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British Airways’ PR team emailed me about a 2-day business class sale with fares starting at $2,015 (including taxes, fees and carrier charges) roundtrip to London.
The key is that this sale fare stacks with several other discounts to make it pretty amazing.
The sale is available through 11:59pm Eastern on Friday, October 16. It requires a Saturday night stay. Here are key terms:
..select “I” class fares for travel November 16, 2015 through August 31, 2016 (with all travel completed by August 31, 2016) from select U.S. gateways to London on British Airways or American Airlines operated services, only. Flights to and from New York-JFK are not included for travel December 1 through December 13, 2015, flights to and from New York-EWR are not included for travel November 16, 2015 through December 20, 2015, flights to and from San Diego (SAN) are not included for travel November 16 through November 29, 2015, flights to and from San Francisco (SFO) are not included for travel November 16 through November 22, 2015, and flights to and from Baltimore (BWI) are not included for travel January 4 through February 14, 2016. Flights to and from London City (LCY) are excluded from this promotional offer.
Thankfully the $400 AARP member discount on British Airways business class is back.
AARP members save $400 on British Airways business class tickets. Anyone can join AARP instantly for $16 per year.
That discount stacks with the 10% off discount given to British Airways Visa Signature cardholders using promo code CARDOFFERU.
- The British Airways Visa Signature card comes with a huge signup bonus: Earn Total of 100,000 British Airways Avios
When searching with the AARP discount I was only given the option for economy queries. I left it that way, and economy and business class both came up to choose from.
After selecting flights, the next page gives you an option to click a radio button and expand where you will enter a promo code or eVoucher.
Note that if you book an American Airlines codeshare traveling on British Airways, you’ll earn American’s premium fare bonus. I fares originally earned bonuses only for elites:
However in May they improved earning on discount business class I fares for general members.
Unfortunately the American Airlines flights may not stack with the 10% British Airways discount.
Either way register for American’s transatlantic bonus and roundtrips through January 31 earn 25,000 bonus miles.
Stacking the British Airways AARP discount with the 10% British Airways Visa Signature Card discount here’s the roundtrip price:
However you can book these flights for even less!
Through October 19 paying part of a fare with British Airways Avios is worth 2.5 times the normal value per point. So that offer stacks with the fare sale and with the AARP discount.
It is still a normal paid ‘I’ discount business fare so the standard fare rules apply and the ticket accrues miles even when you partially pay with Avios.
And it really does price at $646!
British Airways points can be obtained via instant transfers from American Express Membership Rewards (at less than full value) and Chase Ultimate Rewards.
Unfortunately there is no way to stack the pay with cash and Avios discount with the 10% British Airways Visa Signature card discount. But let’s not be greedy..
Nice, has the itinerary to be roundtrip? Can I do multicity (open-jaw) and still get that discount, say JFK-LHR, but LHR-SFO when back (open-jaw)? Also, may I add a connection flight from regional airport? Thanks.
@ Gary — Just yesterday, I noticed that AA had dropped our JFK-ZRH flights for this winter. They reduced the frequency of the flight, so we could change dates or receive a full refund. I decided to sleep on that decision and now with this deal, we actually ended up paying less for business on BA than coach + SWUs on AA! And, we have a chance to upgrade to BA First! THANK YOU!
I can enable the $764 discount for 30,000 avios on ORD/LHR/BCN and return, all on BA Metal. Under $850 RT. (before AARP discount).
I cannot enable over $75 discount for 7500 avios on DEN/LHR/BCN and return all on BA Metal.
Also wont enable much when AA or IB metal is involved. So it seems to be both BA and City specific?
The British Airways/Chase site says outbound travel must start by 31 Dec 2015. Did you find a different offer?
“We’re pleased to offer this exclusive 10% discount to our loyal British Airways Visa Signature cardholders*. Receive a 10% discount on British Airways operated round-trip flights booked through ba.com/Chase10 when you use your British Airways Visa Signature card with promotion code: CARDOFFERU. Flights must be booked with outbound travel commencing from now through 31 December, 2015. You always get a great deal when you book with us directly and now that deal will be even better.”
How are you getting these discounts to stack? I’ve tried booking through the AARP link and it says Avios can’t be used as part payment for these flights. The BA/Chase site says outbound travel has to begin by 31 Dec 2015 to be able to use the CARDOFFERU discount.
Awesome, just booked. Thanks Gary!
Gary, thanks for the tip. This is exactly why I follow your blog. Booked 4 tix SFO-LHR r/t in the middle of summer for $820 each after the $400 aarp discount and 15K avios (per person). I could’ve redeemed 120K total avios to lower the cost to $495/person, but at 2.5 cents/mi it wasn’t worth it.
