Category Archives: Discounts & Sales

New British Airways fare reduction by using Avios

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Up until today, you could only redeem Avios by buying an Avios Ticket.
You had to search for a flight with Avios availability. And if you were lucky enough to find the date and time that you wanted, you could then choose to pay more – and use less Avios.

If you could not find reward seats, the only solution would be to sign up to Avios.com as per my suggestion in this post, in order to find availability.

It’s a frequent complaint – that you have thousands of Avios and are unable to spend them. This is because Avios seats are usually offered in a very limited availability.

Now however, when booking via ba.com or the BA call centre, you buy a ticket priced in any class and you can part pay with Avios.

The maximum discount is £30 per ticket but if you buy two singles you could achieve a £60 discount per roundtrip

This is excellent news because you can travel when you want – on a commercial fare. It’s just a pity that the discount is restricted to £60.

It is good for people with small Avios balances wanting to spend just 1,500 , 3,000 or 4, 500 Avios

The maximum discount of £30 costs 4,500 Avios which is a valuation of 0.67p per Avios, which isn’t terrible – but not very exciting either. If you collect Avios via Tesco Clubcard you in effect buying those Avios for 0.41p each

There are occasions where I have managed to achieve approx 2p per Avios by using the points when the air fare was expensive.

A benefit is that you will earn Avios and Tier points on these tickets too. So, whilst you may spend 4,500 Avios reducing a fare to say Copenhagen, you will earn 1,188 Avios back on the trip! Avios that you would not earn on a pure Avios reward flight

To book, visit ba.com via the link above. You’ll be offered the Avios discount after selecting flights.

Hefty discounts if you book business class on British Airways

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A sale has been announced from British Airways and it is so interesting, I’m tempted to take advantage of it myself! But you have less than 2 weeks to book and seats are likely to sell fast.

You may not normally consider booking club world at £500 or £600 for a 2 hour European flight, but now there are sale prices from £198 which are closer to economy fares!

If you are booking business travel, be careful. These tickets do not allow any changes whatsoever and no refunds apart from the tax.

And most fares require a Saturday night stay. This is how British Airways deters travellers from booking business trips at these prices. Exceptions do apply, for example Morocco (below) is OK for mid-week travel.

There appears to be good availability, the fares are valid through Christmas, Easter holidays etc and many destinations are for travel through to end summer 2014

Travellers will earn full ‘Tier Points’ and Avios on these fares

I highlight the best fares below:

Europe Club Word Deals

Return price examples:

Angers (Loire Valley, from City Airport) £199
Bordeaux £200
Frankfurt £198,
Helsinki £298,
Zagreb £198,
Stavanger £198

The Angers offer is for travel May-August 2014 only
Most European fares are for travel to 31st March 2014
Code-share flights excluded (e.g. Finnair flight with BA flight number to Helsinki)
Bookings are in R or I class

USA Canada Deals

Many of these fares are for travel through to October 2014 !

Boston £1,579
Las Vegas £1,994
Los Angeles £1,993
Montreal £1,496
New York £1,512
Orlando £1,695

South America Caribbean

Cancun £1,405
Port of Spain £1,795
St Lucia £1,795
Rio de Janeiro £2,232

Middle East

Dubai £1,594
Tel Aviv £923
Bahrain £1,495
Amman £944

India

New Delhi £1,495
Mumbai £1,595

S.E. Asia

Bangkok £1,894
Chengdu £1,893
Hong Kong £2,294

Africa

Most fares in the mid £2,000 price range. Not spectacular.
But Marrakech at £319 and Agadir at £299 are closer to peak economy fare levels

To easily find availability, I suggest that you use this excellent Low Price Finder tool from British Airways or go to my British Airways Page above.

As usual, online, it’s a case of ‘instant purchase’ i.e. Book and pay and committed in one transaction.
Travel Agents can book the same fares. If they are using reservation systems such as Amadeus, Sabre or TravelPort, they can ‘hold’ seats for you for up to 3 days whilst your traveller decides.
You will of course incur an additional fee for this service but if it is an ends to obtaining that ‘last seat’ it may be worth it!

