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BA Economy and Premium Economy class flash sale and how you can find the cheap ex-EU flights.

British Airways have loaded a very short sale for transatlantic and Middle Eastern flights for World Travaller and World Traveller Plus classes. You need book by 23:59hrs GMT on 25th March 2014. Travel can be anytime between now and 12th December 2014.

Screenshot from 2014-03-22 18:38:27

The interesting thing is that as long as you satisfy the terms of this other promotion by Shell Drivers Club, then you can get a further 20% discount by using “ShellMARZH” in the promotional code box. The deadline is even more restrictive as this code expires on 24th March 2014.

Examining the dates for cheapest flights a little more, it seems the majority (if not all) headline prices appear to be in October-December 2014 period. With the exception of July, the April-September fares are all around 15-20% higher than Oct-Dec. It goes without saying that some destinations will not have ‘cheap tickets' on certain dates if there are major events nearby such as a FIFA World cup in Brazil, or Formula One Grand Prix which can affect several countries.

Don't forget that with World Traveller Plus fares departing the UK you should be able to request a Proactive Online Upgrade (POU) which will earn Club World Tier Points. For ex-Europe flights the POU option will not usually be available. You can even use BA's 24hr cancellation policy to check how much the upgrade cost is, and if you don't like it just cancel your ticket.

If you credit your BA flights to American Airlines then World Traveller Plus will earn 1.5EQP per mile flown.

Continental Club has, very usefully, compared the prices currently available (which includes non-sale items) against the previous sale in a table which I have included it at the end of this post. You will be able to see from his results that fares this time round are on the whole more expensive.

The real fun of BA sales, however, is if you start playing with the ex-Europe departures. You can do this in a couple of ways, with varying powers of success.

1) If you go to any of google.com/flights, google.co.uk/flights or google.nl/flights (depending on if you want your results displayed in USD, GBP or EUR respectively), and replace the departure city with where you want to try, up to a maximum of 5 airport codes, and leave the destination field blank, you can have an at-a-glace overview of prices. Under the “Airline” drop down menu select “Oneworld” and this will only flag up the Oneworld marketed flights (duh!).

Screenshot from 2014-03-22 19:11:14

2) Following Flyertalk's “Ex-Mainland Europe Travel Planning Guide” If you go to ITA Matrix (if you are totally unfamiliar, here is my beginners' guide), and put the following code in the “from” field:

AMS;ARN;ATH;BRU;BUD;CAI;CPH;FRA;HEL;IST;LCA;LIN;LIS;PAR;VIE;WAW :: BA+

for extra through searches, you should adapt the above airport codes to suit you. You might also want to try the following set too:

DUB;DUS;HAM;LUX;MAD;OSL;OTP;PRG;RTM;SOF;ZAG :: BA+

in the “to” field, put your destination airport codes (substitution YYY) with the airport code or codes you're after:

YYY:: BA+

and don't forget to enter your desired currency in the “currency” field. You should have something which looks like this:

Screenshot from 2014-03-22 19:23:11

The advantage of using Matrix is in its power of detailed and highly-filtered searches. Its clear disadvantage is that you cannot book flights directly through them after you have found it. This is to some extent mitigated by Google Flights which links you straight to a pre-populated airline booking page, but it's not entirely bug-free. I often encounter some price mismatches.

Here's that Continental Club table I promised earlier. Note that these are prices from London:

    World Traveller World Traveller World Traveller Plus World Traveller Plus
    Economy Economy Premium Economy Premium Economy
    This Sale Last Sale This Sale Last Sale
North America        
Atlanta   £514 £499 £989 £819
Austin   £524 £509 £1,114 £889
Boston   £454 £439 £883 £759
Calgary   £686 £659 £1,164 £1,039
Chicago   £518 £469 £997 £849
Dallas   £642 £589 £1,070 £969
Denver   £709 £659 £1,159 £1,039
Houston   £534 £519 £1,071 £889
Las Vegas   £664 £572 £998 £902
Los Angeles   £514 £483 £994 £889
Miami   £582 £569 £1,044 £949
Montreal   £522 £518 £930 £818
New York   £424 £429 £888 £749
Orlando   £463 £462 £997 £842
Philadelphia   £494 £479 £949 £799
Phoenix   £594 £579 £1,130 £959
San Diego   £704 £654 £1,132 £1,034
San Francisco   £564 £549 £1,141 £929
Seattle   £584 £569 £1,160 £949
Tampa   £463 £462 £997 £862
Toronto   £503 £499 £930 £799
Vancouver   £613 £608 £1,119 £988
Washington   £524 £469 £949 £789
           
Latin America & Caribbean      
Antigua   £593 £544 £993 £876
Bermuda   £650 £545 £1,002 £849
Bridgetown   £594 £525 £994 £795
Buenos Aires   £752 £724 £1,189 £1,105
Cancun   £643 £559 £1,043 £863
Grand Cayman £799 £700 £1,184 £1,072
Grenada   £593 £544 £993 £876
Kingston   £708 £708 £1,110 £1,108
Mexico City   £802 £689 £1,210 £1,022
Nassau   £763 £671 £1,110 £1,043
Port of Spain   £623 £555 £1,023 £887
Providenciales £889 £806 £1,409
Punta Cana   £603 £525 £1,003 £845
Rio de Janeiro £831 £648 £1,295 £1,018
Sao Paulo   £860 £690 £1,347 £1,060
St Kitts   £641 £578 £996 £910
St Lucia   £594 £545 £994 £877
Tobago   £593 £545 £993 £877
           
Middle East          
Abu Dhabi   £435 £397 £704 £664
Amman   £417 £299
Bahrain   £435 £397 £704 £664
Beirut   £449 £297
Doha   £435 £398 £704 £665
Dubai   £388 £397 £657 £632
Jeddah   £471 £470 £748 £750
Kuwait   £471 £469 £891 £891
Muscat   £435 £398 £704 £665
Riyadh   £465 £398 £734 £665
Tel Aviv   £389 £369 £751 £647
           
South Asia          
Almaty   £568 £569 £800 £799
Baku   £468 £423
Bengalaru   £532 £530 £754 £750
Chennai   £530 £530 £750 £750
Colombo   £515 £515 £897 £897
Hyderabad   £539 £530 £701 £732
Male   £651 £643 £1,193 £1,147
Mumbai   £506 £499 £711 £702
New Delhi   £524 £521 £685 £724
           
Far East & Australia      
Bangkok   £566 £584 £988 £1,004
Beijing   £632 £620 £954 £931
Chengdu   £599 £571 £867 £841
Hong Kong   £594 £602 £972 £1,013
Seoul   £711 £712 £981 £982
Shanghai   £478 £529 £936 £790
Singapore   £597 £639 £1,081 £1,120
Sydney   £777 £832 £1,650 £1,716
Tokyo   £649 £835 £899 £1,245
           
Africa          
Abuja   £694 £609 £1,053 £916
Accra   £670 £627 £1,070 £904
Cairo   £313 £364 £685 £631
Cape Town   £845 £759 £1,287 £1,199
Entebbe   £537 £609 £816 £886
Freetown   £516 £613 £785 £880
Johannesburg £773 £638 £1,217 £1,078
Lagos   £527 £572 £1,069 £915
Mauritius   £644 £643 £1,176 £1,177
Monrovia   £545 £663 £814 £930
Nairobi   £533 £619 £815 £937

 

 

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