For those bitching about the semantics of Gary’s title, get over yourselves! $1195/person in biz WITHOUT avios to europe in the middle of the summer is an absolute steal.
Just one note: the 10% card discount is only good for flights through the end of 2015. It will not stack on flights in 2016. (Or, at least, I can’t find a way to get them to stack…)
This is misleading. I just spent over an hour on hold and then speaking to a British Airways representative. I explained what I was trying to do and he asked me to send the website link. After receiving it he called me back and said he had spoken to his manager about it and you cannot stack these discounts, and the card offer discount is only valid through 31 Dec 2015.
@Keith Davis the sale + AARP discount and either pay with avios or cardmember discount absolutely stack (along with the premium cabin travel bonus for trips by january 31), the outbound must be by December 31 for the 10% card discount but you cannot use THAT and ‘pay a portion with Avios’.
I booked BOS-LHR this morning but was not able to pay with Avios. Still a very good price. However when I just searched NYC-LHR it did give me the option to pay with up to 30K Avios. Seems this function is city or itinerary specific. So does anyone know if BA will refund my original itinerary if I cancel within 24 hours. I’m very tempted to book a new itinerary from NYC instead. Thanks!
@anyone who might know
If I would like to book 3 tickets with the AARP discount, can I get the $400 of each ticket booking them all in one transaction or would it need to be booked at 3 separate transactions? Thx.
You take advantage of the AARP discount for all passengers booked on an itinerary, only one needs an aarp membership.
@O British Airways will cancel and refund for 24 hours
https://www.britishairways.com/en-us/information/legal/local-requirements/usa/customer-service-and-contingency-planning
MY SINCERE APOLOGIES!
I tried like heck to make this work from Phoenix to London, and just couldn’t get fare anywhere close to what you quoted. The AARP site would not let me use Avios to pay part of the fare. I called British Air and they said no dice.
I saw a comment from another reader that suggested it might be different depending on the departure city, so I tried L.A. to London. I was delighted to see that for this routing it WOULD let me spend Avios. I spend 60,000 Avios and got the fare down to $448 RT!
Thanks for your help, and I again apologize for my earlier skepticism.
Any advice on how to prebook seats. Can you reserve early as AAdvantage Gold? Otherwise prebooking business class seats seems expensive.
Not seeing where AARP discount is being applied! Just signed up but when I go over to the Price page, its not showing the discount. Can someone please help?
Looks like it’s priced out to about 2k without any discounts and 1.5k with AARP if you add in the 60k pay with pts it comes out to about 800 per person.
I was able to book it earlier using AARP using 60k pay with points to about $450 per person.
Anybody else seeing the same?
Family has been planning a golf trip to Scotland. Just booked SIX business class tickets LAX -> LHR -> EDI -> LHR -> LAX for under $10,000. $16 AARP membership saved $2,400. Gary, you are amazing.
@Andy – BA tried to charge for seat assignments at time of reservation, but I passed. One of my legs is operated by AA, and I am PLT. Was able to book seats for all legs for free once reservation was made and paid for (each through respective carrier’s website). BA didn’t charge once I had the AA seats assigned.
DFW-LHR, 60,000 Avios + $909 total (after AARP) for 2 in business. That’s amazing! Thanks, Gary!
Larry,
I got the same price from SFO but that was about 3 hours ago, when did you book this? It’s no longer pricing out to about 450 per person anymore.
Just got JFK-BCN at $713.78 all in for two in July. The bad part…….Its on AA….
AARP website now appears to be down – getting an error message whenever I try to get to it to login 🙁
Not sure I understand how you got a screenshot showing a price of $1297. I booked exact same flight numbers for the exact same dates and my price was $150 higher at $1447 approximately. Also, you have a screenshot showing the outbound flight at a cost of $561 while I get shown a price of $661. My price makes sense: starting at $2015 then the AARP discount of $400 bringing it down to $1616, then the 10% BA Visa discount of about $160, ultimately bringing my cost to the $1447. You must have something else stacked in yours to get down to $1297. In any event – thanks for the tip – it’s a great deal!
Does anyone think it would be possible to book the flight with the AARP discount then go back and apply the 30,000 avios in a few days once my points transfer in from SPG and get the $764 refunded back?
It priced out with the $400 discount several hours ago but I wasn’t ready to buy. So now I sat down to do some serious shopping and of course the AARP discount is no longer being included. The price I’m getting is $1600 for a round trip instead of $1200.
For what it’s worth, this deal seems to be available from any city, not just the five or six that are listed.
You know, I may have gotten it wrong! I’m seeing a $1,600 plus fare, and I guess that is with the $400 discount. I don’t know why I thought I had seen a $1,200 fare. Sitting in front of the computer too long!
Agree – I am not seeing how you get the $1600 down to $1200 with a 10% discount?
