Working out fare class for BA Holiday during booking process

[Wis]

I am looking for help to work out the fare class for flights during the BA Holidays booking process.

I have been through the whole BA Holiday booking process and I can’t see the fare class anywhere (unlike a regular flight only booking where it is pretty straight forward to spot). When I click on the flight number in this booking flow, it does not show fare type.

I am chasing the final 20 points to retain Silver so I don’t want to end up on a Q, O or G fare and miss out open sufficient points!

Can anyone shed any light on where I am going wrong?

[NorthernLass]

Will it qualify for double TPs? Surely that would give you 20 TPs even in the lowest economy bucket for a return trip.

[Wis]

@northernlass Unfortunately not – it’s a micro-break – 2 or 3 nights I think.

[AndrewT]

I’ve never found a way to see the fare class through the BAH booking interface, but afaik it will always be the lowest available for a flight only booking (could be G rather than O, but that is the same TP).

So tedious, but if you need to know check the cash fares for the same flights.

[yonasl]

Is it not possible to get into a higher fare class by selecting the one with suitcase etc? Otherwise, book it and when prices go up a notch then you can book again if necessary and only lose £120.

[yonasl]

Ok I am silly. If BA holiday, no way to select the date type. As said before you are put on the cheapest one or even group fare not available otherwise.

[Andrew.]

If you’re in economy, you can pretty much guarantee that you will be in “O” on a BA Holiday.

But, occasionally you get a nice surprise and get a random alternative value. For my Brother and his family’s BA Holiday to Montreal in the spring, they received 70 TP on the outbound and 35TP on the inbound, along with 20 & 10 on the domestic connection. 270TP on one economy flight was very much appreciated.

[AndrewT]

You won’t be in O if there are no O class tickets available. Other than G (group tickets, even for a single traveller) BAH bookings don’t have access to tickets which aren’t available to everyone else. Some agencies pre-book batches of tickets on selected flights in the expectancy of selling (or presumably at some cost returning) them later. I don’t believe BAH do that, they sell what is available at any given point in time.

For a given package, the price differentials BAH charge for different flights on the same day typically follow the cash price difference, even where you know (by looking at cash booking details) they are in different ticket classes.

[BA Flyer IHG Stayer]

A phone agent may be able to see the fare bucket so a call to book might be worth it.

Even if they can’t then book it then use QF MMB as I’ve always found it does show fare buckets for BA hols.

Doing it that way gives you 24 hours cooling off period that doesn’t apply to online bookings.

[Wis]

OK, thanks all for confirming it’s not viewable in the booking process. Drat!

So from the advice sounds like the options are to:
(1) Take the addition step of checking the lowest available flight only fare classes for the same trip, and assume the BAH is using the same classes
(2) Book flight separately to be sure of the fare bucket and forgo the package price benefit
(3) Book one-way in CE
(4) Extend trip to 5 days for Double TP

[Wis]

BA Flyer IHG Stayer wrote:

A phone agent may be able to see the fare bucket so a call to book might be worth it.

Even if they can’t then book it then use QF MMB as I’ve always found it does show fare buckets for BA hols.

Doing it that way gives you 24 hours cooling off period that doesn’t apply to online bookings.

Thanks I hadn’t thought of phoning, yes I could do that to confirm.