When did BA hike the taxes on long-haul US economy redemptions?

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• Andrew (@andrewseftel) says:

  7 Oct7 October 07:55

  I imagine that high-demand routes like CPT, SEZ and MLE remain reasonable value vs BA pricing, but need to weigh up against cheaper indirect routings as well.

• Michael C says:

  7 Oct7 October 08:04

  Yes, I looked at D.C. on points a few weeks ago (to avoid the obligatory Sat. night stay). The charges for points (econ.) were about 40GBP less than a new ticket!

• Nate1309 says:

  7 Oct7 October 08:15

  How do these prices compare with the Avios part pay?

  • the real harry1 says:

    7 Oct7 October 09:10

    depends which one you mean?

    i) Pay with cash, get discount with Avios
    ii) Pay with Avios, reduce Avios requirement by paying partly with cash

    (ii) is consistently allowing you to ‘buy’/ substitute Avios requirement at ‘cost’ of 0.75-0.8p. Surprisingly a lot of people here don’t seem to get it, despite Anna & I going on about it – this is one of the very easiest ways to ‘buy’ Avios for 0.8p just by doing next to nothing, yet the comments have always indicated that even quite savvy commentators here think we’re talking about burning Avios @ 0.8p – the exact opposite! (Caveat – only applies to HBO/ Economy/ Premium Economy fares – math doesn’t stack up for Business.)

    • the real harry1 says:

      7 Oct7 October 09:42

      Sorry – doesn’t include HBO fares, just RFS Economy, LH Economy & LH Premium Economy

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Oct7 October 16:58

        Raffles tbh I can’t understand why you don’t cover this – it’s not a trick to keep hidden in case it gets stopped – it’s just BA standard offer on Avios redemptions – probably half the people here don’t get it judging by the comments – well, only Anna & myself have ever made comments that would suggest we understand it lol 🙂

        You might consider it too obvious – as would I in a parallel universe – but clearly many folks don’t understand what we’re talking about

        ‘Buying’ sometimes large quantities of Avios for 0.75-0.8p without leaving the comfort of our chairs

      • Genghis says:

        7 Oct7 October 17:46

        I’m sure even the man himself didn’t really get it last time we discussed it

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Oct7 October 17:56

        apologies, Genghis, that makes 3 of us 🙂

        some people only fly Business/ First so this would not be of interest!

      • Genghis says:

        7 Oct7 October 17:58

        Need a search function to find it. Lol. Not easy on the mobile

      • Rob says:

        7 Oct7 October 18:23

        Point taken. Will deal with it 🙂

      • Anna says:

        7 Oct7 October 18:37

        I did a few comparisons recently, you have to choose flights which BA can charge a cash premium for as they fly the only (or only direct) route. Though it doesn’t always follow, e.g. it’s a good deal to Bermuda, but not to Turks and Caicos, even though BA have the only direct flights to both from the UK.

    • AndyR says:

      8 Oct8 October 07:39

      I get it too Harry but 0.8p isnt always offered. Bought an RFS to Prague the other day and it worked out at 1.13 thereabouts to buy them which is not worth it.

      Any idea how BA decide? Is it based on distance? Prague is zone 1 so maybe why?

• Paul says:

  7 Oct7 October 08:16

  Please stop referring to BAs rip off charges as Taxes it lets them off the hook
  APD is thevthe only tax paid and it accounts for a relatively small percentage of the vcharges levied. Heathrow airport take about £35 the US airport and government take much the same and BA fees make up the bulk.
  For example I have just booked a CAI HNL ticket in J for £1288 of which £560 is fees and BAs fee is £360!!!!!!! This is on a 9 sector ticket.
  BA complain about UK APD which is high but until they reduce their fees and credit card charges why should the government lower APD. BA fees are a much greater impediment to travel than any tax.

  • callum says:

    7 Oct7 October 08:24

    BA’s fees are just an accounting practice and are part of the fare. It doesn’t really matter to a normal ticket whether the fare is £10 and fee £490, or the fare is £500 and the fee is £0. I hardly see how it could be an “impediment to travel”.

    • Paul says:

      7 Oct7 October 09:50

      An accounting pracrice? Hmmm, no it’s a fee separate from the fare and charged in redemptions as well as cash fares. Calling it anything other than a rip off fee simply perpetrates this banking accounting tosh. It’s a rip off fee and if removed would reduce fares. If included in the fare would reduce the costs of redemptions. The consumer needs transparency and accounting Del Boy practices ain’t transparent.

