Moriarty

British Airways luxury sale Terms and Conditions: 4 May – 23 May 2017

I normally pay the headline sale fare when I book flights despite flying from a regional airport so it came as a surprise when the pricing from Newcastle was significantly higher. Since this is the first time I'm booking a sale fare after the introduction of Club Europe on domestic flights, I thought the increased pricing might be down to a glitch but discovered that it's not. I called the GGL line and was informed that the terms and conditions of the sale stated the following:

13. Regional connections to London Heathrow or London Gatwick for travel to onward long haul destinations are available, but are not included in this promotion and vary in cost depending on the regional airport.

Looking at LHR-ORD on the outbound BA297 and returning on BA296, the price is as follows:

First
£2494.07

CW
£1894.07

Those are reasonable prices and in line with the advertised fares. However, when priced from Newcastle, the price increases as follows:

First
£3108.08

CW
£2407.08

So, the return flights from Newcastle on this itinerary requires a supplement of £614.01 in First or £513.01 in CW. I normally speak to great people on GGL but the lady I spoke to wasn't even aware there was a sale on but, once she looked at ba.com, she suggested I could book separate flights to connect from NCL using Avios or cash.

BA is effectively penalising passengers flying from regional airports. Surely this can't be right. Am I missing something here?

DYKWIA

I looked at a LHR-DXB-LHR flight. It was around £2k in F.

I made it AMS-DXB-AMS, and it jumped to around £6k. No thanks

Fly2Where

Hi, I thought your point 13 answered your question, no? However, there is a better deal right now from MAN-ORD (depends on your travel date), lowest around £1002 on CW.

Moriarty

I don't believe I've paid a surcharge in the past. Even with a surcharge, why is the cost £100 more for F than CW for the same seat in CE for the domestic flight? I'm pretty sure that something's wrong here unless there's been a significant change in policy.

paul4040

It says regional airports aren't included in the promotion. Therefore, the fares are higher.

You need to start your ticket from London to avail of the promotion. Doesn't seem hugely different to BA putting sales on in Italy, Ireland or Denmark. Same principle.

The logic of excluding regional airports is a bit baffling to me as well, but that's the promotion BA are running. No mistake there.

orbitmic

No mistake indeed. I wonder if this might be a side effect of the introduction of CE on domestic flights that now domestic are considered a separate market for promotion purposes just like (as paul4040 mentioned) foreign markets already are.

capetown2k

Been pricing up first trips in the sale from man to
cpt
bos
jfk
the price difference is only around £120 extra for the. Man leg

Tobias-UK

This is a concerning move, I've looked at a number of flights recently during the sale and noticed there are no sale fares in many of the routes I fly from MAN. I hope this is not going to be a regular occurrence,

This appears not restricted to long haul connections, the CE sale fares also appear excluded.

This appears odd behaviour as there are so many one-stop options with alternative carriers that might cause passengers to stray.

710 77345

BA have never been good at keeping their fare rules up to date when new products / routes are launched. Give it 6 months and this problem will hopefully have been resolved.

so3003

Agree entirely with the OP.

Just as with the introduction of "First Wing", which is only useful for those starting their journey from London, this is further confirmation of the London-centric view taken by BA. I appreciate a knock-on effect of FW is the theoretically reduced footfall in North / South fasttrack security but the experience there remains dismal with large queues, rude security staff, and for international to UK connections the continued absence of a fast track passport lane.

The introduction of Club Europe on domestic sectors hasn't done anything to the pre-existing service level - if anything it has reduced the experience whether in Eurotraveller or Club Europe on these segments - and it's effectively penalised those of us who live outside of the M25 bubble. My experience of UK-CE, on a morning flight, was that I had an almost identical breakfast to what was previously provided on the route, while the cabin crew ran about like headless chickens attempting to serve CE 'meals' and sell as much M&S food in ET as possible within a very short time window. On domestic ET segments it feels totally chaotic and it's apparent the crew are not comfortable with the various iterations of items for sale and payment processing etc.

While I don't expect to have a 'free' flight from Scotland to London for a long haul connection, I also don't expect to be excluded from promotional fares or to be forced into a £500+ domestic return flight in order to take advantage of an apparent discount. The cost of a CE trip has effectively doubled since they introduced domestic CE, since it's not possible to ticket domestic Eurotraveller and European CE online - and if doing it via the service centre there's then an added charge as well as the added hassle of needing to call the Gold line (or equivalent) to book it.

I hope this is just another ruse similar to seat selection on HBO, where they take something away only to return it as an "enhancement" several months later....

Moriarty

The issue is that these tickets are being costed with fully flexible full fare J in CE to connect to long haul flights in the sale which are non-flexible. Both flights should be costed on a matched basis so, if common sense prevails, I expect BA will fix this. I've raised this again with GGL and think I'll hear back by Thursday if not before.

MSPeconomist

Is this an ANTI exEU sale?

strichener

I know Londoners think that they live in a different country but really? Comparing having a sale from London as having one from Italy, Ireland or Denmark?

Surely the equivalent would be having a sale from the UK.

Edit to Add: It is also interesting that the Regions does not include London! When did it assume principality status?

Tobias-UK

Thank you for following up, I look forward to hearing what they have to say.

Quite, it appears unfair that the rich southerners get all the good deals whilst us poor northerners have to subsidise them

Effectively there is no sale for the regions.

seat 13a

And if you buy the London sale fare and add a cheap return from/to Scotland - guess what? You have to reclaim and recheck baggage, since there's now no interlining on separate PNRs....Just how many status pax are there in EDI, BA? It has long been one of the most profitable routes on the network. Not much coming back for such loyalty these days.