If you haven’t been following along with some of the other Boarding Area blogs and on Twitter today, there has been an amazing confluence of promotions that have led to some crazy good sales on roundtrip BUSINESS CLASS tickets from the US to Europe. Many of the deals are gone as of now, but there are still a few available. As of this writing (Thursday 7:10 p.m. Eastern), I was still able to find a flight for $266 and 30,000 Avios
Here are some of the posts that I’ve seen on the subject
- $450 to $850 deal! BA two day sale on round trip business class fares. Here’s how to pay as little as $446 plus 30K Avios! – Frequent Miler
- I Just Paid $408 in Cash Roundtrip for Business Class from Las Vegas to London – Miles to Memories
- AMAZING FARE: $646 British Airways Business Class Roundtrips to London from Several US Cities! – View from the Wing
The deals
As is often the case, the really good deals are a confluence of several different deals that are going on.
- Deal #1: British Airways is having a 2 day sale on business class roundtrip tickets through Friday October 16th. It’s advertised as $2015 for 2015, but throughout most of the day there were fares in the $1400-$1600 range. Currently most availability that I see is in the $2000 price range
- Deal #2: If you join AARP (and anyone can join regardless of age for $16 – I did today along with half the travel hacking world, I’m sure), you can get $400 off business (and first) class flights on British Airways
- Deal #3: British Airways has always let you pay for part of your ticket with Avios, but currently, they are giving you 2.5 times the value for your Avios in paying for your ticket. Unfortunately (for me), this deal is only for select cities: Chicago, Dallas – Forth Worth, Houston, JFK, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Newark, Philadelphia International, San Francisco International, and Washington DC.
Adding all those up, and you can fly SUPER CHEAP ($266 is as low as I’ve seen it) in business class to Europe
$266… plus miles?
So yes, the $266 is the out of pocket cost, but you do have to pay 30,000 Avios to get the out of pocket cost that low.
BUT, you’ll earn those back (and possibly more) by taking the flight!
AA & British Airways both currently have promotions giving 25,000 bonus miles (or Avios) for transatlantic roundtrips taken by January 31st. You do need to register for those promotions before you travel (not before you book – at least with the AA promotion, the BA terms are not quite as clear)
You’ll also earn about 10,000-12,000 miles depending on the length of your particular flights, plus a class of service bonus for business class, and if you’re an elite flyer, even more! In Miles to Memories post, he estimates he’ll get back about 50,000 miles from his flight.
$266 is not much more than you’d pay in taxes and fees on an award ticket!
(SEE ALSO: Comprehensive guide to European airport taxes and fees)
Finding available deals
As I said earlier, most of the good deals on the most common routes are gone. There are still available deals – what I used was Google Flights (one of my Top 10 miles and points tools) to look for cities with flights in the $1400 range. You can get $400 off from AARP, and, if you’re flying from one of the eligible cities, another $764 off with 30,000 Avios.
It also seems that you can not use Avios to pay if you are flying an airline other than British Airways or American
Good luck and happy travels!
This site is part of an affiliate sales network and receives compensation for sending traffic to partner sites, such as thepointsguy.com. This may impact how and where links appear on this site. Responses are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Some or all of the card offers that appear on the website are from advertisers and that compensation may impact on how and where card products appear on the site. Any opinions expressed in this post are my own, and have not been reviewed, approved, or endorsed by my advertising partners and I do not include all card companies, or all available card offers. Terms apply to American Express benefits and offers and other offers and benefits listed on this page. Enrollment may be required for select American Express benefits and offers. Visit americanexpress.com to learn more. Other links on this page may also pay me a commission - as always, thanks for your support if you use them
User Generated Content Disclosure: Points With a Crew encourages constructive discussions, comments, and questions. Responses are not provided by or commissioned by any bank advertisers. These responses have not been reviewed, approved, or endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the responsibility of the bank advertiser to respond to comments.
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 
noooooooooooooooooo
my europe trip is a couple of weeks and ive already booked through united with miles 🙁 🙁
You could always get a refund.
This deal… if booked at the right time (Before price went up by $400) and flown at right time (before deadlines to qualify additional promotions as stated above) is a borderline mistake fare… I mean where can you fly business class international flight for less than $270 and you get net miles back as bonus? I am already booked on another types of trip during Christmas break and spring break so I had no choice but to book one up for for kids summer break. $454 per person plus 30k avios minus 16k AS miles I will earn is not too shabby either. How can you not at this price?!?
Business class? The over the water parts seem to be in economy, per the picture of the schedule. Not that it would bother me. That’s what 5-6 hours?
No – you’ve got it backwards. It’s the positioning flights (DC to New York) that are in Economy, because those regional jets don’t really have a business class
Are you sure you can earn miles on avios plus cash tickets????
Yes that is my understanding. I’m not 100% sure as I’ve not personally done it, but that is what people I trust (Gary from View from the Wing) have said.
Yes, it tells you when you are booking how many miles you are going to earn.
You do earn points. My booking told me I would earn 16,000 Avios for LAX-LHR R/T
I saw the BA offer this a.m., pencil booked 2 BIZ Class RT LAX/LHR for $1600 each ….. did not pull the trigger due to tight window to plan and so forth ……kicking myself in the bum now – ahhhh!
That’s the problem with these kinds of deals – they never seem to last very long…. 🙂