Searching for Aer Lingus Award Flights for British Airways Avios Redemptions

Posted by Noob Master on Jan 17, 2013 in Avios, Award Booking, British Airways, Qantas, Uncategorized | 4 comments

Since my “Falling in Love With British Airways Avios” post last week, I received a s#@% load of emails asking me about how I searched for award availability for my Aer Lingus flights to Dublin. Like whoa.

[Lucky was the first to break this early last year]

Good question. I explained how I called into British Airways to book the flight, but I didn’t go into detail about how I did the basic searching.

If you’re a member of ExpertFlyer, you can search for award availability there. However, I did my searching on the Qantas website. Qantas is an Australian airline that isn’t in the same alliance as Aer Lingus, but they are partners. Qantas is a OneWorld alliance member, and their award search engine is worth getting to know.

You can also search United.com for Aer Lingus availability, but I choose to stay away.

You must have a Qantas membership to search for award flights on their site. You can sign up here for a Qantas account. Easy. Now, it’s time to search.

After signing into your Qantas account – scroll down the page, and you will see the “Award Bookings” search function.

Qantas Award Bookings

Just enter your dates, destination, and click, “go.”

Aer-Lingus Availability

The little shamrock clover is Aer Lingus’ moniker thats helps you quickly identify an Aer Lingus flight. As you can see, there are economy seats available, but not business class seats.

I did a couple more searches, and couldn’t find any business class availability for Aer Lingus on the dates I was searching. But, there was plenty of availability in economy.

However, when I booked our Boston – Dublin flights, there wasn’t any business class availability showing on the Qantas website. When I called British Airways (1-800-452-1201), the agent was able to see business class availability for both of the Aer Lingus flights for that day.

I instantly booked a one-way ticket for Jordan and myself in business class for only 50,000 Avios and $61.14 in taxes. It would’ve only cost us 25,000 Avios if we wanted to rough-it-out in economy for 6 hours. Ehh, Avios are too easy to earn, so I burn ‘em.

And when the agent told me there was a phone booking fee, I politely told him that it wasn’t available to book on the British Airways website. He put me on a brief hold and came back with, “you’re right,” and then proceeded to waive the fee. Winning.

This is a great deal, because normally you wouldn’t be able to use Avios to cross the transatlantic without a hefty surcharge and fee. Going through Aer Lingus negates the annoying British Airways fees. Many people route through Dublin on their way to Europe to avoid London and their hefty airport fees as well.

Since I’m flying out of Boston, I will have to find a positioning flight, but that shouldn’t be an issue – I have options.

Avios isn’t my favorite subject, but I certainly have a very soft spot for them. I’ve flown cheaply domestically many times, and they are just so darn easy to accumulate.

British Airways and Chase have their co-branded British Airways Visa Signature® Card (This offer is expired). British Airways is also a transfer partner of Ultimate Rewards and Membership Rewards programs. There are usually transfer bonuses when you transfer Membership Rewards out to British Airways, but none at the moment.

I hope this helps and best of luck as you search!

— Noob Master

Falling in love with British Airways Avios….Again.

Posted by Noob Master on Jan 10, 2013 in Avios, Award Booking, British Airways, travel tips, Uncategorized | 2 comments

It happens all the time. I remember my love for Avios when I redeem them for a redic low fare. Then I forget about them again, and become pre-occupied with the pretty girl, a.k.a. Ultimate Rewards points, as I should.

But when it comes time again for me to pet my Avios balance, I’m always left happy. Check my latest series on maximizing Avios points if don’t know about the value they pack.

• Part 1: Intra-European: British Airways, Iberia, airberlin, Finnair
• Part 2: Intra-African: Comair
• Part 3: Intra-Australasian: Cathay Pacific and Qantas

This last weekend, I went on an award booking spree, and British Airways Avios played a key role in my bookings. These are the bookings I made in my tipsyness.

Boston – Dublin

Jordan wants to go to Ireland, so what kind of husband would I be if I didn’t make it happen? Plus, she’s dying to do the Guinness tour in Dublin. Yeah, she’s that cool.

We all know that British Airways has a distanced-based award chart and that they have hefty fuel & tax surcharges on longer flights. However, you can fly from Boston to Dublin for only 25,000 round-trip in coach, or 50,000 round-trip in business class! That’s a steal, and the taxes are low because it’s on Aer Lingus and a shorter flight. Sweet spot.

I ended up booking Bos-Dublin, one-way for 50,000 Avios and $61.14 for BOTH of us in business class on Aer Lingus. This is one of the best values around. I had to call into British Airways because I couldn’t make the booking on their website. Shocker. They did waive the phone booking fee without a problem.

This booking made me fall in love again with British Airways Avios.

We may even use Avios again for our positioning flight to Boston, or I’ll use our Southwest Companion Pass. We have time and options.

Dublin – LHR

We don’t want to spend more than a couple of days in Ireland, so we used some Avios to get over to London. We will be traveling with friends who have lived in London, so it’s going to be a good time getting escorted by people who know their way around. Can’t wait.

