Some British Airways ex-160 tier point routes from Gatwick showing 80 points from Heathrow

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

• The Jetset Boyz says:

  7 Jul7 July 05:48

  Suspect this is an error – most likely by the person, updating the flight data that feeds the calculator and Executive Club systems, not realising these route accrue 80 tier points instead of the usual 40 for Europe. Will get fixed when someone flags this to BA.

  • Julian says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:51

    I agree with you that this seems to be most likely. Just don’t let the person responsible anywhere near refuelling BA’s aircraft………….

• Anna says:

  7 Jul7 July 07:08

  I’ll be flying MAN-LHR-GCM return next July on a cash ticket. This usually earns 360 tier points. Will this still be the case then and will it fall within the reduced requirement limit to get silver for 450 points? Just wondering if it worth pushing for silver. My membership year end date is July 8th and the flight will be after that.

  • Lumma says:

    7 Jul7 July 09:35

    Should be no change of tier point earning rates or there’d be no point in lowering the thresholds

    • Anna says:

      7 Jul7 July 11:40

      Yes but does it fit the timescale? How long do people have to earn status at the reduced rate?

      • Jonathan says:

        7 Jul7 July 11:54

        There’s no change to Tier Point earning periods. Even if you have status extended to 24 months your TP’s will reset start at end of usual TP year (ie. after 12 months).

        • Anna says:

          7 Jul7 July 14:21

          I’m not making this clear enough am I?! How long does the reduced tier point requirement last? So if my year resets in July 2021, can I still get to Silver by earning 450 tier points after that?

  • AJA says:

    7 Jul7 July 14:50

    HI Anna BA’s website says:
    “All members will benefit, starting with those who have a Tier Point collection end date of July 2020, through to June 2021.

    What’s more, it will be even easier to retain your status next time you’re up for renewal, as we’ve decreased the amount of Tier Points needed by 25%.”

    The way I read that is that you only need 450TP to either gain or retain silver in the year after your 1year extension. In my case my current TP year ends on 8 Feb 2021 meaning I only need 450TP in the year 9 Feb 2021 to 8 Feb 2022 to maintain Silver after March 2022 which is when my current extended Silver status runs out.

    If I read corectly your current TP year ends tomorrow 8 July 2020 meaning you will have a 1 year extension of to status until 8 July 2021 and from 9 July 2021 to 8 July 2022 you only need 450TP to gain or retain Silver.

    • Anna says:

      7 Jul7 July 15:47

      Awesome, thanks AJA! You may see me doing my first tier point run next year…

• Mr. AC says:

  7 Jul7 July 07:09

  I think as of last year, BA no longer flies to Kiev (Kyiv), so the number of TPs is a bit moot.

• Gin and Tonic Please says:

  7 Jul7 July 08:17

  Must be an error. Heraklion and Chania are both on Crete, and Heraklion is further away from UK.

  • Ian says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:26

    Confusingly, isn’t there also a Chania in Sicily? Don’t know if that could be the source of the mix-up on that route, though it doesn’t explain the anomaly of the Cyprus routes.

    • Julian says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:37

      No the place in Sicily is Catania and not Chania!!!!!!!

  • Julian says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:34

    Kefalonia and Mykonos are clearly very substantially nearer to Heathrow than Heraklion so obviously an error somewhere.

    Or more extreme is Paphos, which is clearly the furthest of all away of the places that BA is now strangely only offering 80 points to.

    And don’t forget that I’m the person who made it on to fastest finger on Who Wants To Be A Millionaire for giving one of the most accurate answers to the telephone eliminator question (they telephoned you back without warning) to get on the show of what is the distance from London to Calgary………….

    • Julian says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:39

      Also clearly absurd that Funchal is considered to be nearer to the UK than Kefalonia by BA

      It makes you worry for your safety in terms of how much fuel they are filling up the aircraft with to reach these destinations………….

      • Julian says:

        7 Jul7 July 08:49

        http://www.airmilescalculator.com looks like it can settle most of these questions, if of course it has accurate data. Google Maps unfortunately does not seem to hold flying distances between two locations that can also be reached over land……………….

      • Peter K says:

        7 Jul7 July 08:53

        Not really, no. I’m sure the people working out how much fuel to put in don’t use the number of tier points anywhere in their calculation.

        • Gruntfuttock says:

          7 Jul7 July 12:02

          I can confirm that they don’t use the air miles calculator for fuel uplift 😂

        • planeconcorde says:

          7 Jul7 July 14:00

          LOL

• Jay says:

  7 Jul7 July 09:21

  Hopefully an admin error which will be cleared up.

  • Julian says:

    7 Jul7 July 09:36

    Seems like somebody made changes using a Seat Of The Pants method rather than by referring to any actual data relating to the distance away of these destinations…………….

    • dgsupersonic says:

      7 Jul7 July 11:20

      I bet you don’t make all this fuss when there is an error fare advertised. People make mistakes so take it easy.

      • Jonathan says:

        7 Jul7 July 11:58

        Some of these destinations would only be 80 Tier Points based solely on distance so there’s plenty of precedent for destinations to be placed in different brackets then distance alone would suggest (not that I am stating this is not an error).

• Jose Marques says:

  7 Jul7 July 10:56

  Since when is BA flying from Heathrow to Funchal? Anyone please.

  • Julian says:

    7 Jul7 July 13:13

    I don’t know since when but they are certainly flying there at the moment from Heathrow several days a week and that’s during the summer season, which isn’t the peak holiday time of year in Madeira……

    • Jose Marques says:

      8 Jul8 July 11:43

      Thanks for the info. I have been going to Funchal but had to travel from Gatwick which is far from me. I will give them a call. Thank you

• Lady London says:

  7 Jul7 July 11:40

  I’d be asking BA for a promise of original routing credit and would cancel (or look into making them pay for another airline from LGW) if not

• Lady London says:

  7 Jul7 July 11:46

  On how many miles BA origin and destination are, never forget that BA successfully moved the earth’s tectonic plates to move Boston further away from Heathrow so that it would fall into a higher band.

  The relationship between air distances and miles BA counts them as, is distorted in some cases so that BA can achieve its aims.

  • Jonathan says:

    7 Jul7 July 12:13

    Never one to miss an opportunity to put the boot in LL! There’s actually more examples of destinations earning TP’s at a higher rate than distance would suggest vs the fairly niche Aer Lingus Dublin-Boston redemption example you quote.

    • Lady London says:

      7 Jul7 July 13:52

      That was what I meant @Jonathan. Some routes ex-LGWdo seem to have always has 160 tier points historically as compared to the 80 you would have thought.

  • Nick says:

    7 Jul7 July 12:28

    80 TPs are only loosely related to distance anyway – BA have certainly never made a claim that suggests it is.

    For example PMO earns 80 but CTA earns 160, despite them being very close together. And HEL earns the higher rate despite being shorter than plenty of routes that don’t.

  • Genghis says:

    7 Jul7 July 12:28

    Sometimes works for the customer: e.g. South Africa redemptions

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