyone had any experience with this that can help. I want to use my 2-4-1 voucher on some flights and at the moment there is only J availability for the return leg and nothing in any class for the outbound leg.

Is there anything I can do to book the return leg now and play the waiting game for the outbound leg coming up (ideally in J but any class I suppose)?

Thanks in advance

pauldb

Best you can probably do is book any available date as an outbound (and/or any destination for the outbound in the same avios band) and then hope to be able to change it at some point. But bear in mind you won't though be able to abandon dummy outbound and just fly the inbound as a fall back.

It might be useful if you posted the route and date (roughly) in case that yields alternatives or specific advice. e.g. if you want to go to ORD, book NYC and then you have options to change it or fly indirect.

mediamonkey

Great advice Paul, thank you.

We're looking for 2pax outbound towards the end of Jan (flexible) to either Cape Town or Jo'Berg, and a return from either destination around the 11th March. Ideally in J but we've enough avios for any cabin.

Tdgraves

these are both very popular routes which book up 355 days in advance. For example, there is no availability CPT to LON next September already. Your only hope is BA releasing more seats, which is unpredictable. However, they did so last year for the early part of Jan. You'll have to just keep your fingers crossed....

pauldb

That's a tricky one as availability is very limited and alternatives are thin on the ground, and you should grab those inbound seats asap. I wouldn't give you a great chance of finding a January J flight; there's not even anything available last minute in Nov/Dec at the moment.

If you have an alternative use for your 241, you could actually book IB MAD-JNB-MAD (eg 1Feb-10Mar) for 170k avios and £300. That compares quite favourably to 125k avios +voucher + £1100 on BA, though you have to add the costs/hassle of getting to MAD. Middle ground would be to fly out from MAD and get a Lloyds voucher in a hurry to get a good value one-way BA redemption straight home.

Otherwise there's seats to MRU on 31Jan but that's in a higher avios band so only really an option if you want to add that to your trip.

Or you could book Nairobi or Luanda instead, and hope to change. NBO might be a reasonable routing to VicFalls if you were thinking of going there (15k FlyingBlue NBO-LVI); Luanda is less indirect but much less obvious (Using BA76 Luanda as a route home from South Africa).

mediamonkey

Thanks Paul. Hugely useful advice here. Thanks so much. I'll let you know what we do. the Mad option might be good, shall look into it more as we'll have a baby with us too.... however a few nights in Madrid before SA might be nice...

louie-m

I'm currently at my destination, so have used the outbound leg of the 2-4-1. Now having second thoughts about the return. Can I:

- cancel it (I think not)

- downgrade from Club to WT and get a refund of the difference? (I did think I could but I read something I can't now find on here which made me wonder whether that was right)

Steve in Olympia

Why would you be unable to cancel? Certainly BA has no interest in forcing you to take the flight, or being a no show.....

jerry a. laska

You can cancel but having flown the outbound you will not be entitled to a refund of avios for the inbound.

louie-m

Sorry, I did mean "and get a refund of the avios and taxes, fees and charges for the return less the change fee", which I didn't make clear and which Jerry has clarified.

Anyone know about downgrading and thus getting at least some of the avios back?

Slliw

Hello fellow flyers, does anyone know how often BA open up Avios redemptions for F? I know CW is guaranteed 2 per day and F isn’t guaranteed but when F does show up is there a method to the madness? I.e does F get released at midnight or can it be sparadoic throughout the day? Just need any idea based on peoples previous experiences.

For some context I’m looking for F from LHR to LAS for the 17th sept. I currently have it booked in J