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I’m in process of spending for amex plus companion voucher – can anyone confirm if there’s generally much additional seats unlocked for the Caribbean on Club? I know in half term etc unlikely but just interested to know generally?
BA aren’t very clear about this unfortunately. It’s all obviously demand driven, so in peak season you’ve very little chance. If there are still cheap cash seats available in Club World when you want to travel, you’ll have a better chance that these will be available using your companion voucher. I’d say your best bet is to call BA directly and see if they can help?
Calling BA won’t make the slightest difference. Either seats are available or they aren’t – no one will be able to tell you what may or may not happen at a future point as it’s all algorithm driven without human involvement.
As per @AndrewT – your best strategy is to have a Plan B and C, and try and book at T-355. More likely off-peak, however.
Also look at the next 12 months of availability as this will give you an idea of demand, with some adjustment for periods like Easter which aren’t fixed.BA aren’t very clear about this unfortunately. It’s all obviously demand driven, so in peak season you’ve very little chance. If there are still cheap cash seats available in Club World when you want to travel, you’ll have a better chance that these will be available using your companion voucher. I’d say your best bet is to call BA directly and see if they can help?
Thanks- do you mean I class seats (as opposed to R?)
As per @AndrewT – your best strategy is to have a Plan B and C, and try and book at T-355. More likely off-peak, however.
Also look at the next 12 months of availability as this will give you an idea of demand, with some adjustment for periods like Easter which aren’t fixed.Thanks this is helpful too- it’s weird how availability on outbound is always a lot better than inbound- probably cos it’s the overnight leg generally
Yes, I think more people want a flat bed overnight, though I find CW and PE equally insomnia-inducing!
Don’t forget also that the Caribbean is very well connected to the US so returning via (e.g.) MIA/ATL/NYC can also be an option.
Thanks- do you mean I class seats (as opposed to R?)
Yes the extra availability (if any) comes from I class inventory, so if there are no I cash fares the Amex voucher won’t unlock anything additional. However with the new website you can’t see what fare class is on offer, so that doesn’t help directly. Other sources such as ITA Matrix still show fare class availability.
None are ever released on popular routes at peak times , I mean peak for that route no avios peak. For example none for Cape town between November and April.
None are ever released on popular routes at peak times , I mean peak for that route no avios peak. For example none for Cape town between November and April.
That’s not true. I’ve booked reward flights to Cape Town over the peak Christmas and New Year period for the last few years, well after T-355. We’ve booked in April, May and June before, although did have to wait until November one year to switch from a Jo’burg to direct Cape Town flight.
Barbados flights have popped up mid year for me as well. It’s definitely worth setting up alerts on sites like seatspy in the hope that something will come up, particularly if you can be flexible on dates/islands. And as someone else said, you could look at going via Miami as well.
Yes – I’ve seen extra availability to NAS/GCM in school holidays, though it might have been more likely because of the regional connection.
As per @AndrewT – your best strategy is to have a Plan B and C, and try and book at T-355. More likely off-peak, however.
Also look at the next 12 months of availability as this will give you an idea of demand, with some adjustment for periods like Easter which aren’t fixed.Thanks this is helpful too- it’s weird how availability on outbound is always a lot better than inbound- probably cos it’s the overnight leg generally
The routes I generally fly are overnight both ways and consistently show availability only on one leg, and which leg it is seems to alternate depending on the month, strange. This is also quite apparent on some SH flights too so makes me wonder if there’s a little manipulation going on i.e. enticing folks to book a reward one way and forcing a cash buy on the way back. Idle speculation though.
Surely I class/extra reward availability would only apply to return journeys though? BA hasn’t quite gone the full Virgin yet in respect of bonkers inbound pricing.
Surely I class/extra reward availability would only apply to return journeys though? BA hasn’t quite gone the full Virgin yet in respect of bonkers inbound pricing.
You’d think – but for instance JNB May has plenty of outbound availability and next to diddly inbound. July it switches the other way around.
If it were July/ August switch I’d say it was school holiday effect, but not starting in May.
All I can say is that this extra availability cannot be relied upon , it seems pretty rare and random. Nothing like that intimated , not quite promising as the excuse for increasing price of BAAP Card. A bit of a con
Not being a BA apologist but there will be extra availability on some routes. They never said there will be extra availability to CPT, MLE, HND. etc. As always, flexibility is crucial.
I think at AMEX price increase they just said this will release extra seats. Implying on all flights . It is more Amex who oversold promise not BA.
BA has at least kept its promise of 4CW on every flight
Also to clear, I class does not equal extra seats. I have seen cases with I class available but no extra “Amex companion” availability.
Yes, I think more people want a flat bed overnight, though I find CW and PE equally insomnia-inducing!
Don’t forget also that the Caribbean is very well connected to the US so returning via (e.g.) MIA/ATL/NYC can also be an option.
Thanks @northernlass this is also a great idea, as NYC availability is huge and Heathrow is better for us. On a practical note, do you know if we book a connecting flight separately do we need to check out and in again, or can we stay in transfers?
I’m guessing best thing to do is stay a night in NYC?
Just a word of caution on NYC, which occurred to me afterwards- BA have recently been refusing some open jaw bookings based on the 2 sectors being in different zones, so you may find that you need to stick to MIA, ATL or another US city in that zone.
This is if I’ve understood it correctly but there was quite a bit of discussion last week about it.
Yes, a connecting flight would be completely separate so you’d need to plan for that.
Just a word of caution on NYC, which occurred to me afterwards- BA have recently been refusing some open jaw bookings based on the 2 sectors being in different zones, so you may find that you need to stick to MIA, ATL or another US city in that zone.
This is if I’ve understood it correctly but there was quite a bit of discussion last week about it.
Yes, a connecting flight would be completely separate so you’d need to plan for that.
Thanks that’s good to know- TBH was planning on going to and back from JFK anyways as open jaw would involve both LGW and LHR which would not work for us
Fair enough – you may also want to note that JFK is one of the best routes for F availability if you want to look out for that! Very nice way to cross the pond and good use of avios/241. (But double check – I’m sure BA flew LGW-NYC at one time?)
It’s not the best airport experience, and of course NYC is hideously expensive, but it’s swings and roundabouts …
Just a word of caution on NYC, which occurred to me afterwards- BA have recently been refusing some open jaw bookings based on the 2 sectors being in different zones, so you may find that you need to stick to MIA, ATL or another US city in that zone.
This is if I’ve understood it correctly but there was quite a bit of discussion last week about it.
Yes, a connecting flight would be completely separate so you’d need to plan for that.
Thus far, such open jaw routing objections have only been in respect of origin open jaws, not destination ones.
I’ve been looking at using voucher (for one person) flying from the Americas via Europe to either South Africa or Asia. Have no idea whether any routings will be allowed. What I can’t understand is when I try to book London to Pudong, the calendar shows availability for many dates from September onwards in business. However when I click on every date that says availability, I can only find large numbers of PE seats and absolutely none in Business. Is this an error? Am I doing something wrong? Seems odd there are 7 plus PE seats available for so many dates but none in business. Especially when searching somewhere like JNB towards the end of August I can find unlimited PE, CW and even availability in first.
There does seem to be plenty of CW availability from Jan ’26 onwards, according to SeatSpy, so my guess is that it’s all been snapped up prior to that.
You should be able to book, e.g., MIA-LHR-PVG, online; whether BA would be happy doing this kind of routing by phone probably depends on the agent!
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