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Oct7 October 10:01

        no offence but pretty naïve to think it would reduce fares – if the surcharge were somehow made illicit, it would almost certainly just get added back in equal measure to the fare

        your only hope would be if BA considered on some routes that it was important to show up in search engines/ Expedia etc as a competitive fare compared to alternative carriers and did away with the extra revenue completely – but now we’re really in la-la land

      • callum says:

        7 Oct7 October 17:10

        No, it’s an accounting practice. Why you think “accounting practice” means it’s not a rip-off or not negative I have no idea…

        As TRH1 says, it will not cause fares to fall – period. It would possibly cause redemption fees to fall, though I would imagine they’ll come up with a way to get around that (e.g. increase avios redemption rates, introduce co-pays etc.).

      • Anna says:

        7 Oct7 October 18:39

        They can charge what they want – it’s a condition of using your avios. I try to think of avios redemptions as very heavily discounted fares – I don’t get as mad that way!

    • RussellH says:

      7 Oct7 October 12:05

      BA started breaking out airport fees etc ( I do not know if they are still called ‘Passenger Service Charges’ – PSC) last century so that their headline pricing did not look totally out of line with the easyJet / Ryanair competition, which at the time had always done that. People will remember the £5 single fares which became £55 after all the extra fees were added.

      BA etc. then quickly realised that this was also a brilliant ploy when redeeming frequent flyer points – they were still getting some cash in for themselves.

      Airlines have been banned from breaking out these various bits and pieces for cash fares, but there has been no pressure to legislate against it for frequent flyer tickets.After all, most people do travel on cash tickets.

• the real harry1 says:

  7 Oct7 October 08:29

  I’m consistently getting quite a lot better return on RFS fares – we always fly peak (school hols) to the same destination – even with the higher Avios requirement, we’re usually getting 1.4-1.5p or better @ T-355 and significantly better for my wife (on occasion up to 3.5-4p) – who can’t commit to T-355 in most cases so by the time we come to book, the cash fare has gone up loads.

  However, I’ve noticed recently that during sales and certain other times, the HBO fares are so dirt cheap that I’d potentially have been better off saving my Avios & £17.50 and getting those instead – at those opportunity points my Avios suddenly seem worth about 0.4p! (Though no checked bag included so slightly unfair comparison.)

  Of course, that’s not @ T-355 and you’d have to cross a lot of fingers and toes to even hope to get a cheap flight on the perfect day out & home @ (say) T-200, let alone a cheap flight in the perfect slot that day. But we don’t usually need 4 checked bags so that might feasibly be the way forward – buy 2 RFS fares @ T-355 then watch carefully/ set up alert – if that is indeed possible – to grab 2 cheap HBOs on the same flight at a later time. Probably not worth the risks.

  • Scallder says:

    7 Oct7 October 11:34

    Harry – you can set up alerts on Google Flights for routes/dates so would suggest having a play around on that to see if that’ll work

    • the real harry1 says:

      7 Oct7 October 11:45

      cheers

• TripRep says:

  7 Oct7 October 09:00

  Agreed, I’m being a pedant, but let’s not join BA staff in misleading us calling them Taxes.

  BA Surcharges or BA additional fare fees.

• mike says:

  7 Oct7 October 09:16

  Whilst I would never be the first to defend BA and their charges (do not call them taxes!), long haul economy redemptions can make sense in certain situations. I’d add the “avoid a Saturday night stay” to your list.

  For example a couple of years ago I needed to go to NBO for a few days but could not stay a Saturday either end of the trip, a cash economy ticket was pricing up at £1900, my ticket was 19,500 Avios plus £300. That’s 8p per Avios! Admittedly not all my redemptions are like that, but…

  • Polly says:

    7 Oct7 October 09:54

    Same here last week urgent trip to Dublin, elderly parent emergency. Door to hosp 4 hrs, with a last minute available RFS. Flight was £ 280 ow..so my avios priced up at 6.55p each. Flew in Y. Really valuable in these circs.
    I call BA fees as they are, BA fees and taxes. Refuse to call them all taxes.

• Concerto says:

  7 Oct7 October 09:43

  I call them bogus surcharges! It annoys me that they think we are stupid enough to not see what bad value Avios has become. With airberlin gone, I have a lot less reason to use my Avios.

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