Evidently, they’re still a little sore about the whole Independence Day thing on the other side of the pond. Overnight, British Airways seems to have completely destroyed its award chart for flights on AA and Alaska Airlines within the US, in some cases raising prices by almost 50%. BA already took a mallet to those awards in late-2023, so domestic US flights under 3,000 miles now cost between 50-100% more than they did last Summer.
Although we always hate to see devaluations like this with no notice, this one actually won’t make much of a difference for most folks who want to use their Avios domestically – BA wasn’t the best Avios program to use for these sorts of awards anyway. That would be Qatar or Finnair. So far, prices in those programs are unchanged.
New Pricing for AA/Alaska using BA Avios
British Airways has drastically increased the pricing of all award flights on Alaska and American that are under 3,000 miles in distance AND have origins or destinations within the US. In practice, that affects almost all flights within North America on both carriers, the exceptions being Hawai’i and Alaska to some Midwest and all East Coast destinations. Here’s a summary of what’s happened:
| Length of Flight (in miles) | Economy Award Price (before/after) | Business Award Price (before/after) |
|---|---|---|
| 1-650 (non-US flight) | 6,000/no change | 12,000/no change |
| 1-650 | 8,250/12,000 | 16,500/24,000 |
| 651-1151 | 11,000/16,000 | 20,500/32,000 |
| 1152-2000 | 14,500/18,000 | 29,000/40,000 |
| 2001-3000 | 16,000/20,000 | 42,000/50,000 |
| 3000+ | Unchanged | Unchanged |
Quick Thoughts
These increases are astonishing, especially given that they occurred with no notice AND after these same awards already increased in price a few months ago. Last July 4th, you could get a business class ticket from Chicago to Los Angeles for 22,000 Avios. This year, it’ll cost you 40,000…almost double.
The new prices will make British Airways completely uncompetitive when booking North American awards – which appears to be the point. However, for folks with pockets full o’ Avios, the sky hasn’t fallen. BA wasn’t really the best option for Alaska and American redemptions previously, as either Qatar or Finnair had equal or better pricing on most (maybe all?) routes. Luckily for us, neither one has changed. Yet.
A flight from Seattle to San Francisco will cost you 16,000 Avios in economy and 32,000 in business when you get it from BA. That same flight is still pricing at 9,000 Avios in economy and 16,500 in business when booking via Qatar:
While BA is now charging 20K to get from the West Coast to Hawai’i, Qatar will still sell you a ticket for 13K:
Since Avios are easily transferable between programs, it already didn’t make sense to use BA in most of these situations. Now, we can just ignore it completely.
I do have some concern that these massive price increases from BA over the last few months will bleed over to Qatar and Finnair sooner than later; the disparity in pricing is now quite pronounced. If/when that happens, we’ll truly have reason to shed some tears. But for the moment, we can celebrate knowing that there’s still safe haven for American flights within the Avios program, despite this all this British aggression.
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