The BEST Tier Point Run in the World? SriLankan from Abu Dhabi to Jakarta. Part Two - Back Again
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 20 ก.ค. 2024
- For many years if you needed Tier Points, you headed to Abu Dhabi. BA used to have direct flights from London and Premium Economy was reasonably priced from outside London, so you'd get to Abu Dhabi with perhaps 200 tier points in the bank from positioning. And then for perhaps £600, you could fly to Jakarta via Colombo and add another 560 tier points to the balance. Extraordinary value and a fun adventure...
Then the you-know-what descended and lots of things changed... BA hasn't resumed service to Abu Dhabi - they leave the region to Qatar these days - so although you can get to Abu Dhabi on the cheap with Wizz air, tier point rich options are now very expensive... And inflation seems to have caught up with SriLankan and their onward fare is now 20% higher than it was. Still exceptional value, but not as great as the "good old days"...
But I need to renew my Gold status, and I've been enviously watching others take this trip for years, so I decided to "just do it". I positioned with a redemption on Qatar and paid just over £800 for the flights. I thought I'd make one comprehensive video about the entire trip, but that would have been about 40 minutes long, so I've split it into two. "There" in part 1, released last week, and "Back Again".
This video shows the experience from Jakarta to Colombo, continuing to Abu Dhabi... Including one of the weirdest flights of my life.... Enjoy!
⭐ #flightreview #SriLankan #MattsPlanet ⭐
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⏰ Timestamps:
0:00 - Intro
0:58 - Jakarta
4:55 - Flight one
8:47 - Colombo
10:13 - Flight two
11:06 - Wrapping up...
DISCLAIMER: Links included in this description might be affiliate links. If you purchase a product or service with the links that I provide I may receive a small commission. There is no additional charge to you. This video may not be copied or reproduced without written permission.
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With BA now returning to AUH you have stirred my interest.... 😊 Thanks Matt.
It's certainly helpful that BA is back... Inverness used to be a great start point for a PE trip over...
Once again Matt, fantastic! The detail is excellent.👌
Thanks for watching!
Enjoyed the video as always Matt looking forward to the next one!
Thanks Bob - same time next week!
What an unexpected pleasure to watch this pair of videos! I love Indonesian food--one of SFO's best restaurants is/was Indonesian--but I'd never thought about going there. The bonus of getting at least OW Silver out of the deal sweetens the deal. Thanks for this and I hope you get to enjoy it just as much in a couple of year when renewing!
Thanks Kevin... Getting to Abu Dhabi is the hard part! I'll share some of my time in Jakarta and Bali in a few weeks - a few nasi gorengs did hit the spot!
🏆🏆🏆Your Tier Run strategies are EPIC🏆🏆🏆 Thanks for the info + video!
Thanks Jimmy. Excellent emoji work!
Thanks Matt. I used to live in AD and have fond memories of that terminal and the lounges.
In many ways I prefer Abu Dhabi to Dubai - didn't really have long enough this trip to show why ... next time!
Dear Matt, thank you for your entertaining and honest review. (A Sri Lankan travel agent)
Lots of negativity about SriLankan lately - reliability seems to be worsening but if they can get their game together its an excellent experience
Fantastic video as always and perfectly timed given that BA recently announced that they're bringing back the Abu Dhabi route which will help UK folks facilitate the repositioning process to this TP run
That's great news! Where did you read that?
@@ianworthington2324 BA sent out a press release on their website 3 days ago and it can be found on various news outlets who picked up the story. Route will resume as of next April
@@ianworthington2324It’s been published on Head for Points and various other reputable aviation news sites.
Indeed - inv-lhr-auh with the long leg in PE kicked out 200 tier points and was reasonably priced - before the you-know-what of course...
@@MattsPlanet that INV -LHR is a fantastic money saver. for me, the difference between flying PE or Business. I wonder if this can be tweeked to give that majic 5 night hotel stay or car hire to generate the double tier points. (its bookable on the Ba website now for next september.)
Awesome Matt, after reading in the Whatsapp of the trip i was really looking forward to seeing it in a video so thank you for both. Look forward to the next one
Cheers Ethan. It's fun - and quite lucrative from a TP perspective.... Just getting to Abu Dhabi is the problem.....
Fascinating run! Thanks for sharing.
You're welcome! I enjoyed the experience and enjoyed sharing it!
Great video, Matt. We recently discovered your channel and immediately subscribed. Looking forward to watching more content. :)
Thanks and welcome! There's a back catalogue to explore as well as new stuff every week!
