LGW-MAD-HAV - two tickets
 

Four of us are booked on MAD-HAV-MAD-MAN in November. It was significantly cheaper to drop the outbound sector from the UK to MAD.

We are assessing our options for getting to MAD. For various reasons we are likely to travel LGW-MAD on the same day as the MAD-HAV. MAD-HAV departs at 1620.

We have a few options for LGW-MAD.

1) Iberia - lands 1415. I understand that even though we are on separate tickets our bags will be through checked.

http://help.iberia.com/frequently_as...ith-stopovers/

2) Air Europa - lands 1335
3) Norwegian - lands 1350
4) Easyjet - lands 1100

Option 4 seems like the most sensible.

Is there any protection offered in the event of a mis connect with option 1 ?

Going to MAD the evening before isn't possible unfortunately.

Throughchecking to final destination with separate IB tickets doesn't work. The last time I tried to do it, I was told that the system doesn't permit it (more likely employees don't know how to do it) and I'm not the only one in FT with similar experience. If you have to get your luggage from the belt, two hour connection is very risky as IB baggage handling at MAD is very slow. Quite often priority bags arrive 40 minutes after arrival at MAD...

Thanks miikkak. I've discovered option 2 includes a checked bag which makes it appealing.

So I think it's become a choice between 2 and 4. I don't fancy the early start for option 4 though !

Option 4 is the most sensible with a good insurance policy covering you for missed connection just in case. You never know what can happen. Strikes and weather delays especially in LGW in November. I have been caught out before with fog.

Be aware that flights 2-4 arrive at a different terminal, so you'll have to take the bus to T4 for IB check-in.

To avoid delays, you will want the flight option with the highest probability of the airplane physically being at LGW, so that delays aren't built up over the day. i.e. even if the weather is fine at LGW, if the airplane is coming in from elsewhere you might still have weather delay issues.

Air Europa will be a MAD-based plane I presume, so you'd have to trust that the plane also leaves MAD on schedule and doesn't run into air traffic restrictions coming into LON. I would definitely avoid Norwegian since surely there will be a flight or two squeezed into the morning for that airplane.

The Easyjet plane would probably have been sat overnight at LGW, in which case it's the likeliest to get out in the morning relatively promptly.

Thanks craigthemif. I think I'm reluctantly going to go for the 0735 Easyjet departure since as you say that should be sat in LGW overnight and be "ready" to go without any constraints of an inbound sector.

Just to reiterate from my recent experience: through-checking a bag can be difficult on multiple IB tickets. I was informed this past weekend that since I had already checked in for my onward segment, they could not tag the bag through, and they could not figure out how to undo the check-in. I'm not sure if that was really the case, but the employee (a contractor at an outstation) seemed knowledgeable enough and tried for at least 10 minutes to force it though.

In the end, my first segment was severely delayed, ran from T4S to T4 to try and get my bag from the conveyor, which hadn't even been turned on after 20 minutes of waiting, before I gave up and dashed back to T4S. Still don't have the bag.

Moral of the story, leave yourself plenty of time in case things do not go as planned at the airport.

We've actually come to the decision that we will go to MAD the evening before we are due to take the long haul flight. With a later afternoon departure from MAD we think a 0735 departure from LGW would become very tiring.

Appreciate all of the input from fellow posters

Did you call to associate the two bookings in advance? I have a similar situation coming up - nested a ticket to London into the stopover on my return - TLV-MAD-JFK-MAD//MAD-LHR-MAD//MAD-TLV.

Before I booked, I checked I was within the MCTs and called IB to confirm that not only would they be fine with checking through my bags to and from London, but that my connection would be protected. They absolutely assured me that both would be fine as I had called and the two bookings had been associated with each other. I'm not sure if being OWE (BA Gold) and on a business ticket made any difference but I doubt it.

No, I wasn't aware this was possible (or necessary).

I'm not convinced it is actually necessary for through-checking luggage. I think it's supposed to be standard that they do this on an all-OneWorld itinerary.

But from what I understood, Iberia protecting the connection is not a given unless you have made the association in advance, and then (they say - hope this is not tested!) it is assured.

Oh, one more thing - they also told me in advance that I had to buy both tickets through Iberia directly to be given the misconnect protection.

So it turns out I did have to test whether IB would look after me in a misconnect or similar situation. They cancelled my MAD-TLV afternoon flight and rebooked me on the overnight, meaning a 7 hour layover in Madrid, and a very short red-eye.

Given my problem on the outbound with an equipment change from mid-haul to short-haul, I didn't want to just bring up the LHR-MAD to cut the layover time and then rely on them keeping to the A340 l/h they have allocated to the overnight that day to accommodate the bounced pax.

Instead I asked them to give me an invol rerouting on the direct BA167 LHR-TLV, giving me most of a day in London and landing 20 mins ahead of the original schedule!

Hope this is a useful tip - definitely worth associating the bookings to ensure protection. Now to see if I can still get the TPs credited from my original routing...

A very good choice. It is a short distance to the centre of town and some very reasonable hotels...even if you want to stay in Barajas, it may be cheap but the Ibis works with a shuttle connectuon every 30 minutes for no cost....also there is a square in Barajas that hosts a few tapas bars/eating establishments that are only 10 minutes if that from hotel. There are also naturally other hotels available at varying costs.

Thanks for the tip about the Ibis. I will check it out.

I had a layover in Madrid once a few years back, also no time to get downtown and back, and stayed at the Hotel Don Luis in Barajas. Small family-run place, but very friendly and pleasant, cost about 30 euros a night I think. No shuttle bus but I recall that I caught a local bus to the square 50 yards away. Had a quick glance now and reviews still seem to be good.