2-4-1 Companion Voucher ex- EU – Possible to book First Class?

I have booked a Malaga-LHR-Singapore return in First Class with the new voucher, I did it online.

It’s quite possible that I’m reading the new rules incorrectly here but, provided the 4 sector limit is adhered to, the journey can start anywhere now. I don’t have a new voucher to test this but as far as I can see you could redeem something like JFK-LHR-SIN return and still take advantage of the 2-4-1 benefit. A trip like that is currently bookable on ba.com without a voucher so why not?

NorthernLass wrote:

I’m assuming the distance rule is still in place for open jaws. You can’t book that itinerary on one avios ticket either with or without a voucher.

But that isn’t an open jaw, it’s a return (or a 1-way if preferred) and is readily bookable on ba.com. Just check JFK-SIN on, for example, 15.10.22 where you will see that available for 75k avios and £175.

What we could do with is somebody who has an unused voucher to try a dummy booking of something like that.

• This reply was modified 54 years, 8 months ago by .

NorthernLass wrote:

Apologies, I thought you meant going to one and coming back from the other. That is very good value if you were happy going in economy!

No problem. As you rightly say, there won’t be many takers for such an itinerary but I’d still like clarity from a dummy booking.

Yes, with the new voucher you can start anywhere in the world and it seems it’s now bookable online too. However, if the stopover in London is more than 24hrs then extra surcharges kick in.

Tokyo-JFK-Tokyo via London is 250k Avios + £2188 if long stopover or 250k Avios + £1393 if less than 24hr with 241 voucher.

So effectively if you want two trips on 1 voucher that will cost you an approx. an extra £800 or £400 per person.

I haven’t checked out how it would work out on say Japan-Brazil return.

OH is not too far off triggering another 241, so when it arrives I’ll have a good play around with it!

spawn606 wrote:

meta wrote:

Yes, with the new voucher you can start anywhere in the world and it seems it’s now bookable online too. However, if the stopover in London is more than 24hrs then extra surcharges kick in.

Tokyo-JFK-Tokyo via London is 250k Avios + £2188 if long stopover or 250k Avios + £1393 if less than 24hr with 241 voucher.

So effectively if you want two trips on 1 voucher that will cost you an approx. an extra £800 or £400 per person.

I haven’t checked out how it would work out on say Japan-Brazil return.

Hey Meta, I’m trying to find a list of routes where a stopover in London is possible to create essentially 2x trips out of a single 241. Is there a reason why we have to do TYO > JFK via LHR and not able to do it the other way round? (JFK > TYO via LHR)?

Also it seems like new york is the only US city that this is possible from after checking a bunch of west coast cities. Is there specific conditions I need to lookout for to determine whether a pair of cities are feasible to route via LHR for a longer than 24 hour stopover?

I’m sure @Meta will have a better or fuller answer, but for example LAX-LON-TYO probably exceeds the MPM for that route and rewards bookings are subject to normal IATA fare construction rules.

NorthernLass wrote:

Is starting in the US not going to incur hideous surcharges, or is this mitigated by booking the entire trip in one go?

Good point. What about Canada?

Since this route ends with a return back to the first country/city of origin, it makes things much easier to plan for if I am able to nest the 2x trips in NA instead of Asia.

Or what about open jaw?

I.e. TOKYO > JFK Via LHR

JFK > HKG / SYD / [Insert suitable non Japan city] via LHR

@spawn606 You can only do one stopover and that includes London; HKG-JFK-HKG via LHR only. This is because the voucher has to be used on BA metal and BA doesn’t fly from HKG/SYD to Japan.

Not sure whether something via Singapore/Sydney would work, but this route would be very difficult to find seats for in any class.

Yes, you can obviously book one-ways on any BA route via London and that’s the easiest.

Here we are talking about return flights!

I think for more complex stuff will require a call as online system often throws errors. It hard to find a match for return because you’re competing with IATA rules and availability of reward seats and same class rule of the voucher.

PGW wrote:

I’m not finding that JFK is by any means the only US departure point for awards of this kind and I had no problem finding, amongst many others, LAX-TYO on ba.com. While it would be interesting to see just what the limits of these potential redemptions might be, it’s probably somewhat academic and the key question is whether the revised voucher can be used for any bookable redemption (falling within the normal restrictions) irrespective of the departure point. For what it’s worth, I see no reason why it can’t.

But what sort of surcharges would you be looking at? Not worth it for £3k as meta pointed out!