British Airways has taken a kicking lately. Fined hundreds of millions of
pounds for price-fixing, vilified for its inability to unite thousands of
passengers with their luggage, and so on. But at least the airline can pride
itself on one thing: its fares online are competitive. Indeed, BA.com
proudly declares: “We promise that if you find exactly the same BA flight
cheaper on another UK website, we’ll refund the difference.”
What most of its passengers don’t realise, however, is that they may be able
to find the same flights cheaper using an American-based website.
In fact, one reader, Roger Gibbens of Hitchin, Hertfordshire, saved 30% off
the BA.com price on a flight from Rome to London by buying from the US site
Orbitz.com. “I gave my address in the UK, paid with a UK credit card and
confirmed afterwards with BA that the booking was all in order.”
So we did some digging. We compared British Airways fares from Rome to London
on a series of dates, and consistently found prices lower on US websites. On
October 6, BA.com had a flight from Rome Fiumicino to London Gatwick for
£67.42. Orbitz.com , an American
price-comparison site, quoted £38.31. But even that wasn’t the best deal
available. On the aptly named Cheaptickets.com
, we found the same BA flight for £35.78 – saving 47%.
This is all very well if you need a one-way ticket originating from Italy, but
does it work if you’re booking flights out of the UK? Well, yes, it does.
Let’s say you planned to fly from Heathrow to Fiumicino on October 6,
returning a week later. At BA.com the fare was £143, but the same flights
were available at Orbitz for £116.43.
And the same applies to BA’s transatlantic fares. At Cheaptickets.com, the
lowest fare from London to New York on August 28, returning on September 4,
was £295.84, only £1.26 cheaper than BA.com. But BA’s fare was only
available for passengers willing to return on a daytime flight out of
Newark.
Those who wanted one of the 10 other flights BA operates from New York to
London that day – including the redeyes – pay more. Indeed, other flight
times quoted by Cheaptickets. com would have cost £419.10 at BA.com, a 41%
premium.
So, where’s the catch? Will you get the same level of consumer protection and
customer service if you buy from an American website? What would happen if
the website went bust?
Neither Orbitz.com nor Cheaptickets. com is likely to go under anytime soon.
Both are part of Travelport, a multinational giant that also owns more
familiar brand names such as Ebookers and Travelbag. Orbitz was valued last
year at more than £375m.
And BA says that once you’ve got your booking reference, it’s all the same.
“There are no implications for travellers [if you book through an American
website]. You can still check in and manage your booking online.”
So why the discrepancies? British Airways admits that it’s a case of one fare
for the UK market and another for the American one: “We price differently in
different markets, based on the state of the market and on what our
competitors are doing.” The airline also claimed that taxes are higher on
some routes if booked out of the UK. On Heathrow to JFK, the difference is
about £15, it said.
This sort of tactical pricing is now outlawed within the EU, but not across
the Atlantic. BA admits it may be forced to rethink its policy. “We will
look at this in the future as part of our overall pricing strategy,” it
said.
Are other airlines playing the same game? Virgin Atlantic said: “We do
sometimes bring out promotional fares to stimulate demand in different
countries, particularly in the USA at the moment.”
We couldn’t find evidence of tactical pricing on routes operated by Virgin
Atlantic and BMI. There were discrepancies, but only marginal ones, but it’s
clearly worth keeping an eye out.
Nor was it always cheaper to book British Airways flights through American
agents. In many cases there was little difference between the fares, and, in
a few instances, BA even undercut the US sites. But not by much.
The fares were found on August 7; the conversion rate used was £1 = $1.974
How to do it
THE SUREST way to find the lowest fares is through an American comparison site
such as Sidestep.com , Kayak.com
or Mobissimo.com . These will
display a range of fares for a given route on a given date, and direct you
to the booking pages of the relevant agents. To be sure you don’t miss a
better deal, run the same search on a UK comparison site such as
Travelsupermarket.com or Traveljungle.co.uk.
If you’re booking a flight within the EU on an American site, you’ll need to
tick a box to confirm that you are an EU resident. Your fare will be quoted
in US dollars. Once you have a booking reference, you can log on to the
airline’s own website and manage your booking in the usual way.
i just looked at two sites, orbitz.com and travelocity.co.uk for a transatlantic flight originating in Miami, it was $143 cheaper to book it on travelocity.co.uk so I suppose it works both ways.
kevin cormack, fort lauderdale, usa
These sites can offer savings on flights originating in the UK for UK residents, but what comparison sites work for those of us who live in Ireland and are joining a flight in the UK? For example, BA charges much more if the flights are being purchased in Ireland, compared to somebody purchasing the identical flights in the UK (even if the Irel-UK sector is included!!).
