Regent "free" business class air

[sevenseassailor]

"BA and AA in their 2014 Regent contracts are adding a surcharge of $1000 pp each way to the “free” business class promotion." Just got this from our travel agent. That sucks so guess no more AA or BA and maybe even Regent. Problem is we have two cruises booked for 2014 with them.

[Travelcat2]

It seems that airlines are charging incredibly high prices for Business Class Air and it isn't as easy as it was before for Regent to get a "contract" with certain airlines. We are paying $1,000/person to have Air Canada (non-stop) from Sydney to Vancouver. Until or unless airlines scale back prices, we are stuck with the high prices. From what we have seen, prices are not better on other luxury cruise lines.

 

On the positive side, we have been able to get Business Class air on Cathay Pacific with no upcharge. Emirates, Lufthansa, Delta and KLM are also alternatives (although KLM Business Class have the most uncomfortable seats we have ever been in).

[nanook21]

Jackie, you are also on the same Dubai-Cape Town sailing as us, have you looked at air for that? I was going to let Regent do it, but not sure what airlines they use from the US (Business).

[Travelcat2]

Jackie, you are also on the same Dubai-Cape Town sailing as us, have you looked at air for that? I was going to let Regent do it, but not sure what airlines they use from the US (Business).

 

Coincidentally I was looking at it yesterday and today. I used 2013 dates since the actual dates are too far out. The best flights I found were with Emirates Airlines which do not fly out of Vancouver...... so I was thinking about leaving from Seattle where they have a non-stop to Dubai and 1 stop on the way back. A concern is the time of the year....... flying in November/December can be problematic. Which airport do you fly out of?

[RachelG]

BA has huge taxes on business class fares, even for their award tickets. This may be one reason for the surcharge. Their taxes on an award business class ticket from tulsa to LHR one way ran about $700 last year.

[nanook21]

Oh wow, air is really getting expensive, and everything Im reading says its just going to keep climbing.

 

Jackie, normally we would fly out of Calgary/Vancouver, but we decided to leave from Phoenix as we have someone there to live with our fuzzy feline while we're gone, and we want to return there for New Years anyway. So I've got to figure out the best routing from Phoenix, maybe thru LA or Atlanta, etc. You're right, it's too early to book. But never too early to plan!

[pingpong1]

Nanook - In case you're interested, US Airways has daily direct/non-stop service between Phoenix (PHX) and Vancouver (YVR). I used it last year when we took the Navigator from Vancouver to San Francisco (by way of Alaska). It's not the "cheapest" among several other choices - but it's the only direct/non-stop service between those two cities. Regards.

[nanook21]

Ya, I know, we do the direct PHX-YYC many times per year, and family use the YVR-PHX a lot. I'd just rather not go "backwards" if I can help it. May be the best connect tho, so will look at it. Think the PHX-SFO might be better, will check that too. Thanks!

[Travelcat2]

Oh wow, air is really getting expensive, and everything Im reading says its just going to keep climbing.

 

Jackie, normally we would fly out of Calgary/Vancouver, but we decided to leave from Phoenix as we have someone there to live with our fuzzy feline while we're gone, and we want to return there for New Years anyway. So I've got to figure out the best routing from Phoenix, maybe thru LA or Atlanta, etc. You're right, it's too early to book. But never too early to plan!

 

For the heck of it I checked LAX. They have non-stop to Dubai and back from Cape Town. It doesn't get much better than that.

[nanook21]

Oh wow, that's great, thanks! Hadn't had a chance to check it yet. Was that with Emirates?

[Travelcat2]

Oh wow, that's great, thanks! Hadn't had a chance to check it yet. Was that with Emirates?

 

Yes -- Emirates! We can get non-stop from Seattle (hate leaving from Seattle) to Dubai but it has one stop on the return. May end up paying extra to fly BA -- just to avoid Seattle at that time of the year. Would love to fly Emirates someday.

[Threechicks]

Yes -- Emirates! We can get non-stop from Seattle (hate leaving from Seattle) to Dubai but it has one stop on the return. May end up paying extra to fly BA -- just to avoid Seattle at that time of the year. Would love to fly Emirates someday.

TC Emerates is very nice. I flew First class from Johannesburg to Dubai. They sent a limo to pick me up in JBurg and another took me to my apartment in Dubai. This was included in the fare. Very nice but Singapore First still beats them.

[nanook21]

I had a look at this November's flights out of LAX to Dubai, and found the 1-way BC fare for Delta (via Atlanta) was approx $4100. Emirates A380 nonstop was $10,060. That's quite a difference. Checked a random date in March, same thing. Guess Emirates is probably out of the picture!

[Wendy The Wanderer]

You guys are talking about named suites which have "free" business air. Presumably this premium of $1K on BA and AA is return? So someone who wanted to pay the $1250 per person/per direction biz upgrade price would also pay $1K per person? Or is it each way?

