MSE News: Costs to soar in Airmiles revamp: use points before they devalue

toonster58

Malkie 76
I use Airmiles for the reason most people do, I think, FREE flights.
From what I can see standard flights to North America are going to cost less in "miles" but somewhere near £300 . which kinda changes the emphasis somewhat.

adobbing

Can't see any mention of ability to redeem on other Airlines such as Lufthansa like you can now with Airmiles!

malkie76

On_The_Ball wrote: »

13,000 miles are buying me £1432 worth of flight if I book before the cutoff - so surely afterwards 130,000 Avios can't possibly be buying £800 worth of flight with £632 charges on top???

Otherway of looking at it is that 120,000 Avios buys you a £5,000 first class ticket to New York (plus roughly the same fees)

malkie76

toonster58 wrote: »

Malkie 76
I use Airmiles for the reason most people do, I think, FREE flights.
From what I can see standard flights to North America are going to cost less in "miles" but somewhere near £300 . which kinda changes the emphasis somewhat.

I totally see your point, but I'm coming from the position of only ever using miles for premium flying. I used 150,000 BA miles for two people to fly to north america in First Class, and had no issue paying the £700 in fees for us both. (using an Amex 2-4-1).

gazpacho_uk

Any wrote: »

If I am not mistaken Barcelona is Zone 2
You will have to pay some cash (£27 per person), but only current 1500 miles - which will be 15000 Avios (no fee for flying from Manchester) so it depends whether you want to pay any cash.

Thanks for that (and the other info you have posted on this subject). I guess £27 each isnt too bad and as you say the miles spent will be 1500 and not 2000 each..... leaving me more miles to spend another day ! Now if I wait for the change could I lose the availability of the flights ..... another dilema LOL

cheers

richardw

gazpacho_uk wrote: »

Now if I wait for the change could I lose the availability of the flights ..... another dilema LOL

Always a big problem with these schemes, flights that you want may not be available.

Any

gazpacho_uk wrote: »

Thanks for that (and the other info you have posted on this subject). I guess £27 each isnt too bad and as you say the miles spent will be 1500 and not 2000 each..... leaving me more miles to spend another day ! Now if I wait for the change could I lose the availability of the flights ..... another dilema LOL

cheers

Always a dilema this!!

RMcC

Sounds like a very bad deal for those of us who use airmiles to fly from Northern Ireland to the mainland.

At the minute I can fly Belfast City to Heathrow return including free baggage with BMI for 750 miles. This will now cost 9000 (900 in old money) PLUS the charges.

Looks like, the only value to these miles now is to book from London to Europe. Disappointing.

Bouncy_2

I am pondering this at the moment - provided the Tesco Club-Card option still stands, Although it will cost more points to book, it looks like it will be easier for me to collect

I recently had a long-running spat with Lloyds TSB, which resulted in me closing all my accounts with them - as a result of the merger, however, it looks like I could take out the BA Amex card, and start collecting miles using that - good plan?

Doshwaster

toonster58 wrote: »

Malkie 76
I use Airmiles for the reason most people do, I think, FREE flights.
From what I can see standard flights to North America are going to cost less in "miles" but somewhere near £300 . which kinda changes the emphasis somewhat.

Indeed. BA Miles have always been like this. It usually hasn't been worth using them to buy transatlantic flights as the taxes were so high. Instead it was better value to use Miles for upgrades.