Hi,

I just saw the BA announcement (probably old news for some),they are changing the BA miles to a new name Avios Points:http://www.britishairways.com/travel...?link=main_nav

For me, using the Reward Flight Saver it seems that flightsto and from Zurich will cost less if you do a part cash part points (Avios& Money). I would like to know what others think?

Cheers

If you end up needing to spend your money as part of a reward flight it sounds to me like they will be costing you more.

How come? In a lot of cases, the amount of miles/points in both cases has not change http://www.britishairways.com/travel...e/public/en_gb ie 9000 miles/points to Zurich with Euro Traveller. However the charges (taxes, fees..etc) have changed from £45+ to fixed amount of £27.

Am I missing something?

As one with far too many BA miles that I can't use, it doesn't seem much of a change. The odd non-business trip to the UK often isn't worthwhile using them, what with extra fees and taxes on top, especially if they're inconvenient for the final destination and there's quicker alternatives.

I was disappointed to see that they've not brought in any way to spend them on things that I might actually want, as is the case with my Swiss Miles&More points, where they have all sorts of stuff to simply buy with points from their website.

It's unclear yet whether previous Airmiles(tm) benefits like days out and sports events will be available, but if so it's a step in the right direction. Similarly their wine offers, although it seems wrong to be buying the stuff, even with points not cash, at UK tax-paid prices, when I can buy most stuff for half the price or less in France.

Still, at least I might be able to get _something_ out of it.

Update:

There is more to this than meets the eye... Have a read ..

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/ar...nds-Avios.html

Might actually be a benefit to me. I'm one of the BA customers who currently pay the taxes on reward flights. A return flight to London still cost £100 in taxes. So if it will truly be £27 flat rate instead of the taxes that would be welcome. But I wouldn't hold my breathe.

If anyone was BA miles they don't or can't use, I'll gladly accept them! My kids would be eternally grateful to see me more often.

Are you sure about that

I didn't have to pay taxes before, so now I have to pay taxes. Big difference.

Same thing happened when Swiss (Qualiflyer) was merged into Lufthansa M&M. What was previously free started to cost Fr.100 upwards.

Well definitely the 2 year old. The 6-going-on-16 year old, well, that depends on what I bring with me!

The Avios scheme is no live, and I am really pleased that my rewards flights from Zurich to London City do indeed only cost £27 return (cashing in 9000 points). My last rewards flight cost about £100 on the same route.

I also had a look at earning more points by not going with the cheapest/reduced points option. Business class actually works out cheaper than economy! But still probably not worth it.

Hmmm... the flights I've looked at from ZRH to LHR seem to be cost 9000 points plus £100.10 for taxes and to LCY 9000 plus £107.05

Is it just me or is the website more than a little frustrating?

Just looked at a one way flight to Edinburgh in April - it now costs 4500 miles plus CHF 20, whereas before it was 4500 miles plus around £67 in taxes.

Looks like a big improvement for trips that connect in Heathrow, which are taxed relatively highly.

Those were the prices I used to pay for rewards flights. How long ago was that? This change was the latter half of last week.

i never really paid attention to this but used up half my BA miles last year because i got warning letters that they would expire. now apparently i have 12,000 left but not sure what this is good for. i'm not even sure how i have them since i haven't flown BA for years and don't use any FF programme.

i'd be happy if i can get a free/cheap holiday somewhere though

I've accumulated (and used) heaven knows how many BA Miles in the past 20 years and I soon came to the conclusion that using miles for a short haul flight did not save me any money, what with one thing or another, and buying an inexpensive economy ticket (BA or Swiss, not EasyJet) was the way to go.

Whereas for medium haul (anything over 4hrs) or longer, getting business class tickets in exchange for BA miles always worked out as a significant saving over even the most keenly priced business class fare. From what I've read, many BA long-haul destinations will now require fewer miles - which appeals.

I will be following the Avios developments with interest

That was Friday night. I've just gone through the booking process again and it is still 9000 plus £100.10 although I am booking for next week. On Friday I picked a random weekend in February and got the same price. I thought I'd double check again tonight, so I picked a random return in March... and I can't tell you the price as the blinking web-site is so slow I've lost all patience

£100.10 is still cheaper than the £243 it would cost me without using my miles for the trip next week although if I have to wait any longer for the webpage to refresh, I may actually miss the flight!

EDIT: After 4 minutes or so, the web-site refreshed with the same price £100.10 plus 9000 miles for the first weekend in March 2012

OK - Just tried the same flights for next week using the BA Exec Club website rather than the Avios site.

This time I get 9000 points plus 40CHF. Much more appealing. Problem is that I haven't got enough BA Avios points to book through their web-site. I can merge the miles but I doubt this is something that will be quick.

Quick update.

I tried to actually book the flights today but still had the price difference between Avios and BA Exec Club. I used the online chat on the Avios site and got great help from an agent. It turned out my account at Air Miles had lapsed because I hadn't accrued any miles recently but I still had a valid balance. That's why I had the £100.10 price showing rather than £27.

The good news is that the agent was able to quickly transfer my balance to my BA Exec Club membership and after about 10 mins the credit showed and I have now booked my flights for next week for the princely sum of 40CHF!!

A couple of points I observed about using the Avios site - it doesn't accept Swiss mobile numbers - with or without the international codes (0041 or +41). This number can however, be changed once the booking is made.

I booked flights last Wednesday using part Avios part cash...
I'll be flying MAN-LHR-ZRH return, arriving 01 Dec and I paid £27 plus 9k points...
Personally I am pleased with the change to Avios.. the introduction of the Reward Flight Saver means that I can finally use some of my miles/points.

Me too. I've just blown all my 18,000 Avios points and booked two return flights to/from London. One wasn't even for me. I picked dates/times over Christmas that would have been very expensive to buy, and all it cost me was £27 in fees/taxes for each return ticket. Happy.