As you are probably already aware, there is an impending British Airways devaluation! I’ve already written about the 6 winners and losers with the British Airways devaluation, but now that we’re less than a week away, I wanted to make sure to book a flight I had my eye on before its price DOUBLES!
Trip to Europe
My wife and I are in the midst of planning a trip to Europe. We’ve got a few things locked down, including our transatlantic flights. We are using the amazing Aer Lingus business class availability to fly into Dublin, and have a flight back from Rome.
(SEE ALSO: How to pick your Aer Lingus seats on an Avios booking)
That BOS-DUB flight is currently priced at 12,500 Avios one-way in economy and 25,000 Avios on-way in business class. As of April 28th, the price for business class is increasing to 37,500 Avios one-way (the economy price will stay the same)
Another flight that’s going away with the British Airways devaluation
One other loser with the British Airways devaluation is that currently, intra-UK flights are free when you use Avios to fly outside the UK. So if you live in say, Manchester and are flying British Airways to Madrid
Then your flight from London to Madrid would be 7500 Avios and $27.50 (remember, thanks to the Reward Flight Saver program, if you’re flying intra-Europe on British Airways, you get charged a flat fee for all taxes, fees and other charges)
(SEE ALSO: 4 ways to not pay UK Air Passenger Duty / APD)
Booking our flights
We knew that we wanted a few days in London, before continuing on to somewhere else in Europe. Because British Airways typically charges Avios for EACH leg of the trip, the easy option would be to just book a DUB-LHR flight for 4500 Avios + $27.50 and then book a separate flight out of London a few days later.
But then I remembered about this deal on intra-UK flights! Since Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, we decided that we’d take a train from Dublin to Belfast, and then fly BHD-LHR (stopover)-NCE
You’ll also notice that LHR-NCE, at 647 flown miles, is just under the 649 mile limit it takes to get into the first band and only cost 4500 Avios. Planned that like a boss, no? 😀
You can see that our cost from Belfast to Nice (with a stopover in London) costs only 9000 Avios and $55 (for 2 people). So a 2 hour train ride (which costs about 15 Euros I think) saves me 4500 Avios PLUS $27.50 in taxes, and I even get to add another place to my Most Traveled People list as well!!!
This benefit is going away!
If you have any similar kinds of intra-UK trips, you’ll want to book them before April 28th. Starting then, you’ll only get a free intra-UK leg if you’re taking a “long-haul” flight, which British Airways currently defines as a flight longer than 2000 flown miles.
Did you know about this benefit? Planning to book any intra-UK flights this week?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
Did you book this online? And your staying a “few days” in London? I didn’t know you could stay more than hours using this 🙂