£780 Club World tickets to Hong Kong available, bookable for all of 2015

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Perhaps it is the fact that Qatar now owns 10% of BA’s parent company that is encouraging BA to follow Qatar Airways into ultra-low pricing?

I’m not sure what other explanation there can be for this astonishing fare to Hong Kong which is currently available from all British Airways departure points in Germany.

This is NOT a fare mistake. It is a published fare with detailed fare rules.

British Airways is currently selling return Club World tickets to Hong Kong from Germany for £595 plus taxes and surcharges.

There are NO advance purchase requirements – you can fly tomorrow if you want. The only rule is that you stay away for six days.

You do NOT need to fly directly to Hong Kong. You can also fly from Germany to London to Singapore, Shanghai, Bangkok, Chengdu, Beijing or Kuala Lumpur, and then connect to Hong Kong using another oneworld airline.

Free stopovers are allowed.

If you try to book this ticket on ba.com it will price at around £1,050 – £1,100 depending on routing.

However, there is a better way. Due to local restrictions, websites in Hong Kong add only minimal fuel surcharges to tickets originating or ending in Hong Kong.

Visit expedia.com.hk and book there. You will see that it prices out at roughly £780 return (HK$9,300). If you want to build in stopovers, use the Expedia multi-city booking option.

Tickets must be booked by April 30th and you must start your trip before July 5th. However, it seems that you only need to fly from Germany to London by July 5th – if you don’t mind paying the Air Passenger Duty (another £150 or so) then you can have a stopover in the UK until April 2016 if you want!

Here is an example with a huge Summer-long stopover in London at £957:

rsz_expedia

Have a play around at expedia.com.hk and see what you can find. Note that availability over Christmas is very slim as the required fare class is rarely available.

How to earn Avios points from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards. Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways BA Amex American Express card

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways BA Premium Plus American Express Amex credit card

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points, such as:

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital On Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios:

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company Read our full review

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus:

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

(Want to earn more Avios? Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)

Category

British Airways and Avios

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

James67 says:

25 Apr25 April 06:35

This is awesome Rob, thanks. Unfortunately I will be unable to take advantage of it because of 5 July requirment. I think these types of fares, if they persist, are a game changer for our hobby in that the collection of miles might be best seen as secondary and an incidential benefit of a strategy where the main goal is to minimise spend.on premium revenue fares. I am booked up until April 16 already but from then on I may change my stategy.
- polly says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 07:02
  
  I agree James. We will use our avios for these European hops to start our sale fares in J. And for our 241 x 2 in F to asia every year. Maybe avios has had its day our J hkt trip on Qatar is a no brainer . Short hop to CPH and done. ba is too squashed in J. But good if people want to fly ba for ethical purposes! Qatar are continuing with their J sale ex Europe even now til April 29th everyone. ..
  - James67 says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 08:35
    
    For me BA keep winning out for convenience because I have to factor in a value on my time and hassle associated with connections and European positioning flights. Ultimately, I am hoping that increased competition from Scotland coupled with substantial reduction or elimination of APD here will culminate in such fares being available from airports across the UK. Incidently QR have again launcbed companion J offer from UK but even so you are still saving about 35% by using your CPH offers.
- Joe says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 11:39
  
  Agree. I’ve got 3 long-haul flights coming up: Qatar to Bangkok (thanks to the article on here about those fares); BA CW to Sydney – redemption with 241; BA CW to Cayman – redemption with 241.
  
  I’m far more excited about the Qatar flights than I am about the redmeptions, and I feel they are far better value too. I think if the Australia flight was in First I might think it was the best value of the three, but BA CW is hardly an exciting prospect and the fees that go along with it are, frankly, ludicrous, especially if you want to reserve seats.
  - James67 says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 13:25
    
    Everybody just keep an eye on the penalty and conditions pertaining to cancelattions and changes on bargain fares as these can be onerous. Also make sure you are insured at time of booking, not just time of travel.
    - Rob says:
      
      25 Apr25 April 14:37
      
      You should assume no cancellation, no refund – which has always been the rule on heavily discounted tickets on airlines.
      - Polly says:
        
        25 Apr25 April 14:50
        
        These QR ones all have $300 change fee, and nil for cancellation, lose the lot! At least they can be changed, which is something, which works out about £180 fee.
      - Rob says:
        
        25 Apr25 April 17:32
        
        Changeable IF you pay the fare difference. Fine if they are still selling £800 tickets, bit of a disaster otherwise!
      - Alan says:
        
        26 Apr26 April 02:33
        
        Indeed, I can’t really see what’s different with these ones.
- Tom euflyer says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 10:59
  
  I tend to agree too James. I am increasingly finding that premium cash flights (BA, Qatar, Etihad, Finnair all being very recent examples of airlines offering incredibly low biz class deals), are offering substantially better “value” than redemption flights.
  