Book by Tuesday 12th November
Travel from 6th November

Eurostar Sale September 2013

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Eurostar is offering fares of £59 return in Standard Class and £159 return in Standard Premier to Paris, Lille, Calais, Brussels and any Belgium station!

20,000 seats are being made available to Paris and another 20,000 to Brussels

The sale begins today and must be booked on or before Monday 16th September

Travel is for 30 September through to 19 December but there are exclusions:

4-7 October,
24 October-04 November
8-11 November.

The good news is that the fares are “combinable” with Eurostar “normal” prices so you may still benefit from a lower fare overall

Bookings direct on www.eurostar.com attract a £4 credit card fee

Is this British Airways Sale Genuine?

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The airline has announced a sale for bookings made up to Tuesday 24 September

Reduced prices appear to be offered for practically all destinations, in economy and business class.

Europe Fares are quoted one-way and are very interesting, for example:

Alicante & Barcelona from £39
Helsinki from £86 (When choosing a return availability I found an even lower £66 one-way and £146 return fare)

Fare East fares e.g. Bangkok £744 even in December are pretty spectacular – considering the high price of oil.
The actual air fare received by the airline is £600 and the remainder, £144, is comprised of UK government tax (£83) and airport charges

To see all the destinations you should visit this page but you should be aware that the prices advertised are offered for departure dates and you then need to search to find an inbound fare at a reasonable price.

So, yes, the sale is genuine but you may have to spend some time searching to find a price you’re willing to pay

Bonus miles on Emirates Airline flights

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Emirates Airline is offering bonus miles – but only on less popular flights.

For example, from Heathrow to Dubai the bonus applies to the day flight departing 08:40 and arriving 18:45, or the 17:00 departure arriving Dubai at 02:50

The bonus is 1,000 miles per flight for economy class, 2,000 miles for business and 3,000 for First Class travel

At the time of this post, there are no bonus flights offered for the following months in 2013

July, September, November or December

To opt into the scheme you need to either book online at Emirates where you’ll receive the bonus automatically or if booking through an agent, you’ll need to login to your account and visit this page which will activate your registration.

This must be done during the same month that you purchase the ticket.

The good news is that the deal applies irrespective of the fare you pay.

Free hotel stopover in Dubai flying with Emirates

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Emirates now have 5 daily A380 aircraft flying to Dubai and an onward worldwide network. To fill these planes, they offer very competitive fares worldwide. However, when looking for seats, sometimes there may not be a suitable connection in Dubai.

The minimum connection time in Dubai between Emirates flights is just 1 hour and 15 minutes .

If the best available connection requires 8 or more hours stay in Dubai (economy class) or 6 hours + (business class) Emirates will provide free stopover hotel in Dubai

There are other rules, you must be flying Emirates in and out of Dubai (and not a code-share flight),

and the “ticket fare” i.e. the net amount paid to Emirates (net of commission or travel agent markups) must be as follows:

Fare East: USD1,100 return
West Asia & Gulf, Middle East USD900 return
Australia & New Zealand: Any fare – no minimum price
East Africa USD800
Rest of Africa USD850

And all Skywards redemption tickets except Saver Economy are eligible, although I don’t rate Skywards very highly – see my article here.

Economy passengers only get to stay in the Copthorne Airport Hotel which, according to our hotel comparison site, is worth approximately £80 – £100 per night.

Business and First class passengers will be accommodated in Le Meridien Dubai which would normally cost between £200 and £300

The stopovers, called “Dubai Connect” must be booked in advance via Emirates and only after tickets are issued 

Stansted Express Discount April 2013

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Again this month we have researched Discounted Stansted Express Train Fares.

A standard fare, London Liverpool Street to Stansted is now £23.40 single and £32.80 return
Tottenham Hale Station (good for the Victoria tube line) is slightly cheaper at £21.00 single and £30.50 return.

If you use the referral link from easyJet here, you’ll be quoted £18.70 single and £30.00 return but there is no reduction for Tottenham Hale station. There is no necessity to fly easyJet!

Cheaper still, is this referral link from Ryanair with a standard class single fare of £18.75 and a return price of £26.70

That’s a saving of £6.10 per return ticket.

Ryanair previously warned that the charge would be in Euros and that there could be a fluctuation in the sterling amount debited. But this warning no longer appears on their website, so we’re guessing that the charge is now a fixed sterling amount.

