Has anyone converted their RBC Avion points to british airways Avios with the 50% bonus promo to fly to Europe? I spoke with RBC and this offer is typically offered in November. Interested to hear how this worked and if it's a good value for my points when flying to Europe.

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Yes and yes. Convert your points, log into your executive club account and search for flights. Only downside I found is I had to call the UK to speak to an agent to arrange connecting flights and she was fantastic.

Thanks Winston. Were the tax charges reasonable?

interested in this thread also! I tried to do this last year, but found it fairly impossible to find flights with the BA points that didn't have insane surcharges...keep us updated Stephanie as I'd like to try again
others I know have had good success with it (I was looking in the middle of high season so maybe that had an effect)

Plan your holidays far far in advance if you plan on using your points.

I did a bunch if research into how to use the points, so you have to decide if it works for you. Instead of using to point to fly "free" since you have to pay some type of fee, I choose to use them to upgrade my flight class. If I booked a flight using avion to Milan it was 60,000 points and around $700 in fees for an economy+ seat. To fly BA business class it would be 100,000 Avios and around $900 in fees, first class is 150,000 Avios and $1300 in fees. If you do the conversion 60,000 avion points = 90,000 Avios so why fly economy? I have also planned a flight to Japan flying business class using JAL and it it 90,000 Avios and $700.

Winston, I've heard that is definitely the best part of converting! awesome tip

If you use Avios to fly within Europe or use partner airline AA to fly in the USA the points used and fees charged are minimal and will pop your eyes out. London to Milan business class return was 16,000 Avios and $200

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Forget it. You can never get a seat with british airways!

You won't be able to book an economy seat but that's a waste of points due to fees charged since higher class seats aren't much more in terms of fees. Many of business and FC seats available. If you book a year in advance fewer Avios are required as well.

I've done this when I was planning a trip at least 4-6 months in advance and even then, it was a little difficult to book BA flights. If you're planning a trip far in the future, I'd say it's worth swapping Avion points for the 50% bonus. BA is a decent airline and the point redemption schedule is the same as Avion. So you could use your bonus points to upgrade your flight. For example, I booked a flight to Munich from Vancouver (with a stopover in London) and the return leg out of Istanbul back to Vancouver. The return leg was business class. With taxes and surcharges, I think ended up paying around $700 (mostly because of the taxes on the business class leg) for the entire flight.

we've been trying to get a seat for 3 years with british airways. Now they tell me that if there is no activity soon, I will lose my points. Seats are VERY limited.

Can never book a flight on BA with points and good luck reaching customer service. I tried many variables and can't use my 250 000 BA points for anything!

I'm a bonehead and forgot to mention the timeframes in my mobile phone replies. If you are not buying a WT+ fare and upgrading to business class with Avios, I was informed the best time to find a seat (business and FC) is 2-3 weeks prior to departure. The 2-3 week window is because BA can not sell the seats in that window so BA releases them for award flights. I tested this and was able to find a seat 80% of the time that matched my dates, or 100% of the time if I was flexible. I also tested the one year in advance suggestion and was able to find a seat as well. I also had much better results calling in and speaking to a BA agent in regards to my travel plans and they were very helpful in sorting things out. Outside of these two suggestions (2-3weeks or 1 year in advance) I was never able to find a seat. In regards to the no activity, IIRC it is a 4 year period and all you have to do is transfer in some points to the account and it resets the clock.

I agree that calling into the BA Avios customer support line was far more useful than trying to book online. The agent I spoke to was able to find flight combinations and availability which were not listed on the booking site. Thinking back, I've booked twice with BA using points and each time I was booking at least 6 months in advance. Winston's note about the 2-3 week booking window makes sense as well, but I've never tried booking that close to a planned travel date.

I never tried booking that close either, but when I tried looking on their online system it always came up with seats in that window. So I had faith, waited and booked and just returned from my trip last week. When I checked how many Avios is needed if I booked a year in advance I was shocked to see that it can go down as much as 33%!!

Spencer if you can't use the points I'd be happy to buy them from you!

I've collected BA avios for years, and concluded BA avios is more or less useless for transatlantic flight. A years back, they had free stop overs, so open jaws were worth it, but now they charge per leg, so it is very limiting. There are lots of web sites on maximizing BA avois. BA flights within north america using AA, or Alaska are great deals with no fuel surcharge. As it is distance based, flights to LA are only 15000 return, and flight to hawaii are only 25000 return. (compared to 25000, 35000 with aeroplan respectively.) Flights to asia used to be a better deals as well. After planning for about two years for a trip to asia, and too annoyed to pay the extra charges for adding a leg, we went on an awesome flight using economy. BLI - HNL (honolulu) - NRT (japan) - PUS (busan, korea) => land travel - ICN - YVR, for just a little more than a return flight from YVR-(NRT)- ICN.

For transatlantic, I hear aer lingus via boston??? has no surcharge, and less distance, but it doesn't work very well for us west coast dwellers.

Suggestion call and confirm availability for the flights you need for your BA flight. Either 1 year in advance or 3 weeks in advance. No sense converting your points to BA for the offer and your stuck if no flights are available. Avian points are waaay more flexible. Yes the redemption value is better with BA but you get get times, flights, and dates that you need always..so there's s trade off. Plus when redeeming your only allowed to book for s specific date if it's at least 14 days in advance so if you try to book on dec 1 for a flight dec 8 they won't let you.. The earliest you can book would be dec 14 ( something to be aware of ) if you need to leave and return by a specific date.

Steph call me if you need more answers I've used the points system a lot..