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I know these kind of I’m lost and don’t know where to start post don’t get much help and often receive a lot of go do your own research response but I’m hoping my years of helping others on this forum gets me some grace and help 🙏. I’ll try and do some reading on flyer talk, if anyone can point me to an easier to navigate resource that would be amazing.
The scenario is this: I am currently bronze, have 120 Tier points, done the required 2 flights towards next year’s bronze status. My tier point year ends in September 2024. I unexpectedly have one week (end April to the first bank holiday 11 days) off work that I can play with, otherwise unlikely to have any opportunity to be away for more than a weekend between now and 8th September.
Since any tiers points earned between now and Sept gets counted for this year and next, seems like a good chance to try and keep bronze for 2024/5 and get myself a head start for 2026. Main goal is to keep bronze, if costs is not too bad I wouldn’t mind pushing for silver.
I would like help to come up with a reasonable plan to earn the points needed, likely to be a solo trip (female) so Europe is ok, maybe east coast US, not too much time zone difference as can’t afford the jet lag on return this time. I’m not confident about going to the middle east on short notice with no time to plan much and having never been.
I don’t have a budget in mind, but let’s just say I’m more a hyatt place gal than park hyatt. Whilst I love bronze (see reasons below) I don’t think I want to spend thousands to keep it.
I know some people don’t rate bronze status much but I really enjoy the 7 day advance free selection and ability to use PE queue when flying economy is amazing for when travelling with my elderly parents.
Will stop rambling, thanks in advance to those willing to help!
As your desired flying date is quite soon, it’s likely that fares will be quite high but you can still have some fun! Consider starting from Jersey as fares are sometimes cheaper from there, and you can do a few back to back trips across to some of the higher-earning TP destination of Sofia or just do Edinburgh and back a few times, which may work out as cheaper.
If you can drive, a BA Holiday with car hire currently earn double TP so you can combine the above plan with a car hire (or hotel, but that’d probably tip you into the thousand plus range). Make sure your trip follows the rules and is booked via BA Holidays. This is probably going to be more expensive than the above plans but might be more enjoyable!
I would look at a BA holiday (car or hotel for five nights minimum) from regional airport via LHR to one of the 80TP destinations in Europe (assuming travel in Club Europe). Look at places like Athens, Istanbul, Marrakesh, Catania as well as the usual Tier Point run destinations (Sofia, Bucharest etc).
Use the BA holiday Deal Finder page to see best prices.
https://www.britishairways.com/travel/holiday-finder/public/en_gbThis should come to (40+80+80+40)x2 = 480 tier points if it meets the BAH double tier point criteria which would get you to Silver.
The Easter school holidays should be over then so you might find some last minute bargains. As mentioned above, a BA Holiday is a great opportunity to go somewhere nice and get double TPs – definitely go for Silver if you can. Once you’ve picked a few seats free of charge immediately after booking, you’ll never want to go back!
I’m doing MAN-LHR-ATH-LHR-MAN in October, it was around £1200 for CE flights plus 5 nights in a 4* hotel (me on the BAH, OH on avios flights). Doing it with a car would have been a bit cheaper but we’d still have to pay for a hotel and have traumatic memories of driving in Athens on a previous trip!
Some BA Hols ideas without having to do the East Coast run (these are all solo travels): I just got back from MAN-LHR-IST-LHR-MAN in a Double Tree by Hilton for 5 nights, £814 for 480 TP’s and a place I’ve wanted to visit for a long time, it’s beautiful! Next month I’m doing NCL-LHR-SOF-LHR-NCL with 5 day car hire for £615 for 480 TP’s to go and see a friend who lives there (so yes I’ll be collecting & using the car!). I don’t need a hotel, but if I wasn’t staying with a friend I’d do it this way anyway as I find the Sofia hotel selection on BA Hols website a little thin on the ground!
Both were booked during the Feb sale, but there are still reasonable rates to be had if you can be a little flexible.
@Deek, those are great prices! I didn’t think I’d be able to sell IST or SOF to my OH and couldn’t get away with another solo trip this year!
@NorthernLass yeah I was pretty amazed at the prices, not far off the fabled AUH-CMB-CGK route and without the hassle! I also looked at Marrakesh which had pretty good deals and might interest your OH more. They were originally a shade over £800 when I started looking (solo in May, and not the cheap place in the Atlas mountains) but did go up fairly quickly in a matter of days to the mid 900’s before I settled on Istanbul.
Enjoy Athens, I wouldn’t even attempt the driving thing, that was brave!
Lol, he’d be even less likely to agree to Marrakesh! He’s pulling a face about going to MEX in November as he’s convinced we’re going to get kidnapped (“For what, exactly?” is my response). He is a very good driver, though!
Thanks for all the suggestions so far. I can drive but since I need a hotel anyway then I might be better with a hotel option.And not that confident about driving alone.
For BA double points I know the holiday needs to last for 5 nights but do I need to book 5 nights of hotels can I do less and do some on hotel points? I’ll read up on the BA holiday double points rules, I know they have changed but wasn’t 100% sure what the key changes were.
With 11 days, I think I have time to start at the regions.
I’ll look into Athens, I saw when looking at flyer talk last night Oslo might be an option? I know it is a pricier bit of the world but I would like to go some day anyway. It seems to be with finnair which I have no clue on the tier point rules and maybe more complex than a newbie in tier point chasing can bit off. And not sure if BAH double points work with that
Is Amsterdam too near in terms of tier points sector? I was planning to go there this year. Is there a routing that allows me make it work like going via regions?
