Reply To: BA booking engine v third party travel agents

[davefl]

Lady London wrote:

Are you definitely searching each flight one by one seoarately on the multistop itinerary? So not man-cdg, but man-lhr stating the date you want the 7pm flight, then lon-cdg stating the following day’s date.

Looks like BA’s system is set to insist on minimum 12? hour connection time on any flight from Manchester. This does make sense as they keep cancelling flights.

Remember they put the hours you are supposed to accept your flight being moved by under their ts and cs, up to something like 5 hours? This is sneaky because that really means 5 hpurs before + 5 hours later, ie a 10 hour period within which they try to get free rein to mess you sround. So setting computer to force a 12 hour minimum connection time for any flight fron MAN, kind of has the same feel.

I still think you’d get better pricing if you booked this by phone

Yes, I’ve been at this game for a while 🙂

I get your point, but 12 hour connection doesn’t explain why I can’t arrive at LHR at 6pm for a flight at 8 am the next day or why it won’t book Man-Lhr-Sofia.

And it doesnt explain why those routes and times are available at other OTAs.

ActuallY I just tried Amex Travel and they can book the ticket that those dodgy OTAs can book (that BA can’t), so I think I’ve solved my issue but it’s darn annoying I can’t just book the same thing on BA.com

FWIW the only way of finding something to book (and finding the cheapest fare) was Google Flights which is awesome. Lock the search to oneworld, and scroll the Price graph of date grid to see the lowest options. Got the 240 point run for £374 at amex travel which is way better than the £419 google priced it at.

Even Amex cant book the Sofia one though. End up coming back Sofia-LHR-DUB-MAN with an overnight stop in Dub and no biz class on 2 of those 3 legs