Thanks for this. Try Iberia for excellent service, short and long haul. It's brilliant.
I've done an Iberia long haul to Bogota and I have another one coming up short haul next week!
@MattsPlanet I'll be interested. I went to Bogotá last year and was blown away by how good the experience was, compared with a flight to México on a 340 in 2019.
I know you like a brandy, and I'm usually the only passenger who requests a Cardinal Mendoza, which short haul used to carry too.
Love the video. Hope you enjoyed your view of the carpark (that was funny!). 560 TPs (almost enough for Silver alone!) for £800 is terrific and for 4 hour flights the seats looked comfortable enough to me. Reading the comments below, it's great BA will be re-opening the AUH route (I love Etihad Business but now I want to focus on OneWorld airlines for status).
If you're can get to Abu Dhabi it's really an easy choice!
That has got to be the best Plaza Premium lounge in the world. How the cramped, dungeon-like Plaza lounge at Heathrow T5 wins so many awards is beyond me.
It was surprisingly nice!
£835 for a week booked direct is available for most dates in the near future, will be looking at that next year. Useful videos again thanks Matt!
And BA is resuming flights to AUH which makes it a whole loe lot easier!
I enjoyed both parts of this trip Matt, thanks for sharing all four flights. I would be up for trying to fit this in at some point! Especially now that BA is offering direct Abu Dhabi flights now.
It's a fun experience!
Wonderful video as always here! Keep up the "hard" work drinking champagne!
It's a challenge but one I'm prepared to take on!
@@MattsPlanet a true martyr of our times Matt!
Nice video again. I did this trip pre-pandemic but from Dubai - which was, as you said, a bit more expensive but not by much and had the advantage of all 4 sectors being on flat beds. The lounge at Jakarta seems to have changed so I might have to do it again!
Thanks - the lounge in Jakarta was a very nice surprise!
So hello Daddy Matt! Every time you upload a BA tier point run I'm reminded of my bit of a pickle here in the US; on the one hand for Iberia Plus Gold (Sapphire), I could take ANY 50 AA flights even in Basic Economy to qualify or re-qualify. On the other hand for Royal Jordanian Gold (Sapphire), I could take JUST 30 AA flights to qualify (and JUST 26 to re-qualify) but they have to be in anything BUT Basic Economy. As I was writing this I could imagine your voice reading it, with emphasis on the allcaps LOL!
- Red
I get asked a lot for "reviews" if other loyalty programs but as you demonstrate, it's fiercely complicated as they vary so much between countries....
Brilliant two-fer of videos. I feel like I may need a trip to Jakarta just to visit the car park! This will become easier once BA restarts its AUH route in April 24. Once flight schedules are firmly established, you should be able to renew Silver in one Ex-EU run from Dublin if you can make the DUB-LHR-AUH portion on BA metal. Really appreciate you showing all four flights, the airports, and the brief discussion of immigration into Indonesia. I feel like some of those details can be very easily overlooked if one isnt careful.
Thanks for that. I wanted to show the full experience as some parts of it might feel daunting for some. Nothing to worry about though!!
I'm mirroring your QR Avios redemption to AUH and the UL mileage run to CGK and back, all in business, in December coming. Only difference is I'm flying out of/back to AMS and will have the Q-suite for the first time on the final QR leg. Thanks for pointing this UL deal out when you did, Matt, I've been waiting to book since then. Paid £806 like you said. I go away Christmas/New Year every year and cheer myself up in the gloom of a Scottish January by booking well ahead for next Christmas. I'm recently back from Mexico City, flying IB in business and your experience mirrored my own - they do enough and no more. I did get the new seats with the doors, though.
Thanks Derek. Jakarta for Christmas??? I am looking at Iberia again - hopefully to get a better product - but their pricing can't be beat!
I flew last weekend and the HK plaza premium lounge had a line of about 30 people waiting outside. Very different from the lounge you had in Jakarta which looked absolutely stunning
Jakarta airport was a surprising delight all round actually!
Splitter? Good. I remain a fan of the 15-minute video.
I'm wondering if you bother taking your own noise-reducing headphones on your travels.
Good video.
People's front of Judea??? I have "moderate to severe" hearing loss so no headphones are really going to work for me... One less thing to pug around though - they can be quite bulky!
Looks a lot easier on your video, I did this run when BA used to fly here however they are returning from April 24 (sadly timings for this run don’t fit with BA flights ) I did this 3 days before we went in to lockdown over you know what 🤷🏼♂️🤣 it was queue after queue. I jumped on the free buggy to save my legs a bit. Maybe next year.
