[Anonymous]

[TiredOldHack]

Just costed out another BA flight into Buenos Aires. LHR to EZE. Club World class,on my selected dates, works out at just under £3000 return.

Flying from Schipol, and changing planes at Heathrow for exactly the same BA flight out, works out at £1740, so for two people, a saving of about £2500. OK, so I’d have to factor in a flight from the UK to Schipol, but that’s hardly expensive, and there’ll be a few hours’ extra travelling time, and I’d have to get the agent to book the onward flight from Buenos Aires to Santiago as well, as a proper connection, but the saving is immense.

Does anyone else here do this sort of thing on a regular basis? Tips?

[MartynSinclair]

Regularly, but sssshhhhhhhh or everyone will know!

(from Milan, Dusseldorf, Paris, to name a few)

[Binman62]

If you want to save money try ITA matrix. It can search multiple points of origin to source you the best fare and you can add LHR in order that you can see at a glance what the level of saving is!
The search can be by route or by carrier, even by alliance. Takes a bit of time to work out the entries but worth it. I have saved more than you did on just 1 club seat recently.
Other sites such as orbitz kayak and even opodo can all help. Saves you having to change the country page on BA..com all the time.

[TiredOldHack]

Matrix ITA wants to charge me $4500 for the AMS-LHR flight. I sort of lost heart after that.Orbitz was slightly pricier than I’d found on Expedia. Kayak was interesting.

[Senator]

BA sale exEUR still on until midnight CET, Monday. Savings to be made. I am about to book ARN-LHR, LCY-JFK, JFK-LHR, and LHR-ARN with roughly 20hrs stopover in London allowing for two full business days in the UK, and all for a cool £1300 return over Easter. I guess the LCY-JFK gives me 180 TPs so I may have a BAEC Gold at some point this year.

EIther way, the “normal” or none-sales BA fare (30 days in advance, none-flex) from ARN to NYC comes in around £1600. Only cheaper alternative from ARN is now Iceland Air which is to be avoided.

[VintageKrug]

I think the title should read APD (Air Passenger Duty) as APT is more Tennis-related.

You can access the fares at http://www.ba.com and if not resident on the Continent, you should simply change the country of residence box to see the sale homepage.

[TiredOldHack]

OK, here’s a question. Take my putative routing plan, which would start me at, an deliver me back to, Schipol. What would happen if, on the return leg, I simply disembarked at LHR and went home to London, effectively throwing away the last leg to AMS? Obviously, I’d have to do it with carry-on luggage only and nothing checked in the hold. I suppose also there’d be a “final call for passenger..”, but as there’d be no baggage loaded, the aircraft wouldn’t be delayed.

Or I could even call the departure desk from my mobile and say I can’t make the flight.

What could the airline do? Are there any penalties they could impose?

In fact, what if I didn’t use the starting flight to AMS? I’d already be checked onto the British Airways LHR-EZE flight and could, in theory, simply rock up at LHR for it. In that instance, I suppose I’d be liable to the unpaid APD (here I give a nod to Vintage Krug….), but I have a feeling that there’d be something in the small print to prevent me doing that.

Again, can anyone give chapter and verse?

[VintageKrug]

If Chapter and Verse is what you really want, then try google as there’s oodles of conflicting information out there.

The summary is that it’s technically against the fare conditions to dump your final sector, and technically airlines could charge you a penalty (or other censure such as loss of miles earned) for doing so.

In practice this rarely happens for the occasional violation.

Start dumping your final sector weekly on your Club World commute to NYC, and Revenue Protection will be onto you faster than John Prescott chasing an ice cream van. You could see miles earned cancelled, your account suspended, and/or charges levied for the re-ticketed flights (the latter being the least likely to happen).

You MUST MUST MUST take the first sector; if you don’t, your ticket will be cancelled with no comeback.

It’s really easy to actually use your final sector simply by taking an extended layover in the UK (although this does now attract APD, which might defeat the object), and remember your final sector doesn’t have to be back to your city of origin, so use it for an open jaw to another city you might consider taking a weekend break in, or for the start of your next exEUR fare.

Cue MartynSinclair berating the iniquity of it all…:

[MartynSinclair]

VIntageKrug – the only iniquity is that BA charge us Brits more.
for flights originating from UK. I accept that that is BA’s model.

So conversely, I take advantage of the ex-Europe fares by living in Europe, as far as my BAEC is concnered and earning more tier points and miles for my trips. Result, every 4th or 5th flight is free (bearing in mind the additional mileage offers that appear during the year).

“Berating the iniquity” – you gotta be kidding VK, more like praising the system!

[VintageKrug]

I thank you.

[DisgustedofSwieqi]

Whilst empathising with Binman62 and others who feel ripped off, I do like BA’s policy.

– markedly lower fares
– silver for 400 points/ gold for double

But I think that Martyn Sinclair should be banned from these advantages, as he is not really ‘Johhny Foreigner’ and he should accept his licking with a stoic British stiff upper lip, as he pays lots more money to subsidise my seat 😉 That’s how the product improvement in CE can be financed!

TiredOldHack

If you try to board at Heathrow, instead of Amsterdam, no doubt your reservation will have been cancelled, yu will be denied boarding and a replacement flight to/from EZE will be very expensive, even if there is a free seat.

[TiredOldHack]

Yeah, I sort of guessed something like that would be SOP. Just idly speculating, and I’m sure I’m not the first and equally sure that the airlines have this base well covered 🙂

[MartynSinclair]

DS – it really depends on your defintion of ‘Johhny Foreigner’.

However, if you do feel that strongly, I would suggest that you buy 1 British Airways (or even an IAG) share and raise this matter, with WW at the next AGM.

Just think, with VintageKrugs connections, we could question the board one after the other.

[VintageKrug]

I think you meant to write VintageKrug’s connections.

Isn’t it time for your medicine now?

[Author]

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