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Hi this is just to give a data point for those considering this option. I had been wanting to visit Australia over Xmas /New Year but inspite of hours of research couldn’t find good redemptions or cash flights in J. Last time we went we only paid £1350 each with Qatar from Oslo to Canberra, so the bar was set high for finding a bargain.
I eventually gave up for December / January – it doesn’t help that we can’t be away for big Spurs home fixtures!
Yesterday I started looking for end Feb until Easter. Today I have managed to book
LGW – DOH BA
DOH – HAN Qatar
HAN – KUL Malaysian
KUL – ADL Malaysian
MEL – PER Quantas
PER – KUL Malaysian
KUL – BOM Malaysian
BOM – LHR BA
These are all in business except the HAN -KUL in economy and the BOM – LHR in premium economy
The last leg not being in Business saves us 120,000 Avios which seems worth it.
So this was a total of almost 24K miles and has cost 360,000 for both of us. I’m waiting to hear about the taxes.
I got through to be pretty quickly on the Bronze line at about 2pm and was my agent’s first customer. He knew exactly what to do and was very happy that I’d done all of my research. I was on the call for a total of 38 mins.
Let’s hope Covid doesn’t mess this up, but the bonus is I can cancel and lose £35 until 24 hours before the first flight.KUL-BOM-LHR is an interesting route. Are you stopping over in BOM for long?
“The last leg not being in Business saves us 120,000 Avios which seems worth it.“
The reason you save so many avios is because it’s a 9+ hours flight.
It is the longest segment of your entire itinerary.If availability is your main issue, switch to BLR or HYD – these two should have decent availability and also have something to see if you happen to stay for a day or two.
So to answer Richie we are not stopping over in BOM, it was just a way of getting back from KUL.
Yes, I do realise that BOM-LHR is our longest leg but although there was Business availability on that flight putting that into Premium Economy means the entire trip prices at 120,000 times 1.5 per person. Would have been 120,000 times 2 per person otherwise and left me with virtually no Avios.The places we want to go are Vietnam & Australia, we will break the homebound leg for a couple of nights in KUL which we have done before when using a 241 to KUL to access Vietnam & Cambodia on previous trips.
I do have a day or 2 to make any tweaks before I get the email from the fares people so still open to advise.
Looks like a great deal to me, although for an extra 60k Avios and the threat of devaluation I’d probably be minded to come back from India in J. Interesting to learn what the random number generator throws back in tax – any benefit in having a 24hr stop in Europe to cut back the APD, or just start there anyway?
So the taxes are coming out as £1956.24 for both of us. I have just looked at each segment individually and and that seems to be about £150 more than the individual amounts. I might try another call to see if I can get the fares team to explain or reduce it. Its the BA segments that seem to be contributing the most over £300 each, all the others are up to £70.
I haven’t been hammering earning miles recently but OH has almost reached 2 years without an Amex so I think its time to earn a few more and maybe upgrade that last leg.
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This looks like a great trip! Did you check for availability first on the BA website, or on individual carriers?
As ‘the real swiss tony’ pointed out, you can cut APD – approx £400 for two? if you start outside UK or have a stopover in Europe.
Am sure you have already checked this, but is there no Qantas availability for KUL-ADL and PER-KUL legs? A pity that you’ll have to travel in the worst OW airline for half the segments!
I would love to plan a trip to get us to Australia using the multi-carrier chart, but I definitely feel like a need a guide for dummies, as really don’t know where to start!
Enjoy your trip, sounds great.
I would love to plan a trip to get us to Australia using the multi-carrier chart, but I definitely feel like a need a guide for dummies, as really don’t know where to start!
Enjoy your trip, sounds great.
Try this https://www.headforpoints.com/2020/12/14/avios-multi-partner-oneworld-award-flight-chart/
Thanks for this reference point Dave. Really useful to know that the longest leg was making that much difference. Seems a great trip and a great way to get out East.
Have a great trip.
Will you get all of these flights on one ticket, or is it separate tickets?
So to try to answer a few of your questions:
I looked for all of the availability on the BA website. It’s a very tedious process. I had expected that that the trip was likely to be via KUL.
I feel like starting in Europe was adding further complexity and having finally found something that was hanging together I just wanted to get it booked. Earlier in the process, when looking for Dec / Jan I was trying European start points too.
I had previously struggled with using the Great Circle Mapper but found a dummy’s guide and that really helped.
The phone call to pay took much longer than the booking one, the agent was pretty new and couldn’t seem to get any help from senior staff for things she wasn’t sure of. She also had a lot to read back to me.
Last night after the flights were held but before I paid we could see the whole itinerary on our BA apps.
I have queried the taxes but the agents can’t call fares so they have messaged them and I should get another email in due course asking me to call back in. Lucky I don’t have a busy day today.
I forgot, yes all of this does come on the same booking and I only have one e-ticket so I guess its all on there
Good to know. Pre-pandemic we did this for an Oz trip with a fairly random routing too. Sadly the pandemic killed the booking but good to hear you pulled it off so will definitely try this again. Seems much more credible than trying to bag more straightforward rewards. I’m too old to be on the phone at midnight.
So the answer to my fares query was tough, that’s how much it is. We can’t explain it just is. Would you like to cancel?
Congratulations. I’ve done it twice now and my only advice to others is Patience…if the first agent doesn’t know what you’re talking about, hang up and try again. Have a back up plan to hand when the agent says…Sorry, last two seats have gone. Have your PC, laptop, phone all open ready to agree or contradict. Make sure you use all of your mileage allowance….we managed to tag on a weekend away in AMS. Record your phone call which can be useful, very, if a problem arises down the road. Make a note of all carrier out of hours contact numbers.
All I would say it is not for the feint hearted or those of a nervous disposition, as you WILL become frustrated and you don’t want to end up with a stroke or heart attack!
There was a very good thread on here some 4/5 years back, but good luck trying to find it.
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