British Airways has released thousands of additional business class award seats available for a limited time across a limited, but wide, date range.
Through December 2nd, British Airways has made 50,000 extra Club World business class seats available for travel between December 16, 2018 and March 31, 2019. Since British Airways pulls upgrades from the same inventory, this also means there are thousands of confirmed upgrades available now.
Longhaul award space has been added to/from the following destinations:
- London Gatwick:
- Fort Lauderdale – FLL
- Tampa – TPA
- Orlando – MCO
- Las Vegas – LAS
- San Jose (Costa Rica) – SJO
- New York – JFK
- Mauritius – MRU
- London Heathrow
- Abuja – ABV
- Accra – ACC
- Amman – AMM
- Atlanta – ATL
- Austin – AUS
- Bahrain – BAH
- Baltimore – BWI
- Bangalore – BLR
- Beijing – PEK
- Beirut – BEI
- Boston – BOS
- Buenos Aires – EZE
- Cairo – CAI
- Calgary – YYC
- Cape Town – CPT
- Chicago – ORD
- Dallas – DFW
- Denver – DEN
- Dubai – DXB
- Durban – DUR
- Houston – IAH
- Jeddah – JED
- Johannesburg – JNB
- Kuala Lumpur – KUL
- Kuwait – KWI
- Lagos – LOS
- Las Vegas – LAS
- Los Angeles – LAX
- Mexico City – MEX
- Miami – MIA
- Montreal – YUL
- Moscow – DME
- Nairobi – NBO
- Nashville – BNA
- New Orleans – MSY
- New York – JFK
- New York – EWR
- Philadelphia – PHL
- Phoenix – PHX
- Rio de Janeiro – GIG
- Riyadh – RUH
- San Diego – SAN
- San Francisco – SFO
- San Jose (California) – SJC
- Santiago – SCL
- Sao Paulo – GRU
- Seattle – SEA
- Seoul – ICN
- Seychelles – SEY
- Shanghai – PVG
- Singapore – SIN
- Tel Aviv – TLV
- Tokyo -NRT
- Toronto – YYZ
- Vancouver – YVR
- Washington – IAD
I took a look at space using AA.com (my preferred tool to search for British Airways space) and there have indeed been many longhaul business class seats released, even on tougher routes like Los Angeles and San Francisco.
But The Fuel Surcharges!
Do not kid yourselves, these are hardly “free” tickets. British Airways recently increased fuel surcharges, so expect to pay (at a minimum) over $1,000 per ticket in “carrier surcharges” plus government taxes. Book two one-ways instead of a round trip if your travel originates in North America in order to cut down on these fees.
Even British Airways does not sugarcoat these fees, with Carolina Martinoli, British Airways’ Director of Brand and Customer Experience stating:
It’s exciting to be able to make more than 50,000 extra reward seats available, giving more members a chance to travel paying just taxes, fees and carrier charges, or upgrade their cabin.
“Just” taxes, fees, and carrier charges…the understatement of the century.
CONCLUSION
As much as I love to pile upon British Airways for their outlandish fees, sometimes award space with fees still represents a tremendous option over paying sticker price for business class. Before your redeem your miles for an outright award, check and see if upgrading makes more sense (you can search both on the British Airways Executive Club website). It is nice to at least have this additional option on British Airways.
Hi!
Nice to have more award seats available… But paying 1000 euros of fees in nonsense.
So… After all it’s still a bad news
+1
The same inventory is available for upgrades. There are pros and cons to booking an economy flight and upgrading versus booking outright with points, but some of the advantages are that, for marginally more money at times, you can still earn award miles and miles towards elite status with your airline of choice depending on their terms. With Alaska, for example, if you play your cards right you still get the business class 100% bonus.
Matthew, don’t forget that BA charges incremental fuel surcharges for the higher cabin when upgrading using Avios. For roundtrip PE-J upgrades departing the US, these incremental surcharges can amount to anywhere between $300 and $700 in my experience, and can alter the value proposition for some.
Note the dates. I have a business trip the last week of March, and was hesitant to connect through LHR due to Brexit. Not expecting things to go badly for BA, but just being cautious. I wonder if others have had the same thought.