Revealed …. the peak and off-peak Avios redemption calendars for 2017

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• Simon says:

  15 Apr15 April 08:59

  Has this gotten better or worse? Seems to me that most of the year is now off-peak with the exception of school holidays.

  • Rob says:

    15 Apr15 April 09:08

    The same overall, I think

• harry says:

  15 Apr15 April 09:18

  Friday 26/5/17 looks another good one to pull a sickie 🙂 (Half term hols May/June.)

  Sorry to ask Q without doing my own research – can I book return flight 4/6/17 BA Avios RFS flight SIE (somewhere in Europe 🙂 ) – LHR – via Iberia Avios – for off-peak rate? Instead of via BA for peak? Do the redemption flights pop up on Iberia similarly to BA, ie T-355 days?

  • harry says:

    15 Apr15 April 09:22

    Just checked & our route is offered on the IB book a flight site, ie IB codeshare & operated by BA – sounds as if it’s bookable as a redemption?

    • harry says:

      15 Apr15 April 09:38

      OK I’m on the IB book a flight page, looking at my route 19/5/16 – it’s a BA flight

      IB is quoting 7500 Avios on 19/5/16 vs 6500 for 18/5/16

      ie IB is using BA’s peak/ non-peak calendar, not IB’s (BA has 19/5 as a peak day, IB has it non-peak

      so it appears I can’t do this?

      • Rob says:

        15 Apr15 April 11:11

        That is correct. Book an IB flight on ba.com and it uses the Iberia chart, book a BA flight on iberia.com and it switches to the BA calendar.

  • Simmo says:

    15 Apr15 April 10:11

    Guess its the same as BA’s stance that all other carriers are treated as PEAK.

• ankomonkey says:

  15 Apr15 April 09:23

  Making the entire summer holidays peak is really moody. Devaluation and now this makes the number of Avios I need annually unreachable without buying some. Ultimately, it drives me away from BA. It also makes achieving status less important. If only VS flew to more long haul destinations…

• Danksy says:

  15 Apr15 April 13:07

  Avios is a Quasi Currency. BA are simply replicating the principles of their core business.

  BA are a capitalist motivated organisation, therefore you can’t blame the BA management for wishing to maxmimise their (Avios) income at a time of peak demand; otherwise they would be letting their shareholders down.

  For what its worth I’m sure the same poor availability will be apparent for peak and off peak times on core routes; again helping them generate cash for shareholder distribution!

  • harry says:

    15 Apr15 April 13:34

    yep, anko doesn’t really have much of a point though not a problem if he wants a bit of a moan.

    You might as well argue that dynamic pricing is unfair…

    There’s not really that much difference between peak & non peak on short haul https://headforpoints.com/2015/07/27/british-airways-avios-redemption-pricing-by-route/

    and since you can use Avios + money, it’s just a matter of paying that little bit more (you don’t need to have the extra avios sitting in your a/c).

    I think the 4 + 2 seat availability promise is valuable enough to offset any gripes about pricing models designed to get closer to optimising revenue.

    • Genghis says:

      15 Apr15 April 15:20

      So you long at you get the 4 at t-355? 🙂

    • ankomonkey says:

      15 Apr15 April 20:51

      I need Avios for long haul in school holidays. Off peak represented good value to me and meant I could achieve what I want pretty much every year. BA have now taken that value away and pushed the requirement out of reach, especially since Tesco Clubcard earning opportunities are fewer and worse value where they do exist.

      I fully understand Danksy’s points on the commercial aspect, just that it hits me in the pocket and leads me to look for better value elsewhere. When my kids are older I will be able to consider ME3, ex-EU, etc. Right now the wife won’t have it!

• David says:

  15 Apr15 April 13:58

  I was hoping the peak/off-peak pricing would be an experiment which they later scrap.

  IMHO the only “peak” days should be the Public Holidays in the UK, perhaps +/- 3 days either side.

  Everything else is not peak, just a “normal” time to fly.

  • John says:

    15 Apr15 April 15:45

    Well, for Y tickets the “peak” price is just the “normal” price, and the “offpeak” is discounted from what it used to be between 2011-2015

    Of course for J both “normal” and “discounted” avios prices are increased from previously

    • harry says:

      15 Apr15 April 15:58

      Same point I was about to make. Off peak is just a nice discount to the old Avios pricing on my European route, so I’m pleased as punch. They certainly did not put the Avios cost up on peak (on my route, at least).

• Simon Schus says:

  15 Apr15 April 13:59

  Hi all,

  The GroupOn deal for Avios with Iberia has returned (seems basically the same as last time it was mentioned on HfP https://headforpoints.com/2015/12/16/buy-cheap-avios-on-groupon/). I’m posting here in case the deal helps anybody.

  Hopefully, the Avios will credit faster than last time. I had my points credited on Tuesday this week having purchased in January. The purchase took over 4 months.

  Simon.

  • harry says:

    15 Apr15 April 14:30

    Crunching the math to get best, decent amount + discount (5 Groupons) = 1 x 2000 + (4 x 4000) = total 18,000 avios. Cost EUR215

    You buy through IB Plustore. = 1075 Avios

    Total 19,075 Avios = 1.127c/ Avios = c. 0.9p/ Avios

    I’m out. Even if you add in your Amex MR points, you’re not going to make much difference to the cost.

    Are the 2000 Avios worth it?

    EUR19 = 2000 (Groupon) + 95 (IB Plustore) + 15 (MR) = 2110 Avios
    = 9c = 7.15p/ Avios

    Maybe 🙂

    Somebody had better check the math lol

    • harry says:

      15 Apr15 April 14:36

      Sorry obviously meant 0.9c = o.715p/ Avios 🙂

      What if you need 100K cheap Avios?

