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Breaking: Aer Lingus redemptions now bookable on avios.com – but Boston loophole closed

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The Aer Lingus Aer Club programme launched this morning.

At the same time, Aer Lingus reward availability has been loaded into avios.com.

You do NOT need to be an AerClub member to book these.  You can log in with your usual avios.com UK account details and book.

This is the first time ever that Aer Lingus awards have been bookable online with Avios.

aerclub-membership-cards

The good news ….

Some rewards are down in price.   Before yesterday, all Aer Lingus rewards were treated as ‘peak date’ pricing in the same way as any other BA partner airline.

Aer Lingus now has peak and off-peak pricing.  Apart from Easter, Christmas and the summer, the rest of the year is off-peak.

The bad news …..

Taxes have gone up.  A return flight in Business Class from Dublin to New York used to have taxes of around £75 return.  It will now cost you £200.

However, if you travel off peak, the reduction in the Avios required would mean you are no worse off.

It is also £300 cheaper than a British Airways Club World redemption from London.

The worse news …..

Dublin to Boston SHOULD be in Zone 4.  Until yesterday, it cost 75,000 Avios for a return business class flight from Dublin to Boston – which is what you expect to pay for a partner airline flight of 2,986 miles.

Aer Lingus has now moved Boston 14 miles to the west.  Dublin to Boston has been moved into Zone 5 which means it now costs 100,000 Avios off-peak and 120,000 Avios peak – the same price as Dublin to New York.

Other thoughts

The real win would be if Avios allowed you to use Lloyds Avios Rewards upgrade vouchers on Aer Lingus.  That would be an exceptional result as you could get their excellent new business class seat for the Avios of economy, as Aer Lingus does not have premium economy.  We need to see if this happens or not.

More on this story tomorrow.

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Category

Aer Lingus and AerClub

Comments (71)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • wetboy1uk says:
    1 Dec1 December 12:19

    Can’t seem to get any flights for DUB-MIA or DUB-MCO any ideas?

    • @mkcol says:
      1 Dec1 December 13:22

      I did a test of DUB-MCO-DUB in J as I have LGW-MCO-FLL in J booked with a 2-4-1.

      EI was available 10/10/16 out & 21/10/16 inbound
      250,000 Avios + ~£450 taxes etc for 2 adults

      BA is booked 11/10/16 out & 21/10/16 inbound
      ~114,000 Avios (can’t quite remember as it’s come out a household account so I don’t see the full amount) + ~£1100 taxes etc for 2 adults

      So if I didn’t have a 2-4-1 but was Avios rich then EI could be a good way to go.

  • Andrew H says:
    1 Dec1 December 12:38

    OK, I just checked the economy avios pricing for DUB_BOS. It’s still only 13k one way! That’s some good news at least!

    • Brendan says:
      1 Dec1 December 12:39

      Thats only for off-peak. 20k for most of the year

      • Andrew H says:
        1 Dec1 December 12:47

        So I see. Damn.

        40,000 avios plus £200 taxes and charges for a return? Oh dear…

    • sprout7 says:
      1 Dec1 December 12:44

      Yes I noticed that. However, the taxes for economy seem to be £100 one way and £176 return – only £24 less than business.

  • Matt S says:
    1 Dec1 December 12:49

    Just called BA to make a dummy booking..

    DUB-BOS economy return 26000 avios + approx £90 in taxes and as its aer lingus there is no £15 telephone booking fee. Rather than the £178 taxes shown for same booking if booking via avios.com

    I checked availability using Avios.com.

    Seems like they’re adding an extra £100ish of taxes to online avios.com bookings. Unless if taxes have gone up they have yet to hit the telephone sales yet..?

  • Frankie says:
    1 Dec1 December 12:53

    How come the tax has gone up? Isn’t tax something determined by a government and doesn’t just go up because a company’s business or IT processes have changed?

    • David says:
      1 Dec1 December 13:30

      With BA (and IAG), “taxes” is a convenient misnomer that they consistently continue to pedal for exorbitant surcharges that they add to award bookings (for the simple reason that they can). For example, AA charges about $43 in taxes and charges for a one-way business class award flight from Dublin to the US, compare that what is discussed above.

    • Brendan says:
      1 Dec1 December 13:30

      It is fixed, But within ‘taxes’ they will often put a ‘Carrier Surcharge’ amount (they used to call it a ‘fuel surcharge’ until the price of fuel dropped like a stone so they needed another excuse). This amount can be basically anything they want to jack up the price of every redemption. BA have always added it to their flights, whether booked with avios or using miles from any other partner or OW member.

  • Lady London says:
    1 Dec1 December 13:23

    Funny how whole cities can be picked up and moved 14 miles to the West.

    • Phillip says:
      1 Dec1 December 13:41

      True, but there are examples of midhaul flights stretching over 2,000 miles that have been kept within the RFS bands! Swings and roundabouts!

      • Rob says:
        1 Dec1 December 14:09

        South Africa should actually be in a higher band but BA squeezes it in to a cheaper one, probably because of the Avios relationship in SA.

        • pauldb says:
          1 Dec1 December 14:55

          Santiago (7239mi) has dropped from SYD pricing 150 e/w peak J to the SIN band 105k e/w. Either that on the narrow 6500-7000 band has been stretched out a little.

  • paul says:
    1 Dec1 December 13:42

    Can’t find one single J class seat anywhere!
    This could be a god send for us living in Northern Ireland.

  • James says:
    1 Dec1 December 13:50

    Sorry guys, OT – Etihad discount codes, historically how often do they show up? Annoyingly I missed the 30% one this month and I’m trying to get a business class ticket to Perth. I’m trying to get the fare as close to 2k as I can. (Or lower!)

  • John says:
    1 Dec1 December 15:01

    Can we now get our free 250 points that we pre signed up for?

    • Scottydogg says:
      1 Dec1 December 16:47

      I was wondering this as well , ive not had an email from them either to say they have gone live , perhaps it will come in the next few days ?

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