Lack of BA destinations in Asia
Mar 1, 2024, 2:03 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2018
Posts: 375
Lack of BA destinations in Asia
Hi all,
I'm fuming, and shocked, to see the lack of routes BA flies to in Asia, it jut doesn't add up.
For instance if one wants to fly to Manila good luck even trying to book that on BA, it doesn't even come up on their search bar,
So then i just started to have a look around and noticed just how little Asia service BA has, e.g. no flights to the Philippines, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand , Cambodia and just so much more,
Yes i know that they are plenty of other oneworld airlines that fly there but it would be nice to even have the bare minimum option to even book on the BA website...
OK rant over..
I'm fuming, and shocked, to see the lack of routes BA flies to in Asia, it jut doesn't add up.
For instance if one wants to fly to Manila good luck even trying to book that on BA, it doesn't even come up on their search bar,
So then i just started to have a look around and noticed just how little Asia service BA has, e.g. no flights to the Philippines, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand , Cambodia and just so much more,
Yes i know that they are plenty of other oneworld airlines that fly there but it would be nice to even have the bare minimum option to even book on the BA website...
OK rant over..
Last edited by Palty; Mar 1, 2024 at 3:51 am Reason: Post moved from another thread.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:12 am
#2
Join Date: Mar 2016
Posts: 145
Hi all,
I'm fuming, and shocked, to see the lack of routes BA flies to in Asia, it jut doesn't add up.
For instance if one wants to fly to Manila good luck even trying to book that on BA, it doesn't even come up on their search bar,
So then i just started to have a look around and noticed just how little Asia service BA has, e.g. no flights to the Philippines, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand , Cambodia and just so much more,
Yes i know that they are plenty of other oneworld airlines that fly there but it would be nice to even have the bare minimum option to even book on the BA website...
OK rant over..
I'm fuming, and shocked, to see the lack of routes BA flies to in Asia, it jut doesn't add up.
For instance if one wants to fly to Manila good luck even trying to book that on BA, it doesn't even come up on their search bar,
So then i just started to have a look around and noticed just how little Asia service BA has, e.g. no flights to the Philippines, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Thailand , Cambodia and just so much more,
Yes i know that they are plenty of other oneworld airlines that fly there but it would be nice to even have the bare minimum option to even book on the BA website...
OK rant over..
My personal preference is Turkish Airlines who have fantastic food, a great lounge in Istanbul and excellent connections to interesting places ranging from Dushanbe to Dhaka and Bishkek to Bangkok.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:15 am
#4
Join Date: May 2006
Location: GVA
Programs: BA Gold, LH FTL, KL/AF Ivory
Posts: 1,878
I would agree. Asia is much better served by other airlines, including Oneworld alliance airlines, QR, CX, JAL, Finnair, just to name a few. All of them will have clean planes, as a start.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:19 am
#5
Join Date: Feb 2017
Location: London
Programs: BAEC Gold, Marriott LT Platinum
Posts: 2,342
I think for BA itself the calcs have changed since Russian airspace is closed. Still air travel demand is comparatively slow in Asia as well.
Much better options than BA available, I miss the KL flight though.
Much better options than BA available, I miss the KL flight though.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:21 am
#6
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2018
Posts: 375
fuming in the sense that it doesn't even give me the option to book it on their website, as i really need to be there, my only option to fly there with a redemption without breaking the bank on taxes would be to position myself somewhere and i cant do that every time i need to fly to Asia which is a lot and i'm sure many people would agree with me on this.
Besides take for example an airline like Biman they fly into LHR from 2 cities, you're telling me that there's no demand to fly there? or Thailand we've got Eva, or Malaysia we've got Malaysia airlines and so on and so on...its ridiculous
Besides take for example an airline like Biman they fly into LHR from 2 cities, you're telling me that there's no demand to fly there? or Thailand we've got Eva, or Malaysia we've got Malaysia airlines and so on and so on...its ridiculous
Mar 1, 2024, 4:28 am
#7
Join Date: Jan 2005
Location: UK
Programs: Mucci. And BA Gold – previous awards - Gold 11, Silver 7, Bronze 4.
Posts: 4,236
This is a commercial decision… and it is exacerbated by a lack of aircraft and crew to run the services even if BA wanted to. Though you might not agree, BA has taken a commercial decision not to run these services (though it relies on codeshares for some of them). At an individual customer level it is frustrating… but from a strategic perspective it is most probably right.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:31 am
#8
Join Date: Oct 2009
Location: Scotland
Programs: BA Silver, Hilton Diamond, BD Blue (RIP)
Posts: 1,986
Yup - the Transatlantic JBA is such a goldmine for them that it makes sense for them to pile capacity into secondary US cities. The other advantage is that most of these allow them to run routes on a 24-hour cycle (i.e. the plane is ready to depart on another rotation from LHR 24 hours after it last left there) - Asia, particularly with Russian airspace closed, doesn't allow that (Finnair could do it pre-COVID and that was pretty much their business model). Couple that to most routes requiring crew rest, 2 nights down route and a lot of them being fairly light on business demand (Manila, BKK and even Seoul being such examples) and you can see why they choose the US, even if I'd prefer that they didn't!
Mar 1, 2024, 4:35 am
#9
Join Date: Dec 2014
Location: London, UK
Programs: BAEC Gold-GGL
Posts: 1,191
fuming in the sense that it doesn't even give me the option to book it on their website, as i really need to be there, my only option to fly there with a redemption without breaking the bank on taxes would be to position myself somewhere and i cant do that every time i need to fly to Asia which is a lot and i'm sure many people would agree with me on this.
Besides take for example an airline like Biman they fly into LHR from 2 cities, you're telling me that there's no demand to fly there? or Thailand we've got Eva, or Malaysia we've got Malaysia airlines and so on and so on...its ridiculous
Besides take for example an airline like Biman they fly into LHR from 2 cities, you're telling me that there's no demand to fly there? or Thailand we've got Eva, or Malaysia we've got Malaysia airlines and so on and so on...its ridiculous
I can't remember the date but soon, if not already, you'll be able to do the same with Finnair.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:44 am
#11
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: London
Programs: BA Silver, ZSL Silver
Posts: 2,552
Pre-pandemic I travelled regularly to China and oneworld was always way more expensive than AF/KL and obviously the Chinese airlines so it was very hard to justify Ba/CX/QR unless there happened to be a good deal. Not sure what it's like these days as I'm not flying for work at the moment.
Mar 1, 2024, 4:45 am
#12
Join Date: Dec 2014
Location: London, UK
Programs: BAEC Gold-GGL
Posts: 1,191
Mar 1, 2024, 5:16 am
#15
FlyerTalk Evangelist
Join Date: May 2014
Location: UK
Programs: BA Gold
Posts: 12,266
Fuming that you can’t get a Reward flight for a few quid to an Asian city ?! That's probably why BA aren't prioritising the routes you mention.
Just book another airline or use Avios to Singapore / HKG and buy an onwards flight
Just book another airline or use Avios to Singapore / HKG and buy an onwards flight
Last edited by mikeyfly; Mar 2, 2024 at 12:32 am