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BAwayday – super-cheap weekend day trips – extended to more cities

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I wrote a couple of months ago about the launch of a new – and potentially very interesting – leisure product.

Called BAwayday (hmmm ….), these are cheap, last minute, same-day-return tickets offered at a fixed price.

Available ONLY for Saturdays and Sundays, the prices are fixed.  And, it must be said, fixed at a very low level for a ticket that is available at short notice.

British Airways BA A320neo

You must fly back the same day, either Saturday or Sunday.  Realistically, you will need to live close to Heathrow to take full advantage, or be willing to stay over the night before or after in a local hotel.

The key thing is that they book into G class.  In plain English, this means that they will be available even at very short notice, except at peak periods.

These flights were initially only available from six cities.  The list has now expanded substantially.  Here is the current list with prices (return, economy, per person):

  • Aberdeen £100
  • Amsterdam £100
  • Barcelona £90
  • Brussels £90
  • Copenhagen £90
  • Dublin £80
  • Edinburgh £90
  • Geneva £80
  • Hamburg £90
  • Linate (Milan) £90
  • Lisbon £80
  • Madrid £90
  • Manchester £100
  • Marseille £90
  • Munich £100
  • Newcastle £90
  • Nice £90
  • Paris £100
  • Rome £90
  • Stockholm £90
  • Vienna £100

I doubt British Airways will do a lot of publicity for these deals, because there are only a limited number of flights each day that can realistically be used.  The pricing is a little wacky (not sure why Manchester is more than Lisbon, except possibly the longer flight time means it is less attractive) but you can’t complain at £100 or less.


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Comments (50)

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

  • thesaver79 says:

    On flyertalk someone reported that the BA website seems to allow you to book this fares with outbound on Saturday and inbound on Sunday, but I haven’t really verified.

    • Sum0 says:

      The price increases to the regular fare if you try to do this.

    • Rob says:

      Yes, me! This was possible when these fares launched but BA seems to have tightened up on that. I tried to repeat the experiment yesterday and it did not work.

    • Rico says:

      It’s true – I booked one for Hamburg, Sat -> Sun at the same price.

  • Andrew says:

    Are these fares eligible for the part pay with Avios (as a cash alternative) – up to £50 if I recall?

    • Dominic says:

      They are… but I’ve just tried a dummy booking for GVA and the most it offers is £20 off the return for 3000 Avios. Also, I note that the fare for GVA is only offered outbound on the ultra-early flight at 0640. The 0915 is not included, making the itinerary a fairly punishing one. The return segment can be on any of the last four flights of the day.

    • Rob says:

      Should be, although you can only part pay against the base fare – not the APD – which means you might not be able to do as much as you think.

  • Judy says:

    Good stuff. BA could improve their website with details of availability by listing the flight times that are available under this offer.

    • Sum0 says:

      If you click on the fare price for the day you want it gives you the availability details.

  • Ian says:

    Am I correct in assuming they attract some sort of Avios and TP’s?

  • aceman says:

    and again, no jersey on the list!

  • Robin says:

    Is it typically British that our largest airport has no tube links enabling reasonable transport to be able to travel on even an 07:00 flight departure?
    The first trains from central London on a Sunday start at around 07:00 arriving LHR 08:00 !
    Faced with the only option of an 03:50 departure from North London and three buses I think I’ll give this offer a miss.
    That’s a fail for British Airways and a fail for Heathrow Airport
    And Copenhagen 🙁

    • Sum0 says:

      Not sure how you can blame British Airways for this.

      • Robin says:

        Sorry no I’m not blaming BA!
        But if travellers cannot get to their earliest flights it’s a fail for them to have empty aircraft which they can’t fill at any price
        And I’d assume the airlines could pressure TfL … (why should Sunday be any different to Saturday …)

        • Callum says:

          The flights won’t be empty, there are other ways to get to the airport…

          • Robin says:

            Other ways?
            Heathrow Express first train on Sundays leave at 06:25 so allow an arrival of say 06:50 which isn’t good enough for a 07:00 departure.
            Three night buses and a 2 hour journey for a 24 mile journey? No thanks it would be quicker to cycle.
            I quote Raffles, “Realistically, you will need to live close to Heathrow to take full advantage, or be willing to stay over the night before or after in a local hotel.”

          • BlackberryAddict says:

            Drive?

            I suppose though that Sunday isn’t the same as Saturday. If travel demand is lower, TfL isn’t going to open the whole network just so you can get to Heathrow very early on Sunday morning.

          • CountryKerry says:

            I recently took the N9 from Knightsbridge to Heathrow, prepared for a two hour journey. It actually took 1hour 15 🙂

          • Rob says:

            So it should, you can do it in a taxi in 40 minutes!

          • Robin says:

            Drive?
            I was waiting for that.
            As I say, typically British. – Rubbish public transport so let’s all get in our cars.
            Look at other European cities e.g. CDG you can get there by 05:30 every day of the week. Most airlines operate the same schedule on Saturday and Sunday.
            OK I’ve booked, I will drive there, I will stay at the Thistle at T 5 just £58 plus £16 car parking

        • Kipto says:

          Night bus ?

          • Andrew S says:

            Hey Raffles,

            How is your Heathrow free bus/transport article coming on?

            Looking forward this one 🙂

          • Rob says:

            It is on the list now that we are back from holiday. Most of the posts next week are ‘catching up’ stuff though – and there is something very cool to read at 7am on Monday!

          • Charlie says:

            The night bus to Heathrow is probably the cheapest and fastest ways to get to heathrow by public transport, it’s a shame it doesn’t run during the day!

    • DV says:

      Public transport and road links to LHR are excellent. Don’t live in North London.

      • DoReMe says:

        Yes it is even mainline train connected via a town called Reading !
        Then there’s the HS2 stop to look forward to HA

  • Tim says:

    I believe the reason UK prices are more than say Lisbon, are because you pay APD twice if you go to a UK destination (£13 leaving LHR, £13 leaving MAN)

  • Chris says:

    Do these fares only work from Heathrow or is it possible to do the return route starting from one of the UK regions to London and back?

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.