[Mighty Hunter]

You may be right, I suppose it’s what you decide it’s worth to you. But there’s plenty of grumbling within BA that it’s a bad move.

I think the jury’s out on the current leadership, not as good as Colin Marshall but can’t be worse than Bob Ayling!

[Mighty Hunter]

Between us, my wife and I have 60 years flying employment with BA, and have many friends still employed there.

My brother-in-law was a BA senior manager for several years. I have over 20,000 hours flying on the 747-400 alone, 14 years as a Captain.

So laugh away.

[Mighty Hunter]

I wonder what forward bookings in Club Europe are like?
My wife and I spent plenty on BA CE Holidays to get status, handy for our frequent trips to Glasgow, and for seat choice for our two 2-for-1’s each year.
Absolutely no point now, we’ll go economy, then when status runs out, EZY to Malta, Canaries, Greek islands, Glasgow, etc.
With Club Suite, paying BA’s rates for seat choice is crazy, so once the ying-yang are gone we won’t need that either.
Looking around the CE cabin at the other pax, I think maybe the majority are doing the same thing.
It may not look too bad at the moment with temporary new aircraft shortages keeping load factors high, but once they’ve sorted that out it could spell trouble and empty club cabins.

[Mighty Hunter]

Part of clause 5 is new.
Adding a car or hotel in ‘shopping basket’ did qualify for double points. I did it lots of times – mostly adding hotel/hotel at the time using hotlines (I’m retired staff, there’s no discount on BA holidays), but also on a commercially available ticket (hotlines aren’t always much cheaper, especially during a sale, and if there’s a problem you have to message the hotline desk rather than phone). I always got the double points.

[Mighty Hunter]

Sometimes they release a block at the same time, so worth checking regularly.
I wanted a LHR-JNB, CPT-LHR later this year, from 26th October onwards. Nothing to JNB after 25th, then on 19th Feb suddenly several days came up, and I got exactly what I wanted.
So my advice would be to check every day if possible.

[Mighty Hunter]

Amy C wrote:

As someone going to Namibia via Jo’berg this coming Sept (for the 4th time!) you do know it’ll be really hot and possibly very wet at that time? Apologies if you do know.
Also going with a companion voucher and I’d also noticed the drought of availability for next Jan/Feb. I want CPT and was happy to settle for JNB as an alternative but can hardly find any. ☹️

I’m afraid that’s just not true. Early spring in Joburg and temps between 5c and 25c. End of the winter dry season so very low rainfall.

Joburg outbound opened up for dates after 25th Oct this morning, I was able to get 26th LHR-JNB, 11th Nov CPT-LHR in J class using 2 -1 voucher. 190,000 Avios and £950. When I looked there was loads of availability outbound, not much inbound.

[Mighty Hunter]

Sorry, missed a bit out.

Mighty Hunter wrote:

Well I feel cheated, I booked an expensive J BA holiday to Mykonos in October, calculating that whatever else, this getting me to Gold would give us an extra year of free seat choice on our 2 a year Amex 2 for 1 vouchers.
I definitely wouldn’t have done so had I believed they were going to renege on the soft landings without enough warning.

Once my gold is up, I think we will drop Amex and go for either low-cost in Europe, and low-cost premium economy or other non-BA scheduled J for long haul.

I’m sure this will save us quite a bit in the long run.

[Mighty Hunter]

Well I feel cheated, I booked an expensive J BA holiday to Mykonos in October, calculating that whatever else, this getting me to Gold would give us an extra year of free seat choice on our 2 a year Amex 2 for 1 vouchers.
I definitely wouldn’t have done so had I believed they were going to renege on the soft landings without enough warning.

Once my gold is up, I think we will drop Amex and go for either low-cost in Europe, and low-cost premium economy or J for long haul.

I’m sure this will save us quite a bit in the long run.

[Mighty Hunter]

I’ve also looked at staff travel, sometimes a guide to possible opening up, and there seems plenty of seats in the 3 classes both ways, particularly towards the end of your date range, except WTP outbound.

[Mighty Hunter]

No problem, and just to confirm I have an unused voucher so it is the best availability.

