Hello all, I am long for sine advice regarding my BA Avios and how to spend them on an upgrade. I have about 70000 avios and my partner has 30000. I also have an Amex gold card so throw in about 20000 avios per year. I'm looking to fly business or first over the next couple of years for a big trip to say e.g Bangkok. The trouble is we fly long haul a lot and often get great economy deals (Sri Lanka in April with Etihad for £450 return and Bangkok in December with Qatar for £340 return). All from EDI. I begrudge using my BA avios for business class when you need about 100000 return per person and still have to pay about £1k each in BA fees. I've heard people say transfer them to Iberia, etc. but have no idea what's for the best. Based on this info, can anyone advise me how I go about utilising my points for a long haul trip. I also don't care about the starting point, the airline, or the stopovers. Thanks in advance.
A better redemption of your avios points can actually be in Economy (dare we utter that dirty word) if you want to make your avios go as much as four times further with about half the taxes than biz. Might be worth you also keeping any eye on BA sale fares to your chosen destinations and upgrading using your avios on class of seat above. IB is better valuse of redeeming avios but usually will require you to reposition outside of the UK first.
When based outside of London and going to Asia, keep doing what you are doing. (i.e. pay great fares during sales from the Middle East airlines) Even if you use Avios, you would have to pay APD and surcharges that are going to come close to those paid fares. And, let's face it, it's much more comfortable and convenient to fly straight from EDI to the Middle East and connect to Asia there. (instead of Heathrow and a very long flight in Economy) Now, the next time you want to go to North America or South America, you can use your Avios to fly on Iberia or Aer Lingus. I wrote a blog post about combining your Avios. https://insideflyer.co.uk/2016/12/how-to-combine-your-avios/ If you don't already have an Iberia Plus account, you should open one today and try to credit some activity to the account. Then it will be ready for whenever you want to use it. I also wrote a blog post about some of the best ways of using Avios. Perhaps you will find it useful. https://insideflyer.co.uk/2016/12/use-avios-effectively-guide-beginners/ Anyhow, we try to be friendly and helpful here at InsideFlyer, so let us know if you need any specific help. Quite often somebody has written a beginner's guide so a bit of searching might also help you find useful advice.
Hi sfo - welcome to InsideFlyer UK! Yep, for Biz Class you'll probably want to check out transferring to Iberia and then redeeming on Iberia: https://insideflyer.co.uk/2016/10/best-value-avios-business-class-sweetspot-america-isnt-think/. Air Berlin to Abu Dhabi (37,500 Avios and a handful of tax from Berlin in Business Class each way) might also be worth considering.
Thanks for all your comments. I am considering applying for the BA Premium Plus Amex card to take advantage of the companion voucher. Do you think it's worth it? Am I right in thinking you can only pay with avios on the companion deal and still have to pay tax? I'm beginning to think all this hard work for miles is ridiculous. Even more outraged that my nephew just got upgraded to business from ORD-LHR yesterday because he was late and overbooked. Oh, the injustice!!!
Many people swear by the Amex 2-for-1 voucher, but you definitely have to pay two sets of taxes and surcharges. It is certainly better than nothing and definitely helps with the accumulation of Avios, but at Inside Flyer we mostly guide people in the direction of Iberia and Aer Lingus, where you can get return rewards in Business Class for 100K Avios or less... It can be hard work collecting and spending Avios, but I'm fairly confident that you won't want to go back to flying in Economy once you've done a long haul flight or two in Business or First.
The BAPP 241 definitely can be worth it, but as Mr Piggie says - it's certainly 2 lots of taxes and 'surcharges', which with BA is a very significant chunk of change. Indeed, it can all seem a bit tricky when you're getting started with Points/Miles but you soon forget all that as you lie down and stretch out ON A PLANE for the first time with a glass of decent champagne next to you! We are here to help make learning about Miles as easy as possible, so any questions at all just let us know! Lucky nephew! - I think I've been upgraded once in my entire life...
I love the BA Premium Plus card. Over the past few years we've had 2 x First to GIG and HKG. We've got SIN/PVG lined up next year in F & C. On top of that we've done LIN & FCO in Club. Yes, it takes a lot of time to save the points, and yes you have to pay the taxes, but if you're going to use a credit card, you may as well get something out of it... for us it's Avios.
Many people are unaware of the BAEC benefits and if you are just trying to rack up points quick for a specific purpose then you're unlikely to see the benefits. Better off accruing as part of a normal spend and using it to reward yourself with more attractive business class or first tickets when you can
