#859788 by Vegascrazy
18 Oct 2013, 22:26
Very impressed with today's experience. Wanted to redeem a BA Amex voucher for the two us to fly LGW-MCO next Sept and return SAN-LHR. As it was open jaw I needed to phone Exec Club (I'm just a lowly blue) and was pleasantly surprised that there's a dedicated line just for BA Amex redemptions. No issues with availability, Club World both ways into MCO and back from SAN on the dates of our choice. Just 50k Avios each and £550. Fully changeable and refundable (for a reasonable £25pp fee) up to 24 hrs before flight.

I love VS UC but the VS companion voucher system is unusable, unless you're willing to part with circa £8000 for a full fare J in order to be allowed to use the companion voucher!!

Forget the VS voucher, just doing a similar trip on VS miles would consume 200k miles - double that of BA. I suppose I could book the cheapest upgradeable Economy M fare and upgrade to UC (a good method I've used many times) but that still means parting with around £800 & 45k miles per person. The other issue of course is that UC rewards on VS to MCO are few and far between as is availability back from west coast.

So all in all very impressed with BA, lets hope the flights themselves are great!

Still got 170k VS miles and still love VS!

Thanks
James
#859792 by mallin
18 Oct 2013, 22:42
I have found the experience of trying to book/look for Virgin UC reward seats a real trying time of late. Like most others its been lack of any availability coming back from the west coast and as we are retired are very flexible on dates.

So with reluctance have started collecting Avios by any means possible, BA prem plus card and changing Tesco points and are now well on the way to having enough spend for our Amex voucher in a few months, with nearly 200,000 Avios already collected, so I hope we have as pleasant experience as you James when it comes time for us to redeem.

We also still have 100,000 Virgin miles left each, so will still be on the look out for a nice G.

We have never flown BA, having been loyal to Virgin for 12 years but as in other things loyalty does not get you anywhere.

Linda
#859798 by buns
19 Oct 2013, 05:31
Vegascrazy

Firstly, congratulations on securing such a good deal through BA y) y)

The trend of this thread is already starting to highlight how passengers who have flown with VS, in some cases for a considerable time, are moving across to BA as the ability to make use of earned miles is so much easier.

Although it is a long time away - have a great time :D :D

buns
#859799 by gumshoe
19 Oct 2013, 07:16
Ah but over on Flyertalk there's a 19 page thread full of people grumbling about BA reward seat availability. The general consensus is they, too, have got a lot stingier about releasing them recently.

Of course BA has a much larger fleet and route network, with a correspondingly large reward seat allocation. So, like the OP, you may well get lucky. But that FT thread shows the grass isn't always greener.
#859801 by Vegascrazy
19 Oct 2013, 08:57
IMO, whilst reward seats themselves may be scarce, the crucial aspect of BA's system that differentiates it big time is the Amex 241 voucher. There's just no equivalent on VS, and as someone who only travels long haul once a year, I don't get the majority of my miles through flying. The BA system is the opposite of VS's. With the latter you get the companion voucher when you've spent £x but you can't use said voucher when redeeming miles, instead it actually costs you mega £k's to use it as it's only usable when partnered with a full fare J. With BA just use your hard earned miles to go wherever and, if you have a voucher, two of you go! The financial reward when doing this in CW or F is massive. In many years of doing the VS method of paying cash for EC & using miles to upgrade to UC I've never achieved a cost as low as £550 pp for J class return travel to USA.
#859852 by spiceke
19 Oct 2013, 17:49
Have to agree with Vegascrazy.

I have just upgraded my WT+ to FIRST for the Abu Dhabi GP (going in / out DXB)using the 2:4:1 - second year running.

Small detour on the way back via Doha, but that is a price worth paying !

You can use the companion ticket on VS with an 'S' and the Amex upgrades to P/E are good, but I cant fault using the 2:4:1 for premium cabins First (or Club) - as you say, VS have nothing to compete.
#859853 by SNOMO
19 Oct 2013, 18:14
Well done Vegascrazy. I too am about to change my VS Amex over to a BA one for the same reasons as yourself.
We have over 300K VS miles between us and now recently retired and totally flexible but trying to work the VS system has just become toooo.... time consuming and there seems to be little consistency if you telephone, one op tells you one thing and someone else tells you the opposite!
Just used Avios we already have for a holiday and the op on the phone was just amazingly helpful !
#859855 by PaulW
19 Oct 2013, 18:41
spiceke wrote:Have to agree with Vegascrazy.

I have just upgraded my WT+ to FIRST for the Abu Dhabi GP (going in / out DXB)using the 2:4:1 - second year running.

Small detour on the way back via Doha, but that is a price worth paying !

You can use the companion ticket on VS with an 'S' and the Amex upgrades to P/E are good, but I cant fault using the 2:4:1 for premium cabins First (or Club) - as you say, VS have nothing to compete.


Out of genuine interest can I ask for clarification of what you have done?

One minor disadvantage of the EC is the restriction of single upgrades, ie WT to WT+, WT+ to CW, CW to F. You are not allowed double upgrades of WT to CW or WT+ to F.

