Questions and Answers

Hi All,

Need your expert advice. My girlfriend is scheduled to fly LAX-LHR-PRG on 24/25DEC, with that LHR-PRG leg likely impacted by the BA flight attendants strike. I booked her ticket using AA miles.

BA says they’re going to announce more contingencies for impacted passengers by Monday night, but I’d prefer to preemptively make alternate plans so she can meet me for our Central European holiday. As of now, I think my best option is to cancel the LHR-PRG portion and get $85 refunded in taxes, then buy a $125 LGW-PRG ticket on Smartwings. However, she lands at LHR at 11:30am on Christmas Day, and the flight from LGW is at 2:20pm. I’m confident an Uber would get her between the two airports in under 45 mins, but I’m less confident about her clearing LHR immigration/customs quickly. Thoughts? Too risky?

If you guys think this connection is doable, I’m wondering if I should just buy the Smartwings flight now before it gets booked up/more expensive as other BA pax look for alternatives, or wait until after Monday’s BA announcement. ExpertFlyer is confusing as it lists 0 seats available for this flight (QS1097) on Smartwings but wide-open availability for the Czech Airlines codeshare (OK4655). My hope is that BA would offer to book stranded pax on this flight, thus negating my out-of-pocket cost. Tomorrow (Sunday) is a week before Xmas; would I be covered under a 24-hour refund policy?

Thanks in advance for everyone’s input!

Hey Brad, is she flying economy, business, something else? It might be easier to just rebook the entire itinerary, and AA should waive the change fees.

I’d probably change the booking to LAX-ORD-MAD-PRG, it would get her there a bit later and I’m not totally sure if there would be space but, you won’t have to put up with BA

Similarly, it looks like LAX>DUS>HEL>PRG is available leaving on the 25th, if that would help.

Thanks for the feedback, team. She’s booked in economy. What i’m hearing is that it’s probably not a great idea to attempt a LHR to LGW connection with 2h50m between flights, on different carriers. Hugh’s suggestion is not available, and I’d rather her not lose a day of travel departing on the 25th. But Tiffany’s suggestion did lead me to investigate Air Berlin, and there is a biz class LAX-DUS seat on the 24th; since AB doesn’t fly DUS-PRG we’d then have to buy a $105 Germanwings ticket for that leg. This option would pretty much drain me of my AA miles balance, but desperate times call for desperate measures…. plus I’d earn major boyfriend points for booking her in biz.

Crisis averted. I wasn’t looking at the full frequent flyer universe, but just noticed LAX-ZRH-PRG on Swiss so I moved some Chase points to United, booked it and cancelled her AA reservation! It’s a shorter connection, too.

Was tempted to try “the trick” to avoid United’s close-in booking fee, but my ladyfriend implored me to just pay it and be done with things. Our Xmas meet up in Prague is back on!

Happy holidays, all…