I just got back from a long weekend in London and am happy to say the trip was a total success on all fronts. While there are several topics I plan on discussing with this trip report, I think it is important to first discuss how I booked the trip.
Finding The Right Price
For this trip I knew the final destination would be London as I was visiting friends who recently moved and I had a rough idea of the dates I would be traveling. With that information, I quickly searched nearby origins from Chicago on ITA Matrix to find the origin with the lowest price on American. If you have flexible travel plans, ITA Matrix is the best place to find cheap airfare.
After a few different searches I found a trip from Los Angeles International (LAX) to London Heathrow (LHR) on British Airways. The best part of the trip was that both my flight to London and back would be on the British Airways A380. Once I had the flights picked out, I setup a google flights price alert to notify me if the price dropped. Keep in mind I had a backup routing in mind and was fine scrapping the trip completely. Luckily, after a few weeks, the round trip price dropped to just over $500 and I began be booking process.
Booking An American Airlines Special Fare
American Airlines recently switched to a revenue based frequent flyer program. Since I found such a discounted fare, the AAdvantage EQD and EQM earnings for the trip would be pitiful at best. Luckily for the flights I selected I could either purchase AA or BA flight numbers. Each method had drawbacks, but I recently discovered a third way. Below is the comparison between the three methodologies to book.
1. Booking AA Flight Numbers
If I booked AA flight numbers I would earn AAdvantage EQD and EQM based on the American earning chart. Using this method I would earn full EQM (10,912), but only approximately $450 EQD.
2. Booking BA Flight Numbers
If I booked BA flight numbers I would earn AAdvantage miles based on the British Airways earning chart. In this case the flight booed into the ‘O’ fare class. Because of this, I would only earn 50% EQM and EQD equal to 5% of the distance flown ($546).
3. Booking AA Special Fare
The third and less obvious way to book this flight is to purchase an AA special fare. Doing so isn’t exactly easy, but it definitely isn’t difficult either. For my booking I chose to use the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal. I logged into Chase, searched the exact flights I had already found (with AA flight numbers), and booked the flights using a combination of Ultimate Reward points and cash. For this booking, which would serve as my test, I used just 1 Ultimate Reward point. If everything worked correctly (which it did) I would earn EQD and EQM based on distance flown. The 10,912 journey earns full 10,912 EQD and $1,092 EQM which is considerably better than either of the other two options. Now that I had the main trip purchased, I had to book positioning flights to Los Angeles from Chicago.
Getting to Los Angeles
Originally I planned to try out Virgin Airways on at least one leg of the ORD to LAX journey. Sadly the prices never dropped for Virgin and I ended up booking with American. I could have used any combination of miles/points to position to LAX, but wanted to earn miles for the fairly long flights. I first found the one-way flight to LAX for just $89 on AA, but return flights were considerably more expensive. For the flight home I again used google flight alerts to find the best fare. For week the price only went up, but 5 days prior to my departure flights from LAX to ORD dropped to just $110 and I booked.
Final Thoughts
As you can, see booking this trip took some thought. At various points when planning this trip it seemed as though it wasn’t going to happen. Finding the flights proved difficult and because I dragged my feet the prices from LAX to LHR went up and I almost didn’t book. Luckily prices decreased at the right times and I made the trip happen.
Also, I am happy to report the AA special fares worked! I ended up earning EQD and EQM based on distance rather than price paid. I just wish I would have also used the trick to purchase my flights to/from LAX. Hopefully this trip can help on your next long distance economy booking.
