Boost Your Airmiles Discussion Area

NonGeographicalMan

The position is clearly complicated and there will be winners and losers. Those of us who live near Gatwick and Heathrow rather than in the regions may lose out to some extent so that the regional types get a better deal. However all of us will benefit from the introduction of one ways and stopovers. So you can fly to Sydney return but stopping in Singapore outbound and in Bangkok on the way home or even construct a round the world trip made up of One Ways.

Although it does sound like the amount of taxes to be paid long haul could be a problem. I'm going to have to have a careful look at this and see whether I need to be taking a part miles, part cash flight under the old scheme rules to somewhere long haul I have never been whilst stocks last. I might also try and see if there is any Gatwick to Inverness availability under with FlyBe under the present scheme rules.

With great respect to stayathomedad him collecting Air Miles so he could retire to Australia was clearly a daft plan as the current Air Miles scheme does not allow one way flights and nor would it have allowed him to make return trips to the UK originating in Australia once he had retired there. However Avios miles will allow him to buy a one way ticket from London to Australia, albeit in conjunction with a cash contribution.

NonGeographicalMan

Any wrote: »

Airmiles always had some "12 mths rule" before.. You had to pay fee if you didn't collect 1 Airmile in the past 12 months..

No they didn't "always" have that rule. It was introduced about three years ago along with the rule that you lose all your miles if you haven't collected any at all for the last two years.

But anyhow at least the "regular collector" rule of the Avios scheme hasn't been made any worse.

I think it is worth pointing out that Air Miles collectors could originally convert to BA Miles at something like 14 to 1 for a limited period so we aren't getting as good a deal as that. However if I can get a Club class ticket at a reasonable fare long haul when I want to travel then it may not be such a bad deal.

Also BA Miles collectors just had a half price sale for converting miles to tickets. So hopefully once we are Avios miles holders the same thing will also be available to us from time to time.

Any

O.K., always and the last 3 years seems the same to me... :-) I only collect for 3 years.
I also noticed Nectar now has 12 mths rule, I've never notice that before..

stayathomedad_2

NonGeographicalMan wrote: »

With great respect to stayathomedad him collecting Air Miles so he could retire to Australia was clearly a daft plan as the current Air Miles scheme does not allow one way flights and nor would it have allowed him to make return trips to the UK originating in Australia once he had retired there. However Avios miles will allow him to buy a one way ticket from London to Australia, albeit in conjunction with a cash contribution.

The plan is to live in australia part of the year and uk for the rest so there would always be a flight originating in uk and returning to uk from Australia. I am assuming this is ok?

Also I thought I could build up miles and transfer to relatives so they could visit. Is this not allowed either?

NonGeographicalMan

stayathomedad wrote: »

The plan is to live in australia part of the year and uk for the rest so there would always be a flight originating in uk and returning to uk from Australia. I am assuming this is ok?

I can't recall ever seeing if there is a maximum duration to an Air Miles return flight and can't seem to track that down on a quick Google. However trying to book a return out and back 6 months apart from one another ought to test the point.

Also I thought I could build up miles and transfer to relatives so they could visit. Is this not allowed either?

You can buy seats for other people with your Air Miles in their name on your own account and do not have to travel as a member of their party as I understand things. I doubt that anything will change on that under the new Aveo scheme.

However part miles and part cash may work better for you anyway as a current cash fare to Australia is £1300 and its 10,000 Air Miles to avoid that but a part miles part cash seat is 2,500 Air Miles and around £650. So you can see that each air Mile is worth around 26p for part miles, part cash but only about 13p to fully avoid the cash fare. Of course it all depends how many Air Miles you have managed to rack up in the first place.

Also you can't really rely on any mileage scheme or even the BA/Iberia group to still be around in another 20 years time and as the real cost of jet fuel will keep rising they are bound to keep devaluing the conversion rate of miles as time goes by............

Also there are several cashback credit cards where you could earn 1% cashback on you spend each year and put that cashback in a deposit account. You may find that over 20 years that is actually more valuable and also more flexible than Air Miles.

