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Hi, I’m organising a trip to Orlando for mid-August 2025 with a party of 5, ideally I want to fly CW. I have 2 x BA Premium Plus Companion vouchers and a BA Barclays cabin upgrade voucher, I also have quite a lot of Avios. I really need some guidance on the most value focused booking strategy! I think the companion seats are simpler, I can book 2 x fares with Avios and use the vouchers to mirror them (if I can get availability)! I am prepared to fly into Ne York first if that’s better. I will use Seat Spy.
I am unclear how I can book the additional seat and be guaranteed of getting on the same flight (I assume I can’t make this all in one booking). Any tips appreciated (I’m new to trying to use vouchers for multiple people)!
First of all you need to read everything relevant on here to get the most out of these vouchers and avios. There is a series of articles covering all this. Have a look as well at articles and posts on booking the outbound and inbound separately if you want to go to a prime destination like MCO at peak time.
Unfortunately you are not going to be able to do this on one booking. If the 2 companion vouchers are both in your name, you can use them to book 4 people on the same booking. If they are, e.g. yours and your partners, you will need 2 bookings for 2 people each. The upgrade voucher would have to be a separate booking again (and won’t be able to be used to book for a child under 14).
To get on the same flight you’ll either need to be very quick off the mark at T-355 for MCO in August, or wait and see if your vouchers open up more availability in due course. This won’t apply to the upgrade voucher, so you would need to book that asap and hope the other seats turn up. Remember as well that only 4 CW seats are guaranteed on any flight.
If you go via NYC you will have much more chance of getting 5 x CW seats on the same flight. You’d then need to find connecting flights but this should be easy between these 2 destinations.
Remember if it all goes wrong, you can cancel avios flights for free within 24 hours of booking, or for £35 pp after that.
Thanks for the reply, really helpful. Good to know that I can use 2 x companion vouchers. That said it does look like I may need to go via NYC and/or pay some cash for some of the seats too.
Do the fares cost more if just making a one-way booking?
You need to complete the travel before your vouchers expire ? Which might be a stretch for 2”25, if you are after 2024 the seats will be being released soon
You don’t need to complete the travel before the vouchers expire, just the outbound leg but this still might be pushing it for summer 2025! You’ve got plenty of time to more though as you won’t even be able to book these for another 12 months.
However, I’m thinking this might be a typo for 2024! @Ubernoob, as mentioned you should read all the articles on here about getting the best out of the vouchers, plus the threads on 241s and Barclays vouchers as there are complications with what you want to do. Other people have asked about this exact same scenario so there’s plenty of info on here under the relevant topic headings.
yes, typo (arggh!), the trip will be summer 2024 🙂
If you look at the most recent 241/Barclays threads there is plenty of discussion around this type of booking, the main issue being that your 241s will (at some point) open up extra CW availability, but the Barclays voucher doesn’t, so you need a strategy to book multiple seats and use all the vouchers taking this into account.
I read through the HFP guide on Companion and Upgrade vouchers which was very helpful. It does look like I can use 2 x Companion vouchers on the outbound (with me being one of the passengers). But it doesn’t look like I have too many options for the 5th passenger…. there will only be 4 CW seats on Avios (as I understand and assuming I can bag them) so Avios won’t help for the 5th person, I assume I’ll need to buy a regular fare for the 5th person on a separate (which I’m not complaining about – given the Avios and voucher derived savings). I also read that it’s better to book the outbound as soon as the availability is there and sort the return when that’s available (and ask BA call centre to combined the flights onto one booking later).
One probably obvious question, Companion Vouchers are just one-way right?
Thanks for all your pointers so far, this is a bit of a minefield!
You need to go back and read it all again, by the look of things! Companion vouchers are for a return trip and as yours are likely to be new-style, they will open up extra availability above the standard 4 award seats, as per one of my previous posts, though not necessarily at T-355. That’s why I said about doing your research and coming up with a strategy.
BA won’t combine your bookings, if you book both legs separately you will still be left with 2 PNRs (i.e. booking reference numbers), in case this happens and you don’t understand why!
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