[Travelcat2]

I had a look at this November's flights out of LAX to Dubai, and found the 1-way BC fare for Delta (via Atlanta) was approx $4100. Emirates A380 nonstop was $10,060. That's quite a difference. Checked a random date in March, same thing. Guess Emirates is probably out of the picture!

 

Regent booked several customers on Emirates last November. Regent has/had (?) a contract with them. Cathay Pacific is another very expensive airline but with Regent's contract, we have one leg of our December cruise and two legs of our March cruise on Cathay Pacific. Interestingly, we had to pay $1,000/person extra to take Air Canada home from Sydney (if I mentioned that earlier in the thread, I apologize for not remembering:-)

 

Also, I would hate leaving Vancouver and stopping in Atlanta as it would not be Business class (actually, my DH would not go on a non-Business Class flight -- we paid extra to fly from Vancouver to Miami earlier this year). I suppose it all comes down to what airlines Regent has contracts with at the end of next year.

[nanook21]

Yes, and Im sure they don't have those contracts in place yet, so will be difficult to find out who they will be using. I also hate the domestic coach portion, would almost prefer to do the domestic ourselves, as we have so many points to use up and can upgrade (UsAir usually upgrades us gratis). Using Regent's air, you can't upgrade the domestic, it's on a special contract fare. That's why we've always declined Regent air and done it ourselves, but for this trip that could be tricky, so we're still thinking on it.

[rallydave]

Yes, and Im sure they don't have those contracts in place yet, so will be difficult to find out who they will be using. I also hate the domestic coach portion, would almost prefer to do the domestic ourselves, as we have so many points to use up and can upgrade (UsAir usually upgrades us gratis). Using Regent's air, you can't upgrade the domestic, it's on a special contract fare. That's why we've always declined Regent air and done it ourselves, but for this trip that could be tricky, so we're still thinking on it.

 

As a help for getting good seats domestically, I'll offer the fact that most of the time if you book a flight from the US to a foreign country and have a domestic segment you will get First Class seats on the domestic portion of the flights. This works even with the use of cruise air. If you are taking a foreign carrier with a domestic carrier for the domestic portion, it won't work but, it should work if you say fly Delta to Atlanta and onward to a foreign destination and then change to a foreign carrier as you would need to for South Africa.

 

As I said, should work if you fly a single airline but, you would need to check it out if you are combining domestic and foreign airlines. Another possible solution which would involve foreign airlines is to book with the domestic carrier on a code share where you fly on the foreign carrier but, purchase your ticket from a domestic carrier who code shares with the foreign carrier of your choice.

 

Have actually done this with flights from Houston to Auckland with the over water on Qantas but, booked as a frequent flyer trip with Continental and flying from and to Houston in First Class and on Qantas on Business. Have recently done a Regent paid upgrade to Business Class from Barcelona to Houston and the ticket was issued Business from Barcelona to Newark and First Class on United to Houston.

 

It does work if you are diligent in choosing the correct airline and check with them prior to booking to see if they do the same as Continental and now United. Pretty sure most if not all domestic carriers do this for people without non-stops to foreign destinations.

[nanook21]

Good to know, thanks! Will keep that in mind.

[Travelcat2]

You guys are talking about named suites which have "free" business air. Presumably this premium of $1K on BA and AA is return? So someone who wanted to pay the $1250 per person/per direction biz upgrade price would also pay $1K per person? Or is it each way?

 

Actually, I'm talking about business class in general when using Regent Air. We do not have included business class air in December (Vancouver to Singapore - Sydney to Vancouver). We paid the cost of business class air and decided that it was worth $1,000 per person for a non-stop flight from Sydney to Vancouver on Air Canada.

 

Regent usually has a upcharge on British Airways and American Airlines (fairly new requirement). If the upcharge is $1,000/person/segment, the cost for a round trip on BA would be $4,000 for a couple.

 

It is important to note that the rules for flying out of Canada are not necessarily the same as flying out of the U.S. The rules can be so complex that when we book our own air (vs. Regent air), we have a TA that just does our air. Although we have to pay the TA, we save money in the long run.

 

nanook21: We will be able to book air for our cruise at the end of February and will be deviating. At that time we'll know if Regent still has a contract with Emirates. Thinking about it now, I would do almost anything not to fly KLM from Cape Town to Vancouver. Unfortunately, they have the shortest flights (still around 26 hours -- other airlines are 35+ hours). We've flown to Cape Town once -- quite an experience. Thankfully we had Ambien:-)

[nanook21]

I can sympathize, in Jan we had 15 hrs to Hong Kong, then 10 hrs to Sydney. Both overnighters, back to back. And I can't sleep on a plane, even with the lie-flat beds. It didnt help that we were on Cathay Pacific, normally wonderful, but they were on "work to rule" and service was spotty to non-existent. Very disappointing. And on New Years Eve, yet!

[nanook21]

I was just looking at connections out of Phoenix, and wouldn't you know it, best (1 stop each way in Heathrow) is British Air. But I'm not willing to pay an extra $2000 pp for that over and above Regents upgrade, so will look at alternatives.

 

 

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