temple

Hello all,

Family of 3 would like to travel to the UK from the Bay Area (SFO, SJC or OAK) for a wedding next June, ideally making some use of Avios (approx 300K), and even better a companion voucher too.

Length of trip can be 14 - 18, days and the only caveat is that we need to be there between June 13 - June 17. Happy to arrive/depart any airport.

My amateurish searching hasn't uncovered anything to date, and suspect that we might have to give up on the Avios concept, and simply buy tickets. However I thought I'd pose the question and see if anybody has any suggestions which might help uncover something?

Thanks!

guv1976

What class of service?

SFO777

Forget BA and Avios. You can fly nonstop OAK-LGW on Norwegian for close to BA's taxes and scam charges, and you'd save miles for another day.

embarcadero1

BA Is all about scam fees. Fly AA if in business, fly IB through LA if you're okay with connections.

Otherwise, fly from Oakland, especially if saving cash matters.

pauldb

Sorry about the helpful advice above.

If you want to fly business, it would have to be BA with your avios total (voucher only good for BA). I can only see a mixed airport option: OAK-LGW on Jun 4th, LHR-SJC Jun 20th. 250k avios + voucher, but yes $1,250pp.

If you want the cheapest option, you might find some value with Aer Lingus, now the lowest surcharge TATL option with AB gone. They are "peak" from mid June so you're likely to be travelling out off peak, returning peak, so SFO-DUB-SFO would be 41,250 avios + $120 pp.

Don't know how DUB would work for you. You can add a shorthaul connection to the UK for 4000/4500 avios, but if you do that on the return you'll pay UK longhaul APD which is better avoided! In other words if you wanted to fly into MAN and out of LON better to book SFO-DUB-MAN//DUB-SFO for 45,250 avios and then buy a separate LON-DUB (either with avios or low-cost cash) and consider a night or 2 in DUB.

hearingdouble

If you are prepared to bide your time and are determined to use your companion voucher to fly in J, additional redemption availability for OAK often appears closer to flight dates as J is rarely full on that route. But I agree with pauldb that a BA metal redemption may not be the best value option for you.

BillyBleach

Another consideration is connecting through another US airport - PHX and LAS are close. ORD and DFW are other options. Worse case I am sure you could find JFK redemption flights.

dnajockey

OAK frequencies are dropping next spring and summer down to two a week in case you didn't know

temple

Can you use Avios AND a companion voucher on a multi-airport trip? If so, presume I would have to call to make the booking?

The specific OAK-LGW on Jun 4th, LHR-SJC Jun 20th detailed above would actually work very well for us, but alas I'm unable to see any club world availability (for 3 passengers) on the return when dummy booking single legs. Is it possible the availability is there and I'm not able to see it for some reason?

TMC

Yes you can - we used vouchers and miles for LHR-JFK then ORD-LHR; nesting JFK-MCO-ORD on United - $7 each in fees on each flight using UA miles and sat in Economy Plus.

pauldb

Yes you can, by calling BAEC.

I can still see the 3 seats on the 20th. I think very occasionally we've seen US availability differ from UK availability, but more simplistically is it possible the website is tricking you into searching either LGW or SJO (San Jose, Costa Rica) rather than LHR-SJC? In any case you need to call anyway so that will be your answer.

temple

Brilliant! As you indicated BAEC was able to see the availability and I was able to set up the booking exactly as you described.

Many, many thanks to pauldb and the other users for their helpful suggestions!