Flying to U.K in September.Would appreciate some help.
 

Since I don't fly too much, I've never been one to really go all in to learning the rules etc for every airline.
So I have some limited knowledge about United and I was hoping that others could share their expertise.

I'll be flying to U.K (London) in September for a month and as far as I can see, these are my options.

EWR-LHR . United. 60k Economy roundtrip.
100k Business. No saver availability.

BOS-DUB. Aer Lingus. 25k Economy
50k Business.

My final destination is Leicester. And I could fly from Dublin to East Midlands for about 50 Euros and it's so much closer to Leicester.

Actually either way would work...I'd be spending the same amount of $$ from London to Leicester as I would from Dublin to East Midlands to Leicester.
But on the flip side, I was planning on visiting Ireland either way, so therefore I could do it at the start of the trip...

Are there any other cheap options that I don't know about?

I live in Hartford, and therefore would prefer United, because I could get a stopover and therefore add BDL into the mix for free.

But I'm just a novice and would appreciate your expert suggestions/help.

EDIT: One thing that I forgot to mention. I will probably have two bags with me and if I want to avoid paying a king's ransom for the second one, I'll have to take that into consideration while choosing my flight.

At a high level, I would go for option 2. 50K miles seems to be a very good use of miles for business (especially if you are using BA Avios):

Some side blogs about that route:
http://boardingarea.com/blogs/onemil...on-aer-lingus/

http://boardingarea.com/blogs/onemil...ton-to-dublin/

Concur.

Plus you avoid those pesky taxes charged for flying premium cabin into LHR

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

No pesky taxes for flying into London; only for flying out.

And if LON-DUB-BOS is booked on a single ticket with less than 24 hours in DUB, then the UK APD will apply based on the BOS destination. For that reason, I would think about doing the DUB stopover on the return, not on the outbound.

So I could do a one way into LHR using Avios and there wouldn't be any taxes?

As for DUB-EMA... It's not going to be part of my award ticket at all, so I'm not worried.
If I decide to do BOS-DUB return using Avios, then I'll be using Ryan Air (or something similar) for DUB-EMA.
Either way I plan to stay in Ireland for a few days.

So that's the general consensus? Avios on Aer Lingus for 50k in business?

No other options?

50K Avios for EI's business class is about as good as you're going to get. The two cheapest other options for TATL travel have both been seasonal and involve Y travel: AA's 40K trips to Europe from mid-October to mid-May and US's 35K (30K with the US Mastercard) to Europe in January and February. The US option is going away. Just be aware that the EI business product, although well reviewed, is an angled lie-flat seat.

Keep in mind that a lot of the airlines that fly into and out of DUB that offer cheap fares, like Ryanair, will kill you on luggage fees, especially if you're going to need to check a bag or two. Those LCCs tend to make up the revenue lost through fares on baggage fees (and bunches of other fees).

For that reason, I wouldn't rule out EI or any other full-service carrier on a paid ticket into EMA if that's an option.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

"So I could do a one way into LHR using Avios and there wouldn't be any taxes?"

The "taxes" -- properly so-called -- would be minimal. But if you redeemed Avios for TATL flights on AA or BA metal, the "surcharges" would be enormous.

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

"As for DUB-EMA... It's not going to be part of my award ticket at all, so I'm not worried."

OK; just make sure that, if you're not going to stop over in DUB on your return, you leave plenty of extra time to make the connection in DUB. Because you will be traveling on separate tickets, you will not be protected if you should miss your DUB-BOS flight due to delay or cancellation of your EMA-DUB flight.

I'm going to jump in on this one, since I have a very similar question and the thread is new. (I'm a bit of a newbie to the forum, so hope I'm following the proper etiquette).
Our plan is to fly ord-dub using avios on EI. Our eventual destination is Bhx. ( or somewhere relatively near. We will rent a car so London, east midlands, maybe other would be acceptable.)
So, how to get from dub to bhx? We don't want to get stuck in dub if our first flight is delayed and causes us to miss the second. If we use avios for dub-bhx on Aer lingus we won't get hit with the apd or fuel surcharges, but would on the return bhx-dub-ord if we stopover <24 hrs?
So, reading this thread and extrapolating a bit, it sounds like this approach would work with minimal fees...
Ord-dub-bhx (2 week Stay..). Bhx-dub (stopover 24+ hours) - ord. All using BA avios on Aer lingus.
Does that make sense to get us back and forth without getting hit with huge fuel surcharges or departure taxes?
Thanks!

Wirelessly posted (BlackBerry: BlackBerry8530/5.0.0.1030 Profile/MIDP-2.1 Configuration/CLDC-1.1 VendorID/417)

Reportedly, intra-European award flights are tough to get on EI. And check out the fuel surcharges on DUB-BHX-DUB EI flights: they might be higher than the surcharges on EI's TATL flights.

But yes: adding a stopover of at least 24 hours in DUB on the return will eliminate the higher APD for long-distance travel.

Another option to consider that might save you some $$$ is to book a Reward Flight Saver on BA metal for BHX-LON-DUB. Your travel time will obviously be greater, but the cost savings might make it worthwhile.

You seem to be correct on both counts there. Time to regroup and consider other options. I don't want to add on a leg with a LCC because we will have bags to check and that will add a significant amount of cash on. There seems to be very poor availability getting from dub to the uk on avios.

Correction, the poor availability is only on EI. Plenty of space on BA metal, but I'm worried about what would happen if our ord-dub flight was delayed and caused us to miss the next flight on BA to lhr.

To be honest, I'm now seriously confused between the two methods.

Here are the pros and cons.

BOS-DUB-BOS

Pros.
-Fly Business class for cheap.
-Get extra baggage allowance (Important to me)

Cons.
-Have to travel from Hartford to Boston.
-Time wasted (a few hours) for flight to EMA
-Cost of travel from DUB to Leicester (on a tight budget)
-Repeat inconvenient process in reverse on the way back.
-Was planning on saving avios for short trips across USA for residency interviews.

Total travel cost: 25k or 50k + roughly £350 ($530) expenses to and from Leicester.(surchages+flight to/from East Midlands+transportation to/from Leicester) + expenditure in getting from Hartford to Logan Airport (Boston) which would be roughly another $100.

________________________________________________

BDL-EWR-LHR-EWR-BDL

Pros.
-Fly directly from BDL.
-Less time wasted.
-Convenient travelling to and from Leicester
-Saves on my Avios.

Cons.
-Will have to travel economy to save on UA miles.
-Even economy costs more than Avios Business class.
-Will have to spend 100k to travel in Business class.
-Poor Business class availability.
-If travelling in coach, will have to sacrifice luggage allowance.

Total travel cost : 60k or 100k + roughly £300 ($460) in expenses (surcharges+travel to and from Leicester.)

Sorry to hi-jack this thread but I was born in Leicester (the op's ultimate(!) destination). Good luck there (or good curries anyway). Gotta say it's not my favorite place on the planet - I still think of it as a working class city with no work and no class.

My only reason to go there is because that's where my girlfriend lives (and studies...PhD in molecular genetics at the University of Leicester :D )

I was at Sam's Club recently and began chatting with the manager because I recognized his Brit accent. Guess where he was from?
You're not going to believe this...Leicester!!