Companion voucher for Sydney – outbound booked

[Duckboh]

Hi all! I’ve booked CW one way for Sydney in Aug 2025, and at the moment have no plans to fly back from Sydney for at least a year.

I would like to utilise the return component of the companion voucher at some point but wanted some advice on my options.

1. How long will my companion voucher be valid to book a return ticket after flying the outbound?

2. Does my return ticket have to end in the same airport I started my outbound booking from in the UK?

[JDB]

Duckboh wrote:

Hi all! I’ve booked CW one way for Sydney in Aug 2025, and at the moment have no plans to fly back from Sydney for at least a year.

I would like to utilise the return component of the companion voucher at some point but wanted some advice on my options.

1. How long will my companion voucher be valid to book a return ticket after flying the outbound?

2. Does my return ticket have to end in the same airport I started my outbound booking from in the UK?

You need to book the return flight at least 24 hours before flying the outbound and while you can then change the date of that return flight, this can only be within the one year ticket validity starting on the date of your outbound flight. You can fly back to a different destination in the UK (or elsewhere within the open jaw rules) but that again needs to be fixed before you start outbound travel. If you cancel the return while you are out in Australia or the ticket expires, you won’t get any Avios refund but you might get some taxes back, less the cancellation fee.

[Matt]

I don’t think you can do this – your ticket is finished once you’ve flown the outbound if that’s all that’s booked on it. You could add a return (subject to availability!) up until you fly the outbound, so a maximum stay of 355 days.

There’s no problem with ending in a different UK airport to the starting point.