Long Haul - Business Class - ideal time to book

whippet

I am in the process of planning a summer 2020 holiday for the family and looking at options for Oz or NewZealand.

we have two kids and want to fly business but am wondering if there is any point in holding off booking the flights trying to get better pricing or would we be best booking as soon as the fares are released to secure the seats?

I suppose what I am asking is there much variation on long haul business class pricing? Any time i've flown transatlantic business class the prices have been fairly static

Marcusm

Generally flights can only be booked less than 12 months in advance. There can be significant variations in business class flights to Oz/NZ depending on how flexible you can be - from time to time there can be special deals available from specific locations. For example, BA is well known for charging substantially less for ex-EU departures than London originations. This might require a positioning flight (to say Milan, Helsinki or somewhere like that and then a flight via London). It may add on a number of different sectors but stopovers might be available to counteract the effect of this.

ITA Matrix and similar can be very useful for this as well as frequenting forums such as FlyerTalk. At this stage, it would not be possible to specify what routing would be cheapest nor when the best deals would be available.

JohnCleary

I have been flying Business Class for the past few years. I have always found that the cheapest = earliest booking. I have never (in my experience) seen business tickets go down closer to the date.

-Edit- This is for flights in Dec / Jan - peak flying season.

Marcusm

JohnCleary wrote: »

I have been flying Business Class for the past few years. I have always found that the cheapest = earliest booking. I have never (in my experience) seen business tickets go down closer to the date.

-Edit- This is for flights in Dec / Jan - peak flying season.

Dec/JAn is not peak flying season in business class - quite the opposite. Most business long haul travel is suspended from mid Dec until mid Jan in my experience. This leaves lots of capacity available on business heavy routes.

For example, for 3-4 years, BA has run a promotion of 2 business class seats for the year price (i.e. GBP2015, 2016 etc). These were only released in end November.

JohnCleary

Marcusm wrote: »

Dec/JAn is not peak flying season in business class - quite the opposite. Most business long haul travel is suspended from mid Dec until mid Jan in my experience. This leaves lots of capacity available on business heavy routes.

For example, for 3-4 years, BA has run a promotion of 2 business class seats for the year price (i.e. GBP2015, 2016 etc). These were only released in end November.

While I don't research too much into it... for the past few years i've been flying Business, DUB - BKK (and return), there has been no more than 2 - 3 empty seats on the planes (787 / 777), with the exception of an A380 once which to be fair I do remember a few empty seats.

However, with certainty, I can say that the route I mention above is for sure the most expensive around Dec/Jan (It's peak season in SE Asia, from a tourism POV) hence Economy is quite a lot more expensive around this time of year. (going off topic, i'll bow out now!)

Marcusm

JohnCleary wrote: »

While I don't research too much into it... for the past few years i've been flying Business, DUB - BKK (and return), there has been no more than 2 - 3 empty seats on the planes (787 / 777), with the exception of an A380 once which to be fair I do remember a few empty seats.

However, with certainty, I can say that the route I mention above is for sure the most expensive around Dec/Jan (It's peak season in SE Asia, from a tourism POV) hence Economy is quite a lot more expensive around this time of year. (going off topic, i'll bow out now!)

BKK hasn’t been a significant component of a kangaroo route for over a decade. Further, I would suggest that it’s a tourism heavy route in business class, unlike HKG, SIN, KUL, DXB or AUH which are much more likely to feature in the OP’s search.

Dickerty

Aside from the cost element, please consider how difficult it might be to get 4 seats together (or at least close) in Business Class, if you were inclined. However, most business travellers do not book many months in advance, so it's less of an issue than with leisure travel.

As mentioned above, Flyertalk is the place to ask...