KevinM99

Sorry for such a simple question, but I have been trying to book a flight (LHR to PHL) and book with money and upgrade with Avios, but each time I do it I get the following message:

Error

• There was a problem with your request, please try again later.

Is anyone else having any issues with book and upgrade with Avios? It has done this all day, and I have tried Chrome, IE and Safari (on my iPad), with the same result each time...I have even tried different dates, to no effect.

I have checked the reward availability on the dates I am looking for (out 15th Nov and return 18th Nov) and there is availability in all classes (except F)...I am looking to book in WT+ and upgrade to J

Anyway, thanks, and sorry to be a nuisance!

Kevin

craigthemif

90% of the time you will pay less by booking the paid ticket online and then calling BA to upgrade. There is a known glitch with the way that UUA prices WT+...

PETER01

The other way, my personal preferred way, is to call up and book it as one as the agent can hold/reserve the redemption availability immediately and process it in one go.

Plus, cite the website errors and say it's not bookable online and the agent should waive the phone booking fee.

IIRC it's also to do with DIF fares for WTP which causes BA's IT to go flaky and produce very high prices too. There's more info on DIF fares by a raw google search or looking in the Forum Dashboard.

KevinM99

Thanks for advice guys...appreciated! Looks like I will give BA a call tomorrow and see what I can sort out...

What I am looking to do is book a flight EDI-LHR-PHL and then return the same route...Can I just book this as a standard WT+ flight on BA.com, and then get BA customer service to upgrade the LHR-PHL-LHR legs to J? Both of those legs are showing as a T class fare in WT+. I take it this is upgradeable with Avios?

Also, I take it I would simply pay the relevant Avios to upgrade, and then also possibly some extra taxes, as I think the tax rate is higher for J over WT+?

Many thanks,
Kevin

ENTP

Correct - T is upgradeable and will just incur additional fuel surcharges since you will have already paid the premium APD on a WT+ ticket

KevinM99

Thanks ENTP ^

KevinM99

OK, so I telephoned BA and spoke to someone (at length), and we got a package together, but the increase in tax for the two people going from LHR-PHL and upgrading using Avios was an extra £400 (£200 each)...on top of the 96,000 Avios it would cost to upgrade...

Does that seem right? It seems an awful lot more to pay in actual monetary terms just to fly in a class higher...They told me that taxes, per person, on a WT+ booking were £467 but on a business booking were £667...

However, I went on and did a dummy booking for both classes on the same flight, and the taxes/fees/carrier charges were indeed £467 in WT+ vs £667 in J...BUT, looking at the breakdown of these fees etc, the Government, Authority & Airport charges were the same for both flights, at £267, however, the extra cost comes in the form of an additional (VERY vaguely named) British Airways Carrier Imposed Charge...for WT+ this was £200/person but for J it was £400 per person! No breakdown of this whatsoever, and this looks very suspiciously like BA simply increasing the price of a ticket under the disguise of taxes & fees, but it certainly looks like it is nothing more than a means of BA to charge more for a ticket and hide it in red tape fees...

Can anyone tell me what these BA Carrier Imposed Charges are, and how BA can justify them, and the crazy increase in price from WT+ to J? Surely the increase in price of the ticket covers any extra expenditure BA have in terms of "looking after you"?

Not convinced I want to spend another £400 plus 96,000 Avios to upgrade...

Thanks

TTmex

I think it could well be true. I wanted to upgrade my MEX-LHR both ways and they wanted an additional 300 GBP plus the miles. YQ seems to be the key figure in all of this. Go to Matrix and plug in the flights there and look up the YQ for both types of booking (W and J). That should help. I'd imagine the issue is perhaps PHL charging a higher ADP: My issue was that Mexico City airport charges some 250 quid more to move from W to J.

Hope that helps.