Terrible timing! A BA direct flight does make things easier!
Great video Mat, thanks. I’m guessing with the return of AUH there could be some options to turn this into a BA holiday and get the double tier points. Will be interesting to see if there’s any value in that. All the best.
I was initially annoyed when BA announced this but now I think - new video!!!!
I needed 300 TPs to maintain Silver, haviing fallen off the perch.
5 nights BA Holidays Tirana £650. Add £50 for the taxis (no alternative at TIA), very affordable food and drink there - not even worth counting - so that's 700/320, £2.18 per TP.
Then I realised - I'd used Avios for the earlier two flights during this membership year, I was two flights short!!! Off to Aberdeen next week for a day trip - £84. Enough about me.
Thank you for this review - back in the good old days, I looked carefully at this run, and I might give it a shot next year. Your advice in your videos is appreciated.
Thanks - 5 days in Tirana wasn't too long? Presumably you made it a holiday by adding a hotel?
@@MattsPlanet Yes, it was £650 including the hotel. Just sweating on the double tier points to credit.
There's no tenable public transport in Albania, so walking around everywhere soaks up time.
Will be interesting to see if BA’s newly announced relaunch of their Abu Dhabi route could open up some affordable TP runs which incorporate this.
Eg BUD-LHR-AUH-CMB-CGK and back would be 1000 TPS in a oner
Indeed - thanks BA for announcing this just after I make the video! Although it does give me an excuse for a new video though!
I keep waiting to see my name up in lights. I guess you make these well in advance. Enjoy the cruise!
I'm a few videos ahead at the moment so that was uploaded a few weeks back....
@@MattsPlanet I'll Stick Around :)
Hi, great vids, and they have really incentivised my search. One question: do the Tier points accrue using any business class fare?
99% of the time on oneworld partners. There's a p class business fare on Cathay that doesn't for no good reason but that's the only one I can think of that doesn't work
I watched this on a Ryanair flight. My onboard space was slightly more limited.
I'd imagine it was! Able to reveal where you were heading or is it top secret?
@@MattsPlanet a wee trip over to Germany to fill up some SD cards :) Hamburg and onto Leipzig.
For perspective though, if you took a BA flight in early 2020, you could easily be flying on a 1995-1999 747 - hence much older
Good point! But BA should have retired them years ago but wasn't foresighted enough to order the new planes!
Is Abu Dhabi a pain to get to? Multiple flights per day from the UK on Etihad (and now BA have resumed the route) and only a 40 minute cab ride from Dubai that has more than a dozen nonstop flights per day from the UK across multiple carriers?
It's closer to 90 minutes in a cab but your point is valid! My point is that it's hard to get there in a tier point efficient way. Or it was hard - BA restarting AUH service really helps
Would be interesting to know £/TP when including the positioning flights/hotels.
A textbook question - well done! The rate will obviously go down, by how much depends on how extravagant you are and how long you want to linger in each intermediate point. . for me, this trip was about making videos and seeing a few places rather than on milking TPS for the absolute lowest cost
As a gold member you’d think I’d be better at this sort of thing but where do I start for trying to price up London > Jakarta on a TP run run like this? March 31st to May 26th. Premium economy or business clsss.
Or even to Bali instead of Jakarta
It's probably impossible to ticket something all the way through - you have to break it into chunks. AUH-CGK is very easy so its a question of getting to and from AUH to connect to that onward flight. I'm planning a video where I'll talk about this - but leave ample time for the connection in case things go wrong... Then a third ticket from CGK to DPS if you prefer to spend time in Bali rather than Jakarta
Yes I have tentatively looked but all arrivals come in at 7am and then leave at 11pm…so it looks like I’ll have to tag a couple of days on each end, unfortunately it’s over 30 days so can’t make a holiday and get double tier points on any of the legs
Hi Matt. Does this TP run allow stopover in Colombo? I am new to TP Runs? These are my BAEC info. Date of joining the club 25 Jan 2013. Tier Point collection year ends 08 Apr 2024. When its best that I do it so I can get the most out of it if i try to go for Gold? Cheers.
No stopovers sadly - the fare is priced on a straight through basis. If you're starting from scratch, then it makes little difference when you start. As close to the start of your year makes sense as if will give you the longest time with whatever status you achieve
Matt. what month was this?
Steve. C. YNWA
September
Garlic bread, its the future.
As the young people say, om nom nom!
@@MattsPlanet not just the young