Companion voucher – Dublin departure

[Dave likes planes]

Hi,

I’ve read a few articles on here about the savings you can make if you start your companion voucher trip outside of the UK, for example DUB>LHR>SFO and then the same in reverse. I had a play on the BA website and the savings do indeed seem impressive.
My question is, for a companion voucher redemption would it be necessary to fly on to DUB on the return? Do you know if it is possible, for example, to book just DUB>LHR>SFO and SFO>LHR (without the Dublin leg) over the phone with a companion voucher and does this still give you the same savings? Could be really tempted to start my next trip from Dublin to save money but I wouldn’t want to have to end it there too.

Thanks in advance for your wisdom!

[Dawn]

I’ve been asking the same question and thanks to Rob who explained it all to me, I finally understand how to do it!
You fly DUB-LHR-SFO but book the return leg as SFO-LHR-LCY-DUB. You get off the plane at LHR and they have to offload your baggage. So you just get off there and forget your LCY-DUB leg. I will be booking this for Sept 2023 so will book my first leg as soon as it’s available.
Hopefully this is all correct 🙂

[Dave likes planes]

Dawn wrote:

I’ve been asking the same question and thanks to Rob who explained it all to me, I finally understand how to do it!
You fly DUB-LHR-SFO but book the return leg as SFO-LHR-LCY-DUB. You get off the plane at LHR and they have to offload your baggage. So you just get off there and forget your LCY-DUB leg. I will be booking this for Sept 2023 so will book my first leg as soon as it’s available.
Hopefully this is all correct 🙂

Ah! That’s really helpful, thanks so much!

[Harry T]

Or just book the LHR-DUB for a different day from SFO-LHR, say the day after, and ask for your luggage to only be checked through to LHR, as you need it for your overnight at LHR.

[yorkshireRich]

I phoned up the other day (got through immediately), and booked Dub-LHR-JNB, and the return was JNB-LHR-MAN. After playing about online, I realised by booking this open jaw ticket, I had not only saved time by not flying back Dublin, but I had saved avios and a couple of quid.

i have the kind people of this site to thank as I was prepared to fly to Dublin and then back. Hope this helps.

[malteser]

Try just booking it starting in Dublin but ending in LHR the savings should still be the same.
I booked Dub-LHR-NYC and Boston-LHR yesterday using a companion voucher and the total cost was £612.

[dougzz99]

malteser wrote:

Try just booking it starting in Dublin but ending in LHR the savings should still be the same.
I booked Dub-LHR-NYC and Boston-LHR yesterday using a companion voucher and the total cost was £612.

Exactly. The tricks to avoid the final leg make sense on cash fares, but on an Avios ticket why go back to Dublin unless you need to. Book from Dublin and return to London.

[PGW]

malteser wrote:

Try just booking it starting in Dublin but ending in LHR the savings should still be the same.
I booked Dub-LHR-NYC and Boston-LHR yesterday using a companion voucher and the total cost was £612.

The only minor drawback is that you have to call to book those itineraries but it’s still a better option over returning to DUB or wasting avios on a last leg you aren’t going to fly.

[NorthernLass]

If you book both legs separately you could end wherever you want then claim back the 50% avios from BA. Unfortunately the surcharges on US departures make this prohibitively expensive unless using the RFS option and returning in Y which is probably a bit much from the West coast!

[meandthekids]

Does anyone know what the cost is doing this for Dublin /Lhr/ Mle?

I have just used the companion voucher for a male booking from London RFS which has used up all my avios so I wanted to understand the difference if done via Dublin or Inverness or whichever.
Thank you

[aseftel]

meandthekids wrote:

Does anyone know what the cost is doing this for Dublin /Lhr/ Mle?

I have just used the companion voucher for a male booking from London RFS which has used up all my avios so I wanted to understand the difference if done via Dublin or Inverness or whichever.
Thank you

DUB-LHR-MLE-LHR-DUB two adults with a voucher, off peak, is 155,000 Avios + £ 1,095.88

[meandthekids]

That seems crazy. I assume that’s business? We’ve used 260k abios & £750 on RFS for 5 of us Lon-mle return and using 1 x 241 – but I’m sure many here have said that non Uk departures would be cheaper in taxes and probably wouldn’t need as many avios as the RFS rates.

[aseftel]

Oh yes sorry didn’t notice the mention of RFS, that’s in business.