Susie, Shannon,
I was just checking some US airlines and once you figure in the EUR/USD conversion ration, it seems cheaper to jsut buy from the US web sites.
On the US Airlines it didn't seem they were completely adjusting for the conversion. NW seemed to adjust the best, but the rest didn't. (On the US web sites NW was about the same, but on a European web site they are lots of EUR's less (though probably the same as on the US Side).
James, The Hague, Netherlands
Note that Sidestep.com & Kayak.com automatically re-direct to a .co.uk when you are browing for the UK! I'd be interested to see what the price difference for the same routes is on the .com website and the .co.uk website!
drc, Chepstow,
Not exactly news, I've been booking flights through US sites for over five years, often saving between 33% and 50% on transAtlantic flights for the same route on the same day.
At the weekend I booked a flight to the US in November that was £350 through a UK web site but only cost me $400 (£200) when booked through a US site, a saving of £150.
Clive, Bristol, England
keep burning that untaxed kerosine
d johnson, hull,
Interestingly, even within the BA system, purchasing "out of UK" can work to your advantage.
I was looking for a London-Geneva-London flight. Because I needed flexibility, I asked the BA system to quote me single fares for each leg. I decided to fly out by EsayJet and back with BA.
This meant that I had to purchase my return leg entering Switzerland as my country of origin in the BA system. The result? The return leg ticket was about £12 cheaper. So you would actually make a saving purchasing your single outbound from BA (UK) and your single return from BA (Switzerland) as opposed to a return flight from BA (UK)!
John Smith, London,
Last year I needed to fly from Christchurch to Auckland in New Zealand. Air New Zealand's .co.uk site was 10 pounds more expensive than their .co.nz site for the very same flight, even after I took the credit card fees for using my card abroad and currency coversions into account.
Luke Nicolaides, London, UK
So if BA can cut the price just to sell in the US market, that means they are keeping it artificially high over here instead of using their ability to undercut, or at least provide a more robust challenge, to the opposition. Isn't that called price-fixing - or is that only true if we actually find a piece of paper where they promise not to undercut their opponents?
KR, Stockport,
The catch of course is that BA is not generally the cheapest airline on the route so you could be better off flying with another carrier. And if you have ticket issues we have found BA Customer Service to be incredibly unhelpful. The 5 of us fly to the US 4-5 times a year and we will no longer book with BA.
Darrill, Crawley,
Not exactly a startling revelation. All the airlines have special deals which can be obtained sometimes through the 'cheap ticket sites' and sometimes the sirlines themselves have the best deal, as you found. From many years of travelling and fare hunting I have actually found that if you have plenty of notice there is rarely anything cheaper than the carrier itself, but for closer dates the others have the best deals. I think it is time to stop singling BA out for the activities which all the airlines indulge in. After all, they are not a charitable institution and never claim the kind of perfection and dedication to good deeds which Mr. Branson does.
Bill Atkins, Rehoboth Beach, USA
Isn't this similar to the story about the Eurostar and tickets bought by a resident of country outside of the UK that were much cheaper.
Why do we keep getting stung??
Will, London,
Anfd BA dont take debit cards (eg my nationwide one that saves a lot of money on foreign currency transactions).
brian, london, uk
Whilst I agree with this writer and have found similar price differences recently when trying to travel from Mexico to Uk and back there is one fundamental problem. Many of the US sites, including at least two mentioned in this article, refuse to accept credit or debit cards with a billing address outside the US; even when directly in touch with the relevant bank in London via a tripartite telephone call where the bankers authorised the payment!
Paul Diehl, Puerto Vallarta, Mexico
This is no surprise at all and has been going on ever since airlines first started some 70 odd years ago.
Until recently IATA was a price fixing cartel second only to OPEC in its power and reach.
On many routes, particularly to long haul destinations it was a breach of ticketing rules to undercut a published fare.
Thankfully with competition these practices have stopped with airlines now offering cut price half-return fares that were unheard of if not a breach of IATA rules 9 years ago when I was first trained.
Marios Patrinos, Reading, UK
So, another example of rip-off Britain. What a surprise!
Adrian Gilbert, Tonbridge, England