Again, Tottenham Hale is not offered but there is no reason why you cannot board or disembark there on these deals.

As with the easyJet deal, there is no necessity to fly Ryanair to take advantage of the discount!

If you appreciate this impartial advice, do try our Hotel Search engine, as recommended by Ryanair.

Heathrow Express Discount April 2013

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Each month we search for discounts on the Heathrow Express Trains. There have been many different sources for discounts over the years but they come and go. So we check every one and update you here – saving you the effort.

The normal fare direct from heathrowexpress.com is £20 single and £34 return. Make the mistake of buying your ticket onboard and you’ll be charged an additional £5!

A travel company by the name of CJL Travel offers 10% discount on their front page, bottom right corner.

You’ll still be booking on the Heathrow Express website but at a lower price of £16.20 single and £30.60 return.

Here is the link for CJL Travel

We earn no financial kick-back from our selection. Booking Business Travel believes in pointing you in the best direction for the best deal, impartially. If you appreciate this, you can save on flights and hotels too so do try our recommended flight search and hotel search tools.

Double Avios flying with BA to selected destinations

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British Airways and American airlines are offering double reward Avios points for return bookings and travel before 30th April 2013

But the offer only applies to “premium classes” i.e. First and Business Class. And the double points only apply to the higher fare types, for example, with British Airways, in F, A, J, C, D class

You need to register here, before making your booking.

The offer applies to the following destinations:

USA

Chicago O’Hare
Las Vegas
Los Angeles
Philadelphia
San Diego
Seattle

OTHER

Bangkok
Beijing
Cairo
Delhi
Dubai
Hong Kong
Johannesburg
Rio de Janeiro
Sao Paulo
Sydney
Tel Aviv

British Airways to charge for check-in baggage?

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Within a week of KLM announcing that customers are to be given “more choice”, by charging separately for check-in bags, British Airways launches “hand baggage only” fares.

This is a different way of introducing a charge for baggage. It’s promoted as a saving, because hand baggage only fare is lower than their normal price by approximately £10 to £12

So we now have two-tier pricing, ‘with bags’ and ‘without bags’ which, after the introductory period amounts to paying more for taking baggage on your trip.

Which we think is a shame. Up to now, you could trust the BA fare to include everything whilst you knew that the easyJet and other no-frills airlines would charge extra fees.

The BA hand baggage fares apply only to Gatwick departures, for departures from 26th February.

To begin with, baggage only fares are available to the following destinations: Amsterdam, Dubrovnik, Jersey, Tunis and Turin.

The carry on allowance on BA is relatively generous: 56cm x 45cm x 25cm plus a handbag or laptop bag

Remember that the lowest BA fares are only available directly from ba.com

Please visit the British Airways tab above.

How to avoid KLM new baggage fees

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How to avoid KLM new baggage fees

The airline has just announced, as an enhancement, “providing more choice to passengers”, “the option to travel with just carry-on baggage or to check in baggage at a fee”

This applies to KLM European flights from 22nd April 2013

Of course, passengers have always had the choice! It’s just that they’ll now be charged for check-in bags, following the low cost or no frills airline model.

The charge is €15 each way – that’s around £26 extra per person per return journey for the first checked in baggage.

However, the following passengers will be exempt

NGO’s
All Flying Blue & BlueBiz members
Sky Team Elite Plus members
Corporate Contract holders

Simply become a Flying Blue member and avoid the baggage fees altogether. A one-page form asks for minimal information, takes just a minute to complete, and you’ll be instantly given a Flying Blue membership number. Apply via the KLM registration page here

And remember to use our flight search page to ensure that find the lowest KLM fares

Earn Miles for your Company bookings with Emirates Business Rewards

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Here’s an overview of the corporate reward scheme from Emirate Airlines.

Emirates has a rewards programme, “Business rewards” which accrues points for your company in addition to your traveller’s existing personal “Skywards” accounts.

Previously, only “online-direct” bookings were eligible but Emirates has now made the programme available for bookings made via agents too.

The standard earning rate is 1 mile or point per US$ spent.