  Of course, it heavily depends on how you harvest your points, but it increasingly seems that the “value traveller” needs to focus as much on the bargain sales as they do on playing the miles and points game.
Eric says:

25 Apr25 April 06:57

Great deal! Just curious whether there would be any negative consequences of forfeiting/”missing” the LCY-FRA leg in the example above?
- polly says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 07:06
  
  Might want to complete it to be sure of getting the miles applied or do they apply them by segment? Anyone know the answer?
  - Alan says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 07:08
    
    As long as you only very rarely miss the last sector of a booking you’ll be OK, but don’t do it repeatedly! You’ll only miss out on TP/Avios for that last leg. Never miss an earlier sector or the rest of the booking will be cancelled.
    - polly says:
      
      25 Apr25 April 07:14
      
      Thought that was the case. Thanks.
      - Eric says:
        
        25 Apr25 April 09:35
        
        Cheers Alan.
Matthew says:

25 Apr25 April 07:02

Worth noting that is you book the higher price on BA then for the next few days you can also part pay with avios to save another £400 IIRC.
- Andrew says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 08:26
  
  Think that’s only London departures, so wouldn’t be able to benefit here. Shame – would be an excellent deal!
- Polly says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 10:54
  
  Just asked Rob if this was the case? Do you think it is, as that would take the hassle out of ex EU flights for people….
Andy says:

25 Apr25 April 07:30

I put the above itinerary into BA.COM and get a price of over 4000 euros. I must be doing something wrong that’s fairly obvious. Any ideas?
- Rob says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 07:38
  
  Not 6 nights away? Not departing Germany? Not travelling first leg before 5 July?
  - Andy says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 07:51
    
    Fairly sure I put in the itinerary just as above but maybe didn’t choose the exact flights on that day if that makes a difference.
- Ade says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 09:11
  
  The above price only appears if you input it on expedia.com.hk not ba.com. At least that’s what I’ve found anyway.
  - Rob says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 10:30
    
    Correct. You will pay over £1,000 on ba.com because the full fuel surcharge is added.
    - Polly says:
      
      25 Apr25 April 10:53
      
      Rob do you know if we did book from LHR could we apply the extra £400 off with avios, or would that be a cheeky ask????? Know it can’t be done from Europe, I think…
      - Rob says:
        
        25 Apr25 April 11:17
        
        May work, try a dummy booking through to payment page …..
      - BlueHorizonUK says:
        
        25 Apr25 April 11:43
        
        You can get €480 off for 60,000 avois bringing cost down from €1429 to €949.
      - Polly says:
        
        25 Apr25 April 14:47
        
        No it’s not working ex EU, max offered was £120 worth of avios, sadly.
Rob says:

25 Apr25 April 07:38

On the way …
Jason says:

25 Apr25 April 07:39

It’s even cheaper from Brussels, on the 787, which is the same seat.
JCB says:

25 Apr25 April 07:41

I wonder if anyone can help. I booked a Qatar business class fare ex BRU 2 weeks ago, and now they are 500 euros cheaper each. I think I am stuffed as the fare is non-refundable. I intend to phone Qatar but suspect I will be told “them’s the rules”. When I booked the saving versus LHR or MAN was OK, factoring in Eurostar, but now with the 2-4-1 ex UK out there and an even better price ex BRU, the fare looks poor.

Any bright ideas on how to get the fare changed?
- Polly says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 07:51
  
  You can always try the call centre in MAN, but they had a $300 change fee attached to those fares you booked. We discussed that at length here, shame really, but maybe you did get a good fare even then. Always worth a try, they might only charge you the standard £100 fare change fee. I have always found them quite helpful in the past, its worth a call.
Polly says:

25 Apr25 April 07:47

Tom, I mentioned it first thing this morning. Was hoping ROB was doing an article on it. Has to be the QR influence on BA though for this J sale. Have you looked ex EU, saw some amazing fares from CPH and ARN, didn’t check BRU though, all Dreamliner etc and short overlays… You might save even more on your MALE trip. Best to keep reminding each other of these greats opportunities though. I got a QR CPH one to HKT, so that’s us set for an extra trip.
- Tom C says:
  
  25 Apr25 April 08:01
  
  Thanks a lot Jason and Polly.
  
  I was going to say how I’ve flown Qatar before, loved it and wanted to try out their A380, so am prepared to pay more. Yet then I looked up the price if flying from Brussels, which works out around £2k and promptly changed my mind and decided Dreamliner it is. I flew Virgin’s Dreamliner out to Delhi on the inaugural flight (not deliberate, just coincidence), so it will be interesting to compare.
  - Rob says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 10:34
    
    Same seat on the 787 and 380 in business. Note that Qatar moves planes around a lot so they may well switch on you anyway ….
  - Polly says:
    
    25 Apr25 April 12:35
    
    Tom. Honestly you will think you are flying BA F. The service is a much higher standard between certain high profile cities, I noticed a vast difference between certain routes. Shouldn’t be but certain expectations are reflected on certain routes.
    - Tom C says:
      
      25 Apr25 April 13:28
      
      I 100% agree. We flew to Manila with Qatar in J at Christmas and I’d consider them the best business class airliner we’ve ever flown. The service was amazing, but the food is what really stood out. It was just a shame it was an old plane, so no flat bed. I’d agree with you that it’s better than BA’s First in most areas. I’m sorting the hotels out now with AMEX for the Maldives. We stayed at Huvafen Fushi last year, which was amazing, but I fancy trying Cheval Blanc or Velaa. Thanks again for the tips.