      EUR1295 = 100,000 (Groupon) + 6475 (IB Plustore) + 1030 (MR) = 107,505 Avios
      = 1.2c = 0.955p/ Avios

      We seen worse 🙂

      Doesn’t seem to tally with the % discount claimed by Groupon, odd

      • Lebron James says:

        15 Apr15 April 14:42

        U have been busy Harry Boy.

    • Genghis says:

      15 Apr15 April 15:27

      Not checked it over fully, harry, but I think you did mean 1.127c / avios or 0.899p / avios. Not too shabby but I’m not a buyer at that price

    • Worzel says:

      15 Apr15 April 16:06

      Harry, get your keyboard checked-out as clearly there’s a problem with the “S” tab.

      “Math” ? 🙂 .

      • harry says:

        15 Apr15 April 16:13

        heh heh

        you WILL see a lot of “bb”s as I spilt some coffee (or ‘something’)

        & completely destroyed my keyboard @ Xmas – red wine ISTR 🙂

  • Rob says:

    15 Apr15 April 18:30

    Oh no! 🙂

    Dare I risk writing about this? Although I did get mine ….

    • harry says:

      15 Apr15 April 18:38

      I got mine in full as well

      last time on IB/ Groupon we got (between my wife & myself) 100K @ not much worse than 0.7p thanks to the more generous Plustore promo

      but I also got a different 100K @ 1p (via HFP) & at the time I was very happy to stick that in the bank

      nothing wrong with 1p when you need to have enough for a 241 or indeed any redemption

      swings & roundabouts

      I reckon you’ve got too many good stories for tomorrow, famine —> feast

      • Andrew H says:

        15 Apr15 April 23:18

        I purchased another 2000 yesterday. My December purchase went through fine.

        Unfortunately I forgot to go through the Iberia Store this time, but it’s only 304 avios, so it’s not a massive error!

        It was easier going through the redemption process a second time. They have exactly the same confusing procedure as in December, but I remembered all the trouble with getting the code to appear on the right hand side of the page. For anyone who is stuck, I have written out a guide:

        “Once you’ve made your purchase, it will show up in your Groupon purchases as ‘processing’. Wait 5 or 10 minutes and check again (you should get an email to confirm that the Avios are ready).

        The ‘processing’ message should have disappeared and a link should appear in its place. Click it and you will be taken to a new page to redeem the Avios.

        On the left side there should be a blue button underneath a picture of an Iberia plane. Click the button and a pdf file will open in a new tab. At the top left there should be a security code and a coupon code. You will need these codes so make a note of them (ignore the ‘ref’ code).

        Close the pdf file. Towards the bottom of the previous page, there’s a set of instructions. In the first paragraph there should be a small link. Click it, and you’ll be taken to a new page with some fields to fill in.

        Add the security code, the coupon code, your email address, click the tick box, and hit the green ‘validate coupon’ button. The page will not change, but on the right hand side, your coupon details will appear.

        This is where the main problem lies. I HAD TO DO THIS TEN TIMES TO GET IT TO WORK. Same as last December. But it will eventually work, just be patient!

        When you can see your code details on the right, scroll down the page and click the blue ‘continue’ button (not the green one, which is to validate the coupon – you’ve already done it).

        You will be taken to a new page and prompted to enter your Iberia Plus number. Again, it took me ten attempts to do this, but it will eventually accept it!

        You should then get a confirmation message on the next page!”

        • harry says:

          16 Apr16 April 09:03

          thanks

• Sebastian says:

  15 Apr15 April 15:55

  This change is an absolute killer for me as a private school teacher 🙁

  • harry says:

    15 Apr15 April 16:03

    But why? Possibly only if you fly long haul business/ first, I think.

    Short haul peak Avios redemption requirements stayed the same as the standard ‘price’ before – and off peak was the introduction of a discounted Avios cost, ie nothing was more expensive & lots of dates got cheaper.

    What are your typical destinations?

    • Sebastian says:

      15 Apr15 April 17:24

      The US and Asia!

      • harry says:

        15 Apr15 April 17:46

        if you fly business or better, I know you’ll have been hard done by

        but if you fly eco, did the peak/ off peak change really affect you in long haul?

        as I said, in Europe it was simply the introduction of cheaper off peak avios redemptions

        in other words, if you fly eco, did eco long haul redemptions get more expensive in peak, or did peak stay the same and off peak get cheaper (same as Europe)?

        • Sebastian says:

          15 Apr15 April 21:27

          To be honest I just fly biz/first with my Avios. I recognise I could use my points for Eco, but that’s what I have my Virgin miles for as they’re better value. As for Europe bookings I just fly Easyjet and book the first row, while I get my lounge through my PP as I do not find CE that much different apart from the inflight meal and the possibility of not having the middle seat free.

• rams1981 says:

  15 Apr15 April 17:01

  I bought one of each groupon. Under 1p for me gets value as I usually redeem long haul on a 2 for 1.

  • harry says:

    15 Apr15 April 17:19

    nice one

    you can buy 5 in total, up to 5 of each type – except only allowed 1 of the 2000 deal

    have you redeemed successfully already? people got confused last time round because of the Spanish but it’s a case of ‘try, try & try again’ until you get the success message

    • rams1981 says:

      16 Apr16 April 23:46

      All went through fine first time and got confirmation emails. But nothing to indicate it tracked through Iberia store yet

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