Through February and March 2013 the airline is offering double points and a 10,000 bonus for registrations before 31st January 2013

London to Dubai return economy class costs 45,000 miles and business class costs 90,000 miles. An upgrade on the same route costs from 50-65,000 miles. So you’ll need to have booked approximately £30,000 of tickets for an economy flight and £60,000 for business. The business class redemption is by far the better deal, and equates to approximately 4% in cashback terms

This scheme is one of the most difficult to administer. Emirates seem to be paranoid about misuse so they have controls in place that limit you. For example:

  • Only employees of the company (i.e. not guests etc) are eligible. This is verified by email – the traveller has to have a company domain email address
  • You have to first be a Skywards member
  • You need to “invite” individual members to join the scheme via an online form and those members have to respond, online.

For more information and to sign up, visit the Emirates page here

Buy your Euros here before 31 March to earn a bonus 1,000 Avios

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British Airways has teamed up with American Express foreign exchange service with this offer; Spend over £300 before 31 March 2012 and they’ll reward you with a bonus 1,000 Avios

We’ve compared the rates offered and if you only spend approximately £300 they appear to be marginally better than the Post office and Travelex. If you are spending in the region of £1,000 you may benefit from an extra 10 Euros from alternatives such as Travelex

For more information visit the BA American Express site here

Remember that it’s usually cheaper to purchase currency online rather than directly at UK airports. You can still benefit from lower rates even if you order for airport collection.

easyJet new route and fares to Moscow from under £120 return

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easyJet begin their daily Gatwick to Moscow services on Monday March 18 with fares of less than £120 return.

The airline is filling the gap left by BMI who used to fly the route and were taken over by British Airways, with prices of £47.49 outbound and £62.49 inbound, on sale from today.

British Airways return fares are in the region of £238

Flights depart early, from Gatwick at 07:00 arriving at 13:50 but from Monday 15th April there are two flights to choose between. The second departure is at 14:10 arriving 21:00

Return flights depart at 15:30 and from the 15th an additional 21:40 from Moscow

Moscow is only 3 hours 50 minutes flying time from London.

Unfortunately, visas still take considerably longer (allow several weeks). More information on visas is available on the VISA tab, above.

Starwood Guest Discounts European 72hr Sale

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Starwood group, comprising Sheraton, Westin and Le Meridien amongst others, has a sale of European city stays, at over 250 hotels, for up to 72 hours at www.beatthetimer.com/

The prices are approximately 30% off their normal rates and appear to be available to everyone, not just Starwood Preferred Guest members.

For example, the Munich Westin Grand, normally EUR139 per night is reduced to EUR99.
The Hotel Kämp, Helsinki is priced at EUR145 and the lowest rate, prepaid and non refundable, is usually EUR179

Annoyingly, the prices do not include VAT so you may have to add typically 7 – 10 & to the above rates. The additional tax amounts are only displayed after you select the hotel and click on ‘Terms and Details’ or ‘Book’. Nevertheless, the rates still represent good value.

Here is the link to go direct to BeatTheTimer.com.

British Airways Sale – Book by Tuesday 22nd January

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The economy airfare sale started around Christmas time but the First and Business Class sale begins today. Bookings must be made and ticketed by midnight on Tuesday.

Is the British Airways Sale applicable to business travel-bookings?

If you’re looking for economy fares within Europe then the answer is most certainly yes, providing that you can adhere to the airfare restrictions.

Sale fares are priced based on one way tickets rather than return. The airline has to do this in order to compete with the no-frills airlines who nearly always offer one way fares instead of return.

For all long haul travel in any class, and Club Europe, the sale fares require a Saturday Night stay. Most business travellers do not want to stay over a Saturday Night and the airline knows this.

Our suggestion; Ask the traveller if he’d like to stay longer. Throw in a decent hotel and the total price should still save your company money!

Stansted Express Discount November December 2012

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A new offer has just been launched by Stansted Express which is only available for bookings made online for two people travelling together and is available for travel any time!

The price is just £10 each way, per person, for Liverpool Street and £9 per person for Tottenham Hale.

The Tottenham Hale reduction is especially nice as I have always resented paying the same price for Tottenham to Stansted as for Liverpool Street to Stansted.