[Mighty Hunter]

Don’t forget you can boost up to treble the Avios points you’ve earned in the last 30 days for about 0.9p per point, much cheaper than part-paying.

[Mighty Hunter]

Nothing outbound (or inbound) until the 28th Oct, then lots both ways

[Mighty Hunter]

We flew to Cape Town on 21st Jan, having pre-selected 4J/K. I’m silver, wife gold.

At check in we were reseated in 1J/K. Crew had no idea why. Not very happy as we booked the seats 9 months ago, but not much we can do about it I suppose. 1J/K are decent enough.

[Mighty Hunter]

Thanks for the help, very handy.

[Mighty Hunter]

Yes thanks, it’s not on the current statement but when I downloded the statement prior to 7th Jan, it states it there. It is the same date, 7th Jan.

[Mighty Hunter]

Thanks for the quick replies!

I tried the PDF statement route suggested, and for me it says next annual fee due on 7th January, so presumably that’s it?

[Mighty Hunter]

<I just wanted to flag that the service standard in Club World (unlike in Club Europe) is for the crew to take orders for the entire cabin and reconcile these in the galley.>

That is service standard but sadly like most other service standards these days, mostly ignored.

My longhaul CSD wife retired 3 years ago and is now a gold card holder, and has often not got her first choice because they’ve all gone. Her friends still flying confirm nobody bothers much these days because there’s no managers anymore to hold anybody to account. I’m a silver card holder and have been luckier.

[Mighty Hunter]

I thought it was tight for an answer in time.
Anyway, here now and although the agent at the check-in desk looked at our mobile boarding passes and said that we would, when we got to security we didn’t. Lady showed us the list and it clearly said ‘J’ class only for BA.
As an aside, I read elsewhere that the A gates (BA’s normal) lounge was between security and immigration (like Malaga), however this is also wrong as we’re sitting in it now after immigration and it’s right next to the gates.
No hot food but otherwise very pleasant.

[Mighty Hunter]

I did call, and after some considerable time with the agent trying different things and escalating it to a manager, we are very satisfied with the outcome. I don’t want to say too much, as the nature of our problem probably made a difference (and maybe wife being a gold card holder), but well done BA for a change and thanks here for advice.

[Mighty Hunter]

Thanks, if I call I’ll report back on the outcome

[Mighty Hunter]

£11300 for the same booking paying cash. Unbelieveable (and non-refundable!)

Thomas Cook’s premium seats to CPT were acceptable, it’s a shame Covid took them out. Must be a good opportunity for another carrier?

[Mighty Hunter]

Thanks, I am the lead traveller but sounds like it’s OK. I think if I decide to remain, I’ll check in as normal but not turn up at the counter.

If they make an issue of it, I’ll have to decide whether to travel or not at the time, tricky!

[Mighty Hunter]

I and Mrs MH are retired BA with over 60 years service (pilot/cabin manager) between us, and used Hotlines for many years. They’ve changed a bit over the years, originally the were completely non-refundable and changes were not allowed, even for a fee.

Hotlines are best value for domestics in my experience, generally they are a small discount elsewhere, but sometimes can be good value. Basic hand baggage only fares are not available, so often these are a bit cheaper than Hotline anyway.

I wasn’t aware anyone other than staff/retired staff had access. They definitely do get Avios and tier points – my wife is Gold thanks to many 2020/2021 domestic LHR-GLA trips in J class, all booked via hotline (they were cheaper during lockdown, and worth the extra cost as she frequently needed to visit her mother with care needs, and didn’t want to risk sitting too close to others).

However, BA sale fares often don’t get reflected in Hotline prices, when they can be more expensive. We are currently between 2 5-day BA Holidays trips (640 tier points!) paid for with FTV’s. Booking the same holiday with Hotline would still have given us double tier points (I checked), but would have been much more expensive – in one case 20%!

[Mighty Hunter]

It’s very variable. Best discounts are often domestics, particularly one-way where commercial price is ridiculous.

Recently booked two 5 night euro breaks in J to get the double tier points, both times the hotline flight + hotel was significantly more expensive than the BA holiday price.

[Mighty Hunter]

Thanks very much, sounds good, especially now they’ve gone beyond October for double tier points