wb1969

LHR-DUS peak day is quoting me 5250 in Y & 9750 in J. Unless prices have changed, it should be 4500 & 9000.

Yes I have taken it through to the payment screen and I am also well aware that there are different options depending on the fees paid, but I am looking at the standard £17.50/£25 fees.

Have I missed an announcement or is this just another example of BA IT incompetence?

mikeyfly

It's showing the correct Avios fees in November, but indeed it has crept up checking a peak day in Feb 2022

wb1969

yes I’m looking at 8/1/22. Haven’t looked at any other destinations to see if it is a genuine increase. Wouldn’t surprise me as there must be many millions of unspent Avios in Exec Club accounts.

ECR

I looked at a route I frequently fly for January, and likewise the price has gone up by 750 avios. At the what is the now the RFS rate of 50p it is now 9750 one way instead of 9000. It is not that long ago that they increased from the 8000 avios when they first introduced this 50p rate.

Over the past weeks I have been happily converting nectar points to avios, but this is now making me think I should be sending them in the opposite direction.

wb1969

So the percentage increase in Y is much greater than that in J, even though it is only +750 Avios for each class.

megaloman

Another BA incompetence. Started as a "trial" of charging avios instead of RFS fee - instead of implementing it correctly, so would price as [standard avios or avios+cash] + [avios for RFS or cash], they've decided to mess around with [avios+cash] prices and charge RFS fee of £0.50 per segment.

As with all "temporary" solutions deployed to production, this one too was never properly implemented, and BA kept messing around. Year ago (I think) Executive Club T&Cs were updated so RFS was reduced from £35 to £1 per return ticket and BA agents "forgotten" about standard avios prices and started forcing full avios [avios + avios for RFS] on products like Gold Priority Reward... it had unwelcomed side effects on connecting flights too - where now connections were charged at [avios + avios for RFS] prices, rather than standard avios prices.

This latest change is a small increase for those eligible for RFS, I personally would usually book one of the [avios+cash] options anway.

The biggest hit will be for those not eligible for RFS - as they now are being charged [avios + avios for rfs] prices + TAX. So where previously they had to pay 4500 + £25.41 in tax for GLA to LHR, they'll now have to fork out 9750 + £25.41.

wb1969

So I had the option of buying a one way cash fare for £37.77 (flexible as still under Coronavirus booking policy) or spend 5250 Avios + £17.50, which I value at £70 total.

It's a no-brainer.

CarefreeBA

Just been on the phone to BA regarding some other stuff. They have confirmed that the Avios required for short haul trips have increased by 750 Avios. The prices on BA online are correct, and after some digging, these are the new rates for the RFS pricing level (£17.50/£25 fee vs £0.50 fee)

Economy:

Zone 1: 4,000/4,500 -> 4,750/5,250
Zone 2: 6,500/7,500 -> 7,250/8,250
Zone 3: 8,500/10,000 -> 9,250/10,750

Club:

Zone 1: 7,750/9,000 -> 8,250/9,750
Zone 2: 12,750/15,000 -> 13,500/15,750
Zone 3: 17,000/20,000 -> 17,750/20,750

craigthemif

Between this and the seemingly generous 0.8p conversion rate to Nectar, we should be resetting downwards our expectations of the value of an Avios methinks...

ECR

I suspect this price increase might be related to the additional £8.90 Airport Cost Recovery charge that started appearing on flights from Heathrow last month. This avios price rise will ensure that the customer rather than BA will bear most of the cost of this on short haul RFS flights.

The price before today's changes of an economy return zone 1 peak RFS flight was 18000 avios plus £1. Now it is 19500 avios plus £1 or 18000 avios plus £9.

Raffles

This has now rolled out to 2021 flights after originally only showing for 2022 flights.

craigthemif

It certainly might be related, but it is also irrelevant for flights not departing from LHR...

One might also assume that BA would make a show of blaming Heathrow for the price increase, instead of sneaking through a no-notice devaluation.

ratechaser

I thought it was just me... was looking at LIS or FAO today and it was coming up at 66,000 for the 4 of us (based on what I think of as the 'standard' £35 cash component). Couldn't understand why it was 10% more than expected.

bit irritating but then I don't think the rates have changed for a good few years so can't complain too much.

alex67500

Actually, with BA charging so much in TFCs which I find infuriating, it is rather annoying. Those certainly haven't gone down over the years...

PGberkshire

TFC's?