I have to admit, British Airways is becoming one of my flights of choice this year, as I reattempt my growth back to American Airlines Executive Platinum and route some of my Europe travel via London which adds flexibility into my schedule (2 flights a day to Mumbai, as compared to one a day with Jet Airways at Brussels which is my evergreen option).

They have been running an excellent promotion for a while, which was highlighted to me sometime back but I failed to write about because I thought it was useless. I changed my mind last night. British Airways has had a tie-up with Groupon in India to sell promotional vouchers, where they are offering the following deals on return tickets:

• Rs.199 to get Rs.5000 off per ticket (for 1 pax) for destinations in UK & Europe), Cabin: World Traveller (Economy) & World Traveller Plus (Premium Economy)
• Rs.199 to get Rs.5000 off per ticket (for 1 pax) for Destinations in United States & Canada, Cabin: World Traveller (Economy)
• Rs.299 to get Rs.7000 off per ticket (for 1 pax) for Destinations in United States & Canada, Cabin: World Traveller Plus (Premium Economy)

The terms & conditions are very simple, and your outbound travel needs to start by December 31, 2014. These discount codes are not valid on tactical discount fares, and can be used for online reservations. There is a minimum value to the tickets, which you can check on Groupon’s pages. You have till July 31, 2014 to ticket your booking, however, you need to buy the voucher sooner. The deal is on till mid-May as per somewhere I saw on the website. I’ve picked up a few more just in case.

I discovered the great value this deal offers last night. Now, I almost forgot about this trip I needed to make shortly, and flights started to fill up. So bad that they were selling Premium Economy on a particular flight cheaper than economy. And then I bought one of these vouchers and got a straight 5000 INR off on my ticket.

The second deal is directly with British Airways themselves and something I wrote about in the past. They are offering a free UK visa to anyone who wants to book a ticket. Earlier the details of this proposition were sketchy and you could only book via a travel agent. Now, they’ve moved the deal to their own website as well.

What you need to do, is to send a copy of your UK visa or visa application to British Airways via email, and they will send you a promotional code for an INR 8,400 discount on the ticket price. INR 8,400 is the amount you get charged for a 6-month visit visa to the UK. You can also apply for a longer term visa, however BA will reimburse only this cost to you via the promotional voucher. There is a minimum ticketing amount of INR 62,200. Offer is valid for travel in World Traveller (economy), World Traveller Plus (premium economy) and Club World (business). The offer is valid on oneway and return bookings made in F,A,J,C,D,R,I,W,E,T,Y,B,H,K,M,V and L classes. It is valid only on return fares in N and S classes.

I think this is an excellent offer and very innovative. I’ve recently flown the old BA 747s and I’ll fly their new 777-ERs shortly, and then I hope to report back on the various products shortly as well.

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