Here’s what our short flight cost us:

Dub-LHR

I’m more than happy to spend 9,000 Avios and $45 for the both of us. I checked out Ryanair and the fares were affordable, but they kill you with fees on bags and other silly things.

DFW – Miami

We’re taking a cruise out of Miami in April, so I went ahead and booked our flights there. We’re going out of DFW since we will be seeing family the week before, and it’s a better rate with Avios. We would have to connect through Dallas most likely anyway.

Here’s the damage:

DFW – Miami

That’s right. 15,000 Avios & $5 for both of us! I can live with that.

Ways to get British Airways Avios

There’s a 50,00 offer on the British Airways Visa Signature® Card. You will get 50,000 Avios after spending $1,000 in 3 months, though.

There’s a 30% bonus on American Express Membership Rewards transferred into British Airways until January 14th. I transferred over 50,000 Membership Rewards points to top off my British Avios balance for the previous bookings.

British Airways is also a transfer partner of Ultimate Rewards. The points transfer at a 1:1 ratio. I wish Chase would come out with transfer bonuses to their loyalty partners. The Chase Freedom® Visa , Chase Sapphire Preferred®, Ink Bold® Business Card, and Ink Plus® Business Card all earn Ultimate Rewards points.

As you can tell, there are many ways to earn or top off your British Airways Avios account. Always make sure you have a plan or upcoming travel before you go transferring points out.

I’ve always found value with Avios, and find them to come in handy often. I highly recommend earning Avios, and looking for ways to maximize their value.

[Disclaimer: I receive a referral credit for the cards mentioned in the post above. Thanks for the support if you decide to apply through the Noobtraveler]

— Noob Master

I Have this Awesome Award Trip! But I Changed My Mind…

Posted by Noob Master on Jan 3, 2013 in Award Booking, Miles, Noob Contributor, travel tips, Uncategorized | 0 comments

[Noob contributor, Ethan, tackles fees on award bookings.]

Changes/Cancellations to Award Travel

So you’ve got a lot of miles, and have booked your award. But something comes up! You change your mind, want to go somewhere else, or need to change your dates. Well, just because the trip is mostly free doesn’t mean the airlines are going to let you off easy.

There are several similar fees that American AAdvantage, Delta SkyMiles, United MileagePlus, and US Airways Dividend Miles charge. They are:

1. A phone reservation fee

2. A close-in booking fee if the award leaves within 21 days

3. A fee for changing your origin/destination

4. A mileage redeposit fee (if you want your miles back when you cancel.

Everyone but United considers a change of the origin or destination a new award, so they charge the same redeposit fee as canceling the ticket outright.

Here’s a chart of what the big 4 airlines charge:

How to Avoid Fees?

Avoiding the phone reservation fee is pretty simple- do your booking online. If you’re trying an especially complicated award and the internet is giving you trouble, you can probably convince the reservation agent to waive the phone fee if they know you tried.

Close-in booking is equally easy, just know the rules for each carrier. Delta, obviously, is free! The caveat to Delta’s close-in booking being free is that you must book at least 72 hours in advance. But that’s much better than 21 days if you’re using miles last minute!

Keep partners in mind as well! You can avoid close-in fees on American by using your British Airways Avios points to book your award (though they charge higher fuel surcharges for some trips).

Finally, keep your changes to a minimum. Just like booking with cash, knowing your plans before you book can save you a lot of money down the road.

Another Perk of Being Important…

But wait, there’s another way to avoid fees: ELITE STATUS! For top-tier elites on these airlines allvof these fees are ZERO, ZILCH, NADA. A big reason for me making a mileage run this year was to make Platinum on UA so I could make all the award changes I want for free! I’ve already changed my honeymoon award trip once, am going to try to add a segment, and plan to put our Lufthansa segment in First class if I can when those come available close to departure! Mid-tier elites also catch breaks on some of the fees, but not all, and some low tier elites pay the same fees.

What About Southwest?

Southwest does things a little differently. Their award system is revenue based, meaning you earn off how much you spend. The redemptions are also based on spend: each Southwest point is worth 1.67 cents (for a Wanna Get Away fare), and cheaper $$ flights means cheaper points flights. So the same rules apply to awards as to normal bookings, which means NO CHANGE FEES! You will pay more points if you book close-in, because fares will be higher. But no fees. The only caveat is that if you cancel outright, the value remains in the award ticket as it would with a cash ticket, so you’ll have 1 year to use those points for a new award.

Before you book an award, make sure you know the rules for your program. There are obviously a lot more airlines out there, so do your research ahead of time if you collect points elsewhere, and be aware of the fees you might incur. If you’re an elite traveler, change away! But if you’re earning miles/points mostly on credit cards then you may not have that luxury. Planning ahead can help you avoid a lot of these fees, and no fees helps everyone enjoy that awesome award trip that much more.

— Noob Master