Gotta move fast. The route Gary shows above now prices at $4,140.34.
Very sweet… AARP worked just like it did for my trip last year to Europe.
Too back the BA Card bonus was only through the end of the year…
What a great use of miles to reduce the fare by $3k…
Now its $3k all in for LAX-LHR-LYS and back.
Time to go cancel the awards I had booked with miles!
Got DFW-MAD-DFW for $262.
Obviously didn’t work (pay with Avios) from PHX, and while others got it to work from LAX, I never could.
Thanks SO MUCh, Gary! I just booked two Bus class tickets JFK to London for next summer, end of July-Aug 6. Went thru AARP and used 30,000 avios, only $1,600 for 2 tickets so I went on and paid to book my seats in advance. This past summer I paid $1,350 for one coach seat (after it came down from $1,500).
Guys, This link puts you to BA from AARP and gave discount.
http://www.britishairways.com/en-us/offers/partners/aarp-member-benefits
@Kevin Try the site I gave to reach AARP booking. It allowed me to book 2 tickets and each got the $400 reduction. It does have a different link for booking over 10 people I noticed.
@Gary Thanks again for the tips!
Here I was, yesterday, moping about not having any trips scheduled in the near future, saw your post on FB and next thing I know I’m booked for all my upcoming vacations.
Booked DFW-MAD-DFW for Thanksgiving and Spring Break for $531+60,000 Avios (2 people) and another PHL-MAD-PHL for Summer for the same price as well… 6 Business class tickets for $1,593 and 180,000 Avios and I should earn at least half of the miles back…
For 15k avios, I’m being offered a measly $150 off bos-lhr. No 30k offer available. I guess not only is the 30k city specific, but also the bonus.
I’m confused about how you’re getting the $646 price. The sale price of $2015 minus the $400 AARP discount, minus the $764 for using Avios, works out to $851. What step am I missing?
@James and others looking for the $646 Gary had in the title:
It disappeared around 7PM Eastern last night. There *were* sub-$2000 fares loaded, which, combined with the AARP $400 discount and paying $767 with 30k Avios lead to absurdly low prices like $250 out of DFW (see comments above for this example). Best I can find now is about $800 with those discounts combined.
@bill how did you get the discount using avios to come up for flights outside of lhr? i’m trying to book flights to spain (lax-bcn/mad) but i don’t see option to use points.
Hello All! I am dying to get this deal done, but I do not have the avios in my account now (though I do have SPG points which take a few days to transfer). Does anyone know if its possible to book this now, and get the points rebate later? If not, how often do these sales run? Should I transfer some points now in the hopes it comes up later?
@SAM it is not.
How is AA business DFW-LHR compared to BA? is it lie-flat?
Can this fare be found using an ITA matrix search (or even pre-AARP rate using I fare class)? If so what would a sample advanced routing code look like? Or can it only be checked out on BA site via AARP and seen in one week of fares per page?
Thanks for posting this. This is why your blog is one of the ones I read regularly along with industry news. $700 business class RT flight from Texas to Madrid nonstop on AA (so no BA 10% discount). Yes it is on older AA config, but still tons better than economy. Add in 25K points since it is before 1/31 along with AA premium and I will earn more miles than I spent.
On 10/16, I tried for 4 hours to book two business class seats from Chicago to London using the BA sale, AARP discount and 30,000 Avios points for each ticket for an additional $773 discount. The tickets would have cost about $875 a piece. Only one problem, the web site would not recognize the Executive Club logon or passwords for either passenger’s account. I called BA’s customer service four times in the last two hours of the promo and was unable to get any assistance assistance with stacking the Avios discount on top of the sale price and AARP discount. My last call was at 11:50PM and while working with the BA representative, I lost the sale price at midnight. The fares doubled at this point and the BA rep could only help me get fares at 4x the fare I should have been able to get. The BA rep told me the problem was with AARP and not BA. I disagreed since it was the BA site not recognizing valid Executive Club account numbers and passwords. I ended up not booking anything, as all the options BA offered required a lot more Avios points and money than I was prepared to pay. Extremely disappointed!
I managed to book two business class tickets from Memphis to Copenhagen for next April. We’re going to take a cheap SAS flight to Amsterdam to look at the tulips. Our total cost was just over $1,600 with the AARP discount. I don’t have any Avios. It’s rare to get a coach fare for under $1,200 to anywhere in Europe from Memphis, so I’m very happy with the $1,600 business class fare, which we’re taking on American metal.
It was kind of odd. This deal lasted two days, but at midnight eastern on the first day the prices shot up. The next day they were back down again. Also, the sale was advertised as quite limited, but in fact was from almost every city in the country, and was to quite a number of European cities that were not listed.