silus

Hi,
I was looking to book flights with BA, and I noticed if going premium economy both ways the tickets were several hundred cheaper going via a third party called Travelup, who i've never used before.

Having never used them, I was considering purchasing direct with BA instead and then using their best price guarantee to claim the difference back.

Am I over complicating this? Are Travelup good/reliable anyway? Do BA have any issues with their best price claim process or am I risking getting it declined and stuck with tickets several hundred more expensive?

Also, presumably, there's no way to avail of a pricematch with booking it with a car for the book-together discount that normally comes with it?

thanks

corporate-wage-slave

Welcome to Flyertalk and welcome to the BA forum silus, and I hope that we will see more of you here.

There are some well established threads about Travelup here are two.
TravelUp
BA booking through travelup.co.uk

The general advice I would give about them is to proceed with caution since unless you are totally certain to travel, and don't hit any significant problems with things like cancellations and you are perhaps ok about shifting flights a day or two, then they have a role. Some regular FT contributors use Travelup from time to time.

Price Match also works, though as it happens I have no experience of this or indeed TravelUp. Obviously there are some tight rules about this, but there are also a number of FTers who get vouchers out of this process.

bisonrav

pricematch works great, but for a few hundred difference you could expect a lot of scrutiny on fare classes and condiitions. It's quite unusual to get that level of discount so it rings a few alarm bells already.

No, can't have it except on straight ex GB flights, doesn't work with cars or hotels.

silus

May be down to the number of passengers for the difference being so large, this is for a total of 4 passengers, but in total the BA price (for london-austin next easter) is 4,422.84 and the price for the same tickets via travelup is 4,215.79 which is quite appealing to make that saving. Unfortunately when I get the quote page for travelup it doesn't seem to mention fare classes etc so i'm hesitant about making the more expenive booking with BA and them not matching the price.

mikeyfly

For Ł50ish per person difference, I’d absolutely book direct with the airline

corporate-wage-slave

You'd save more by starting in Inverness or Dublin or Jersey. I'd focus on trying to get the main part fo the fare down.

bisonrav

You should look for a cheaper start point, and you can also split the booking up to get multiple price matches (not for a DUB start though, price match doesn't work with non GB starts).

I would never book something that substantial with an OTA, even TravelUp who are on the vaguely ok part of the spectrum. But the point that is perhaps being missed is that with price match you don't have to. You are using a discounted price from an OTA to get a bigger discount with a BA direct booking. It's one of the best tricks there is to travel inexpensively.

If you're booking with BA anyway, it's really no extra effort to put in a price match claim. Most times you won't be asked for screenshots, though you should have them. And it'll offset fuel price increases this year very nicely.

bisonrav

Worked example of using both approaches.

JER->AUS, AUS->LHR over Easter to reduce the initial cost

Jersey to Austin | Google Flights - Ł1,012.36 booked at BA.

Price at travelup for the same thing is Ł966.71

Double the difference rounded up is a Ł100 e-voucher, which would pay for the positioning to JER (the timings are not ideal but this is showing the principle). This is essentially per passenger though there's a cap of Ł200, so maybe split the booking into two pairs.

I'd venture to suggest that anyone flying frequently on cash bookings with BA who is not using pricematch is deserving of having their bumps gently felt in what remains of the Elemis Spa. It's literally free money for flights for very little effort. Having said that, always look at the angles and booking, say, with AA, which can be cheaper still.

RichieMc

Speaking of AA, I've often booked there when it was cheaper (or less hassle booking over the phone). Always wondered if booking on AA and then finding a lower price on AA would qualify for price match??

Trevski220

From my experience I've often found that when differences like this occur searching for multiple passengers its because there are less than your required seats left in a fare class, When you search with BA they always quote with you all flying in the same fare class for each direction, but the travel agents are happy to quote and book with your party split across different fare classes and this often accounts for the difference.

I.E. 2 of your 4 seats might be available in L and the the other 2 in the higher K Fare, BA will force all 4 into the higher K Fare where the agents often seem to be able to book your 4 seats with 2 in each class.

You may be able to get the same total cost with BA direct if you split your group into 2 bookings? Not always the case but I've done it in the past.

bisonrav

no, AA doesn't count as an OTA. In fact these are often different flight numbers as codeshares so different conditions.

silus

Hi so i've made a booking directly with BA and have screenshotted travelup, filled out the form for a pricematch and am waiting to hear back to provide the screenshots.

Anyone know if I was to change my booking within 24hours to add car rental (in order for it to include the ATOL protection), if this would invalidate my pricematch claim?

bisonrav

It would, yes. I don't think I'd be massively concerned about ATOL with a BA booking, if you booked with a credit card you have protection anyway, and normal travel insurance is your friend. If you want a car then you can add it later, but shopping around separately is likely to get a better deal anyway.

silus

thanks yeah weirdly I looked around for a car and the cheapest was via Budget which was the same price either with budget or via BA so was going to do it via BA for the additional avios. Maybe i'll just wait until after the price match is sorted first.