mario

I am trying to make a reservation on ba.com for a LIS-LHR-LAX-LHR-LIS in Club.

I picked 1st March as the outbound date and 5th March as the return date.

I also checked using the fantastic SabreConsole for "I" class availability and I know that this is available on my chosen flights.

However, aftter choosing the very same flights on ba.com, the remarks are:
NOTE - NO PENALTIES UNLESS OTHERWISE SPECIFIED. FULL REFUND PERMITTED AT ANY TIME. UNLIMITED FREE CHANGES PERMITTED AT ANY TIME. IN THE EVENT OF REROUTING THE FARE MUST BE RECALCULATED FROM THE POINT OF ORIGIN.

From what I know, this is full fare (J) right?

If it is, why can't I book in a discounted fare knowing that "I" class is available on all of the flights?

Dakota

How is it pricing? If you get the price you want and more flexibility than expected, you're ahead. I don't know, but maybe BA offers essentially a full J product at I fares to stimulate demand in your market.

mario

In ths case I am getting exactly the opposite of what I want. I am getting more flexibility than expected but at a higher price. What I want is the "good old days" LIS fares at 1,800 eur CW RT with lots of restrictions.

dnw

The el-cheapo LIS I/A-fares are dead as of the 15th Dec, although maybe they will make a comeback after the holiday season (fingers crossed!) If your pricing after that time, you're probably getting a 'regular' I-fare, which wont be anything like as cheap, but may well have less penalties (its only ex-UK that we're screwed on refund/change on everything except full-full fare )

Dave_C

I've been able to price I fares ex-LIS for EUR1600 in J and EUR2000 in F to EWR for travel in feb/march, so it appears that they are available for the rest of the low season. I was planning on purchasing the F fare in the next couple of weeks - I'll be very surprised (and p***ed off) if they've gone or been "unloaded" by then.

mario

I also tried to price a flight in CW to EWR in Feb and I got a 2,500 EUR fare instead. Again, the chosen flights have "I" availability. How long ago were you able to price those flights at 1,600 EUR?

Frequentflyer99

Best is to speak to BA res. I had this recently buying an I/A Lis-LHR-HKG on the 'special' offer. This was when Galileo was still alive and showed A availability on my chosen flight but I could not get BA Fare Explorer to come up with the right price. I called BA in Portugal who told me that whatever the online Galileo system showed, there were no A seats available on the relevant flight.

Dave_C

I've just checked again and the EUR1600/2000 J/F fare seems to be still available to EWR.

whmere

2,500 EUR is still awfully cheap. Perhaps there is no I on that flight available from BA reservations? Perhaps you have to go to a BA Holidays shop to get it? I've always found that Galileo or Sabre are more guides than anything. Some seats in some fare buckets are not available to some vendors. An example: I have in the past been able to get 'A' fare seats on BA when BA shows A0 sold out, by booking on a QF flight number.

NickB

Availability under a different airline code is a wholly different matter. The inventories are separate.
You do get variations between vendors (under the same airline code) under the same class fare but this is usually at the margin, when systems are not yet fully updated. It is not unusual to have I1 or I2 with one vendor, when another shows no availability.
If, however, a CRS shows I9, it is rather unusual for others to show no availability at all and suggest that something else is at issue there.