I live very close to london city airport, any particular region airport would people suggest that is easier? could I do city-region-LHR-???-LHR and not the final region airport?
Amsterdam is a p***take hotel price wise, every day of the year nowadays. What you gain on flights you lose on hotel cost. Even the Sheraton and Hilton at Schiphol are £250ish
Oslo will only give you 80 TPs each way at double TPs. Here’s an HFP article on the longer routes:
You need 5 nights of hotel bookings, car hire or a mix of both or you won’t get double TPs.
Can I do this and qualify for BA holiday double points:
Option 1 LHR- MAN (one night hotel) – MAN – LHR – Athens or Malta (4 nights hotel) – LHR
instead of:
Option 2: MAN-LHR-Athens/ malta (5 nights) – LHR – MAN
I will have to get to MANs and stay a night anyway and really can’t be bothered to make my way back to London from manchester at the end.
Thanks
@Reney, the hotel nights need to be between the first and last flight, though you do need to check the Ts and Cs when you book as they have changed a couple of times during BA promotions. This was the rule when I last booked a BA Holiday and I have a similar itinerary to ATH in October but starting in MAN.
No one really knows exactly what will and won’t count for the double TPs, but there are some recent examples on FT which might be helpful:
@Reney – the BAH Double Points T&Cs were redrafted yet again at the beginning of March, but still aren’t crystal clear. The type of itinerary you are suggesting (and @NL) is clearly not within the spirit or intent of the rules, but the words can be interpreted in your favour, but it’s quite a stretch. The problem is that if BA applies the terms strictly or logically such that someone doesn’t get what they expect, you have no recourse at all, so if reaching x status is very important and hanging on that, personally, I’d be wary. Unfortunately, there can be no certainty until after the event and I would count on similar itineraries being treated in the same way.
I really liked Thessaloniki, some good information here https://www.headforpoints.com/forums/topic/thessaloniki
So is the 4th March 2023 rules the right version? in which case it states this which suggests my option 1 doesn’t work. It’s the first time I think I have seen this rules pulled out – Thanks NL for the flyer talk post. I sort of assumed HFP post have pulled out the ones that matters… but I guess I am trying to be more awkward.
g) Bookings can only contain one flight departing the UK, multiple journeys from the UK within one booking will not qualify.
The general consensus seems to be that domestic flights connecting to/from an international one also count for the double TPs, so your trip should be ok. I think the rules are to stop people getting double TPs from having multiple foreign trips back and forth on one booking. BA are terrible at writing Ts and Cs so it’s still not clear whether if you breach this requirement, only one UK departure will count for the double TPs, or the whole trip will be disqualified.
I’m fortunate to have lots of free time to travel this summer so will post data points after each BA Holiday I take and see what status I end up with in the autumn!
I really liked Thessaloniki, some good information here https://www.headforpoints.com/forums/topic/thessaloniki
I would love to do Thessaloniki but I cannot seem to find a regional airport that flies into Gatwick!! They all seem to fly into Heathrow and then I need to find my own way into Gatwick.
@Reney, there is a daily flight between LGW and GLA (I can’t recall if also EDI). This often doesn’t come up when pricing up a BA holiday so you need to play around with your itinerary – sometimes you need to enter the GLA leg separately, sometimes not! Hey ho, BA IT, lol.
I’m doing something similar in September – flying LGW-OPO-LGW-GLA, finishing with a visit to family in Scotland. It was more convenient to add this to the BA Holiday to benefit from the low deposit option as well as getting some TPs (however many that will turn out to be!)
I really liked Thessaloniki, some good information here https://www.headforpoints.com/forums/topic/thessaloniki
I would love to do Thessaloniki but I cannot seem to find a regional airport that flies into Gatwick!! They all seem to fly into Heathrow and then I need to find my own way into Gatwick.
There are flights to SKG from LHR.
This is a great post and replies. I’m also quite new to this and need to get 110 TP by 1st Sept. Trying to get the cheapest option I can, any suggestions?
Is this to get to Silver?
Have you tried the low fare finder on BA.com? If you’re not particularly bothered about where you go, this is the most helpful tool. Obviously the summer period can be pricey – I found bargains to LYS and GLA but prices have probably gone up since then.
May & June outside of half term and summer school holidays might be the most reasonable.
The least complicated option might be to do a BA holiday in CE in the U.K., this would give you 160 TPs which is well over what you need. Or if you don’t need a holiday booking, 3 U.K. sectors would give you 120.
Don’t forget you need to have flown 4 flights on BA metal as well.
Sorry I was a bit vague… Just trying to get to bronze for now, I can be fairly flexible on dates between now & 1st Sept . I have done the 4 flights already )
Then the above still stands, or if you can find lower fares on other OW airlines that would work. Check how many TPs you’d get before booking though.
If you’ve got (presumably) 190 TPs, it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to get to Silver with a double TP BA holiday, Bronze really doesn’t get you much by comparison.
See also the BA Holiday thread on here.
I agree about Bronze v’s silver. But as the OP said its the 7 day that is nice to have. I have lough access via my credit card already. Sadly my bigger holidays are Nov/ Dec, and that after my reset in Sept 🙁 But many thanks for the suggestions / help
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