This is one advantage of VS where you can upgrade from economy to upper.
#859926 by locutus
20 Oct 2013, 22:18
PaulW wrote:One minor disadvantage of the EC is the restriction of single upgrades, ie WT to WT+, WT+ to CW, CW to F. You are not allowed double upgrades of WT to CW or WT+ to F.

This is one advantage of VS where you can upgrade from economy to upper.


Yes, but you can upgrade a sale PE fare to CW, which is a great way to upgrade without spending too much, and you get a lot of the Avios back that you have spent, on the Amex card and the PE Avios.
#859930 by spiceke
20 Oct 2013, 23:08
PaulW wrote:
spiceke wrote:Have to agree with Vegascrazy.

I have just upgraded my WT+ to FIRST for the Abu Dhabi GP (going in / out DXB)using the 2:4:1 - second year running.

Small detour on the way back via Doha, but that is a price worth paying !

You can use the companion ticket on VS with an 'S' and the Amex upgrades to P/E are good, but I cant fault using the 2:4:1 for premium cabins First (or Club) - as you say, VS have nothing to compete.


Out of genuine interest can I ask for clarification of what you have done?

One minor disadvantage of the EC is the restriction of single upgrades, ie WT to WT+, WT+ to CW, CW to F. You are not allowed double upgrades of WT to CW or WT+ to F.

This is one advantage of VS where you can upgrade from economy to upper.




When I first looked at this, there was only WT+ available as reward seats. I took these in the hope that First (or Club) would become available (knowing that I would moan like hell if they didn't, but I did want to go again).

On the return leg, DOH became available in First so I used miles on the new tie-up with QATAR for the DXB / DOH leg.

This made it an open jaw.

Then LHR / DXB First reward became available for the outbound.

Perseverance was the watch word - routine was:-
Get to work, log in, check for First availability
Lunch time ditto
Get home, ditto
Before going to bed ditto.

See the rewards seats - pounce on them!

You are right about the upgrades for one single cabin on BA whereas VS can go from Y to J. However, this is only applicable to revenue fares that are upgradeable.

My booking was all reward seats and no such restriction exists as, in effect, each change is treated as a completely new booking - I think this is evidenced that you are recredited all the miles and then debited the new amount, rather than being debited the difference.

Of course, a minor irritant is the fact that I had to swallow 2 change fees for each passenger.

As for the fees - it was a total of about £1,300, so about £650 each. However, in that there are £100 change fees and nearly £300 for the DXB / DOH leg. If I had booked when I first thought of it, I would have been LHR / DXB return / 120k Avios and a total of about £1000 (£500 each) in fees / taxes / YQ etc (I will have to check the exact figures).

Still think it is a brilliant deal as the seats would set you back £4k each using cash.

One interesting point - the fees / taxes etc on WT+ are not that much different to First. When I only had the WT+ DXB direct the taxes & Fees were nearly £900 (£450 each) :0
#860103 by spiceke
22 Oct 2013, 20:32
Smid

That does seem excessive.

Was it a quote for WT+ and then UuA?

Last year when I did the trip, direct to / from DXB with my son on the 2:4:1 the fees were about £950 in total (£475 each). That again was First.

So not sure where £825 comes from
#860146 by Smid
23 Oct 2013, 13:45
Oh 825 for the both is fine for me, but yes, it was a reward fare, seeing where I could go for how much (can I add amex points and spg points plus 24K bought, perhaps on a +% sale).

I did find 825 as "huh". Clubworld, I think to Vegas. I'd understand if it was first, I assume they had higher taxes. I didn't actually go through and attempt to book it because I didn't have the miles, but was trying to price it up for a 2-4-1 voucher.
#865787 by stoneman
02 Feb 2014, 11:37
Funny, I have just redeemed Tesco points into VS miles because of the lack of availability on BA compared to Virgin for this coming October. from this coming May to next January there was not one pair of CW or F redemptions available that could get us out and back to either LAS or LAX.
#865805 by mallin
02 Feb 2014, 14:53
When I was looking last November for reward availability on BA for Vegas this October there was quite a lot available in CW and First. You may have had to go LHR and come back Gatwick or reverse, but it was definitely there, that's what convinced me to start collecting Avios, as its our yearly fix.
We did however use our stash of Virgin miles to get 2 G' to LA, we will qualify for our 2-4-1 voucher soon, so we'll see whats available then. :D linda
#865814 by stoneman
02 Feb 2014, 16:34
mallin wrote:When I was looking last November for reward availability on BA for Vegas this October there was quite a lot available in CW and First. You may have had to go LHR and come back Gatwick or reverse, but it was definitely there, that's what convinced me to start collecting Avios, as its our yearly fix.
We did however use our stash of Virgin miles to get 2 G' to LA, we will qualify for our 2-4-1 voucher soon, so we'll see whats available then. :D linda

Yes last year there seemed to be far more availability (I myself managed to use a 241 for March in F to LAS with loads of available options) But from the beginning of January things have dried up completely, that's what people are moaning about at the moment.
I am quite happy to spend the miles with VS for the trip I am looking for, with it being a redemption I wouldn't get any TP's anyway. And from what my recollections are of Upper, I preferred it to CW anyway.
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