News in brief:
£20 off Virgin Atlantic this weekend
Virgin Atlantic’s Winter Sale ends on 8th February and this weekend you can get an additional £20 off on selected economy flights.
Unfortunately this offer is not on all routes and the discount will only be given for flights to Boston, St Lucia, Orlando, San Francisco or Hong Kong.
The £20 will be knocked off the full price automatically which means you don’t have to enter a promo code.
Virgin Atlantic’s sale site is here.
British Airways to halve Leeds Bradford services
British Airways is halving the number of flights to Leeds Bradford Airport from 20 per week to just 10 from the end of February.
The airline has said that this is down to “matching flights to demand”. It does make a bit of a mockery of Heathrow’s promises to increase the number of domestic flights to the airport, although this is more of a political game as the third runway will never get built if it cannot be sold as a project to benefit the whole of the UK.
The route attracted 165,000 passengers in 2016 and was up 1.6% for the first 11 months of 2017. This implies around 80 passengers per flight although, of course, yield is more important than volume.
Leeds Bradford to Heathrow had historically been a successful bmi British Midland route until rail improvements led to the service being axed in 2009. British Airways revived it in 2012. With only flight per day for four days of the week, it is difficult to see it surviving much longer.
You can find out more in this Yorkshire Post article.
SAS EuroBonus removes free baggage for status members on Go Light fares
Scandinavian airline SAS has tightened the rules on the free baggage allowance for status members who purchase its cheapest Go Light fares.
Previously, any Star Alliance Gold or SAS EuroBonus Silver or above status member was allowed to check in a suitcase for free when purchasing a Go Light ticket. If you buy a ticket now for travel from 7th May, this will not apply.
Tickets already purchased, or tickets purchased for travel before 7th May, are not affected.
Details are on the SAS site here.
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About Head for Points
Reduction in services to Leeds is due to BA having to dish out some of the BMI slots again.