Use the following promo code:
For Liverpool Street: DuoL
For Tottenham Hale: DuoT

Click on the Web Duo train link here: Stansted Express Website

The normal return fare for individual travellers is still £31.50 but this can be reduced by as much as £8.25 simply by booking through the Ryanair link below. The return fare is priced at € 29.03 so it may fluctuate due to exchange rates. I’ve always achieved the best fare by visiting Ryan Air here

Suprisingly – there are no extras!

Please come back and see how much you could save on hotels by trying our recommended hotel search comparison site – thank you!

Heathrow Express Discount November 2012

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Every month we research the discounts available on Heathrow Express and this month the best discount we’ve found is 10%

The normal online fare for comparison is £34 return and £18 single

Two travelling together:

Up to 31 January 2013

Two travel together for £25 per person. You need to use this code DUO12 in the promotion box to get the discount Full details from the Heathrow Express Site  here

Individual traveller discounts

For some bizarre reason, ANA – the Japanese Airline continues to offer the best November 2012 discount on Heathrow Express, as first announced by us nearly two years ago!

The return fare is £30.60 and the single is £16.20

Book directly on the Heathrow Express website below to get the discount

If you appreciate my impartial advice, do try the fantastic hotel comparison site on my Hotel Search page as I promise you the lowest hotel prices too.

Here’s the link to Heathrow Express with a saving of £3.40 or 10%

Avios Sale 25% off flight costs

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Starting today, Wednesday 14th November, the “miles” or Avios points required for bookings is being reduced by 25%

This does not apply to short-haul European flights which still cost 9,000 15,000 and 20,000 Avios

But for other longer flights e.g. to Tel Aviv, the cost is reduced from 25,000 Avios to 18,750 !

This is an excellent deal so book a.s.a.p. to find availability.

Bookings must be made by Monday 19th November

Travel up to 31 May

Only for departures from London airports

Go to British Airways via our link above

 

British Airways Sale ends Midnight Tuesday 13 November

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The British Airways sale is advertised as the “Luxury” seat sale but you’d be wrong to dismiss it as being the same as some previous sales.

This time the fares include European routes and some offer club Europe business class seats at less than economy prices!

Bookings must be made before midnight Tuesday.

Valid for travel as follows:

Europe, from City airport for travel 15 December 2012 to 31 January 2013
Most other worldwide destinations are for travel 14 December 2012 and 4 January 2012 (except Orlando, Tampa and Caribbean through most of 2013)

I’ve seen Amsterdam at £139 return, Zagreb £159, Dubai at £999 including tax

Use this Lowest Fare Finder find the best fares.

How to extend Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles expiry date

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A traveller friend of mine has some 36,000 miles and a silver status about to expire because she hasn’t flown recently.

I telephoned Virgin Atlantic yesterday to check, because their website isn’t 100% clear regarding extension of miles.

Please note that we’re discussing miles here, not status. There’s nothing you can do about your status.

The cheapest and most effective way to extend the life of your Virgin Atlantic Flying Club miles is to logon to your account and DONATE 1,000 miles to “Free the Children”

Yes, that’s correct, not “save” the children but “free” the children!

Such activity will renew your account for another 3 years.

There are alternatives. You can buy miles but at £30 for 1,000 that’s very poor value. Or you can spend miles at Virgin Wine for example – 12,500 miles provides a £50 voucher

But we believe that the donation avenue is the most cost effective.

STOP PRESS!
If you travel Premium economy or Upper class with Virgin we have access to fares that may be cheaper than online. Contact us.

Ramada Hotels just £20 per night Book by Sunday 21 October

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The Independent newspaper is offering a promotion at 35 Ramada hotels including the Docklands in London.

See the article here

Stay anytime between 8 November 2012 and 7 November 2013

You’ll need to print out a token to present upon arrival.

A dropdown list of hotels and the availability is available here

www.ramada.co.uk/£20

Maximum 3 bookings per person!

Hilton Sale – Book by Midnight Wednesday 17th October

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A flash sale by Hilton group including Waldorf Astoria and Conrad has been announced

For Europe, it is only available for weekend stays (Friday, Saturday, Sunday nights) but for other destinations, any day of the week.

Valid for dates up to 29th December, discounts of up to 40%

Book directly through Hilton.com but remember to also compare rates via our comparison site.