What am I doing wrong? Miles for Upgrade?

[achoogirl]

Morning I’ve just got a quote for £4K PE to CW travelling to Miami. This is ridiculous! one way CW points only is £425. This is one way as no availability for return. Am I doing something wrong. Also has anyone done the starting journey in EU to make cheaper? I’m in the UK. Booking redemption never used to be this hard!!

[NorthernLass]

Not sure exactly what you mean here? One way prices are always very high though. What exactly are you trying to do?

[Froggee]

Yep it sounds like you are booking a cash one way premium economy fare. These are punishingly expensive and this should never be done.

If you say what your end game is and how many Avios etc you have people will undoubtedly help but it is all very vague right now.

It may be you should book a return flight and upgrade the leg that is available now and hope availability opens up on the return leg.

If you are Avios constrained and have to fly one way then maybe it will need to be in the back of the plane {shudder}

[Thegasman]

If you use the “Book & Upgrade” option on the website it’s a well known bug that you will usually be presented with Flexible (ie. expensive) cash fares in the base cabin.

There are restrictions in economy fares that are able to be upgraded with Avios but all WTP fares are eligible (if bought direct from BA). The best option (though not great at the moment) is to book the cheapest WTP cash fare online then call up to upgrade or do the whole transaction on the phone.

[achoogirl]

Apologies my brain is a bit fried from hours on the BA site. My overall aim is to get away die half term. Ideally Miami (warm) or could do New York. I want to fly in Business with my daughter. I have c 200k Avios. I am trying combinations of using miles to upgrade and just standard miles searches. The cash price for PE seems to be the highest PE fare being quoted so in my example £4K plus 125k miles. Hope this makes sense. I’ve also read on here is might be cheaper to fly from Madrid or Paris as taxes and charges are cheaper. Hope this makes sense

[SamG]

achoogirl wrote:

Apologies my brain is a bit fried from hours on the BA site. My overall aim is to get away die half term. Ideally Miami (warm) or could do New York. I want to fly in Business with my daughter. I have c 200k Avios. I am trying combinations of using miles to upgrade and just standard miles searches. The cash price for PE seems to be the highest PE fare being quoted so in my example £4K plus 125k miles. Hope this makes sense. I’ve also read on here is might be cheaper to fly from Madrid or Paris as taxes and charges are cheaper. Hope this makes sense

You’d need to book WT+ normally online for cash (as a return ticket) and then do the upgrade afterwards, assuming Avios seats are available. You can try upgrade online or call in. If anything goes wrong you’ve got 24hrs to cancel the cash booking for a full refund.

You can shop around and see if you can find a cheaper ticket ex-europe, either straight cash or WT+ and just do the longhaul upgrades. However this may not save a fortune and adds quite a bit of hassle for what isn’t a particularly long flight (relatively!)

[NorthernLass]

What exact dates are you looking at? There’s very little CW availability for MIA around half term, unsurprisingly as it’s a very popular route. It’s also going to be expensive for cash. Without a 241 you’ll have to be creative with your avios. One option would be to book outbound to NYC in business, get a connecting flight to MIA, then return from MIA using the RFS options. If you found off peak dates this would cost about 160k avios plus the taxes/surcharges.

[achoogirl]

You guys are so helpful thank you. I haven’t travelled in the back of a plane for years (business travel has spoiled me) and even though financially it makes sense I cannot do it 😀. I may try LHR to MIAMI and fly back from NY see if that’s feasible as a return.

[ChrisC]

Does your stay include Saturday night?

If not the Saturday night rule will be kicking in and causing the huge fare.

Yes you can fly from e.g. Spain. Rob has wrote articles about it but unless you have an IB account already I don’t think the option using miles will be available to you.

But the normal way of doing it for cash could be an option but it does of course take longer and positioning flights are also an issue.

• This reply was modified 54 years, 4 months ago by .

[achoogirl]

NorthernLass wrote:

What exact dates are you looking at? There’s very little CW availability for MIA around half term, unsurprisingly as it’s a very popular route. It’s also going to be expensive for cash. Without a 241 you’ll have to be creative with your avios. One option would be to book outbound to NYC in business, get a connecting flight to MIA, then return from MIA using the RFS options. If you found off peak dates this would cost about 160k avios plus the taxes/surcharges.

I was thinking of flying out Tuesday and back Sunday. I like the NY idea thanks. I didn’t realise I could do RFS long haul will take a look.

[NorthernLass]

You are far more likely to get CW to NYC than MIA. The RFS options will show up when you make the booking, you’re looking at 35k avios and £75 each MIA to LHR for economy, a bit more for PE.

It’s a very long way to go for a few days though, I would think NYC would have many more options than MIA for a short break. If you want a few days in the sun I’d be looking at Canaries or somewhere like Egypt.

[achoogirl]

NorthernLass wrote:

You are far more likely to get CW to NYC than MIA. The RFS options will show up when you make the booking, you’re looking at 35k avios and £75 each MIA to LHR for economy, a bit more for PE.

It’s a very long way to go for a few days though, I would think NYC would have many more options than MIA for a short break. If you want a few days in the sun I’d be looking at Canaries or somewhere like Egypt.

Thank you. I once did a Wednesday- Saturday return to Mumbai! I’m flexible around length of stay just need to get daughter back in school 21st Feb. I know NY well and love it there so suspect that’s where we will end up. I also have Virgin Miles but jeez their website is terrible

[NorthernLass]

You could do out to NYC in CW on the Tuesday then back in PE on the Saturday. BOS and ORD also showing on RFF (though it’s not always accurate), with 2 F seats to ORD on the Wednesday of that week!