One factor you don't seem to have considered is how poor flight availability is on UK to Australia as a router under the Air Miles scheme. You would be better off planning on retiring to South America or South Africa in terms of half way reasonable seat availability being available when you need to fly.

Also without wishing to be unduly pessimistic the cost in today's terms of an economy return air ticket to Australia in 20 years time may be around £5,000 at today's prices so that may mean swapping back and forth between the UK and Australia becomes an increasingly expensive option. Although iI agree that t is probably much simpler administratively to live in Australia for just under six months a year and so avoid immigration rules than to try and actually permanently emigrate there. You probably also have family in the UK you don't want to permanently lose contact with.

stayathomedad_2

NonGeographicalMan wrote: »

Also there are several cashback credit cards where you could earn 1% cashback on you spend each year and put that cashback in a deposit account. You may find that over 20 years that is actually more valuable and also more flexible than Air Miles.

Thanks for that, all very useful information. I considered a cashback credit card but don't think I have the discipline not to spend the cash whereas I think I could avoid spending airmiles.

EDIT - just searched and at the moment the first flights to Australia are on 15 Nov and latest return is 8 Jul. Assuming it is similar in january and you can book to fly in Mar and return in Oct it would work. Obviously if family visiting are limited to peak times then they aren't going to be able to use airmiles. Think I'll carry on with plan and see what happens.

NonGeographicalMan

stayathomedad wrote: »

EDIT - just searched and at the moment the first flights to Australia are on 15 Nov and latest return is 8 Jul. Assuming it is similar in january and you can book to fly in Mar and return in Oct it would work. Obviously if family visiting are limited to peak times then they aren't going to be able to use airmiles. Think I'll carry on with plan and see what happens.

An advantage of the Aveo scheme is that I imagine that you will also be able to use them to upgrade the cheapest possible cash tickets to Club with miles just as you can with the current BA Miles scheme but can't do with Air Miles. So that might be another way to use them if you ever find World Traveller too uncomfortable in your old age.

NonGeographicalMan

Here are two longstanding bugbears of the current (but not original) Air Miles scheme that are clearly resolved through our transfer to Aveos (or re-badged BA Miles as it in reality clearly appears to be).

From the Avios Terms and Conditions:-

D.1.6 One way tickets can be issued as a Reward on Airline Partner flights at 50% of the Points required for a return journey to the same destination and subject to the applicable taxes, fees and charges as set out in Section D.1.12. Open tickets cannot be issued as Rewards.

D.1.7 There are no charges for stopovers included in a Reward itinerary, where stopovers are at connecting points on the most direct route between origin and destination.

D.1.14 Reward tickets are subject to IATA fare construction rules. Travel itineraries for Reward bookings may start and end at different airports within the same country, or in different countries, provided the two airports are in the same zone. Outbound journeys may terminate at a different airport to the airport where the return journey starts provided the two airports are within the same zone.

Round The World tickets therefore also now seem to be possible using more than one airline and resuming the journey at a different airport from the last one flown in to as confirmed by the following paragraph.

D.1.11 Rewards are based on round trip travel between origin and destination using the most direct route possible. Rewards may be for more than one flight sector. On one occasion only per booking may a flight sector commence at a different point from the end of the preceding flight sector. It is possible to combine flights on Airline Partners to make a round trip journey of up to a maximum of 8 sectors.

steve1500

Completely lost. Have been saving for 4 tickets to Orlando. Would have reached 25,000 miles by Jan / Feb 2012 and planning to go in 2013 Althouth live in the North have family in London. So always planned on flying from London

As read it looks like I'm going to really loose out by having to pay the taxes, which apparently aren't cheap - please tell me I'm wrong.

gardner1

steve1500 wrote: »

Completely lost. Have been saving for 4 tickets to Orlando. Would have reached 25,000 miles by Jan / Feb 2012 and planning to go in 2013 Althouth live in the North have family in London. So always planned on flying from London

As read it looks like I'm going to really loose out by having to pay the taxes, which apparently aren't cheap - please tell me I'm wrong.

same here had 28000 for 4 people to orlando which we planned to use in 2013 it will now cost £300 pp taxes etc
might be a few thousand less miles but it wont justify the £1200