All She Wrote

I've had a look on ITA Matrix for a late-ish booking for outbound late-ish May, inbound mid June, and have a couple of questions as I've not done a multi-city multi-class trip before.

1) I'm assuming the booking has to be made by phoning BA, or via travel agent? Since it cannot be done via the BA site as far as I'm aware.
2) I'd like to fly F outbound, inbound J. Outbound will be rev, Inbound there's some reward seats in J, so are these bookings eligible for post booking Avios upgrades? If so booking W and paying the tax difference and 17,500 Avios will save me a decent amount.

Multi-citying to avoid travelling back on a 52J

PETER01

In answer to your questions

1) Yes you will have to call for multi-city and mixed classes. I'd use BA and they are quite used to it but a TA can do it but should anything go wrong then you will have to deal with the TA. Personally, I prefer direct bookings with BA.

2) I booked a revenue fare, out in F and back in W which I then upgraded to J as there was availability. If there is availability to UuA then do that and the extra taxes from W to J is around £48. Just to be clear you can't combine a revenue fare (outbound) and reward fare (inbound) together if that's what you mean? It sort of reads that you'd book a one way revenue F fare (usually eye watering expensive!) and a W reward fare back then UuA which you can't do for the latter.

From the Dashboard:

Important:
UuAs can only be applied to tickets issued on 125 stock. In other words tickets issued by BA or BA registered travel agents with ticket numbers beginning 125. Tickets sold by Iberia and American Airlines are issued on different numbered stock and cannot be upgraded using Avios.

All She Wrote

Thanks very much for your help, both legs on BA metal and will do the booking via phone with BA so not anticipating problems

/thread

PETER01

If you can keep a booking simple then that's best in my humble view. Now, don't dilly dally and get on the phone before the availability is snapped up!

Enjoy your flights

Goldensunset

Sorry to jump on your thread op but looking for some help with doing this.
plans are to fly to mco (5/9/18) in economy and return from lax on (16/10/18) in cw. I have checked and there is availability to upgrade with avios from PE ( looking for 1seat). How do i work out how much this will cost in both cash and avios ? . Every time I try I get an error message. I know from above I will need to call Ba but would like to know what im talking about when I do. I can pay full cash for this at £1017 so just wanting to see how much it will save me and if it is worth it .
On another note there is availability on both 380 and 787 , which would everyone recommend and even suggestions on departure time would be helpfulas a first timer leaving the US from the west coast.

Thank you for your help

All She Wrote

If you ring them and just say you'd like to make a multi-city multi-fare booking. You then give them the details and they will give you a price. You'll be asking for WT outbound WT+ inbound, you can take care of the avios booking afterwards via MMB. The upgrade inbound from WT+ to CW will cost you £235.29 and 25,000 avios. I hope this helps.

To find out in the future, you can search for a reward booking, and you will pay the difference in cash and Avios between the WT+ fare and CW fare respectively. It's also worth noting you're travelling on a peak date and the cost of the upgrade in Avios differs to that from an off-peak date (it's actually slightly more expensive to upgrade on off peak dates at 30,000 avios).

Depending on your Wednesday plans you could get either flights back. However to me it looks like both flights from LAX to LHR in16th Oct are both A380s
Personally I'd be more inclined to get the later flight as I'd find it much easier to get some sleep when onboard. You'd want to eat dinner in the lounge a couple of hours before departure in that case.

FeedbirdNiner

The BA explanation is here: https://www.britishairways.com/en-gb...ing-with-avios


An upgrade with Avios consists of:

• a cash amount for the flights
• an Avios amount for the upgrade
• taxes, fees and carrier charges

The Avios amount required for the upgrade is based on the Avios costs for reward flights in the cabins you are upgrading from and to and will depend on whether your flight is scheduled on a peak or off-peak date. View the British Airways peak and off-peak calendar to check.

The formula is:

Avios for the cabin you wish to upgrade to - Avios for the cabin you make your booking in = Avios required to upgrade one way

Here's an example for a peak one-way upgrade from London to New York, upgrading from premium economy (World Traveller Plus) to business (Club World):

Club World: 60,000 Avios - World Traveller Plus: 40,000 Avios = 20,000 Avios to upgrade

To work it out, you can use our reward flight calculator or we'll work it out for you when you're ready to book your upgrade.

Goldensunset

Thank you both for your quick replies. I thought the BA280 departing at 4.55pm was showing as a 787?
Would I be able to choose BA1509 showing as an american 777 ? Are either of these better than the 380. Otherwise I will pick the later 380 and do as all she wrote suggests and eat in lounge then straight to sleep
I have flown on BA 777 in club from mco if the american would be the same?

All She Wrote

These are the only direct flights from LAX to LHR with reward availability in J on 16/10/18 as of right now.



If you had decide to go for a cash booking, I'd take the 19:50 AA 777 as their J is far better than BA J, followed by the 16:55 787 due to the cabin being far quieter, followed by the 21:35 A380.

Goldensunset

Thanks again , ita matrix gives me the price of £709 for my wt(mco) and wt+(lax) plus the £235.29 giving me price of £944.29 for the upgrade now I just need to decide if its better to pay the £1030 that matrix is quoting for the wt and cw( aa777). Think it looks like a no brainer as 25000 avios for £86 doesnt seem good value!

All She Wrote

When I look for a return the difference in taxes is actually only £50, you'd still be getting less than 1p per Avios so it's still not the greatest option for redemption. Since you're booking a return fare I'd imagine that you'll pay the £50 difference not the £235.29 difference (which is for a one way reward flight).