Skyscanner Glasgow to NYC at Easter - flight help please!

[longhaullaura]

Haven't flown anywhere longhaul this century but we've got some PPI back and have decided to splash out and go to NYC for a week in the Easter holiday (2 teens and 2 adults).

We're flying from Glasgow and have looked at flights with BA via LHR and Aer Lingus via Dublin. The BA ones are coming out at about £2400 for all 4 of us and Aer Lingus are coming out at £3500. But when I go on Skyscanner I can find deals from online companies that are more like £1800 and they're virtually the same flights (mainly BA). But I am really suspicious. One I am looking at is called Travel UP and their package is coming out at £1800.

I'm holding flights with BA at the moment for £2400 and have another day before I need to commit to booking them. Am I right to be distrustful? Has anyone used these cheaper online only companies?

Another question I have is about the gap between connecting flights. The ones I am holding with BA have us landing in LHR at 13.40 Terminal 5 and then our flight to JFK leaves from Terminal 5 at 16.15. Is that long enough? What happens if our London flight is delayed?

On the cheaper Travel Up fare of £1800 our flight lands at Terminal 5 at 13.40, the connecting flight is at 17.00 but it's from Terminal 3.

I'm just wondering which is the best scenario of the above - less time but not having to change Terminal (direct through BA) or slightly more time (3hrs 20mins) but having to get to Terminal 3 from Terminal 5.

I am so used to just flying in Europe on cheap as chips tickets ie. £300 for all 4 of us that I'm finding this all a bit daunting (and expensive!)

Can anyone give me some advice please?

What dates can you fly?

Look at BA directly, as 1-8 April is under £1600 for 2 adults and 2 teenagers, going via LHR.

Will check again with BA Angrybird345 was that flying specifically on the Sunday 1st I wonder? trialanderror we would really like to fly on the 31st which is the Saturday immediately after Good Friday and then fly back the following Saturday which is the 7th. Want to get our money's worth and a full week. We've already booked our hotel which is Hotel 50 Bowery which looks fab. Any money we can save on flights would be put to good use!

Re your connecting flights question, as long as you have both flights booked on the same ticket you’ll be fine. This way the airline takes responsibility for getting you to your destination so if say the Glasgow-Heathrow leg is delayed causing you to miss the Heathrow-JFK connection, they will be responsible for rebooking you on a later flight. The airline won’t let you book a connection that’s impossible to make as its on them if you don’t.

I wouldn’t consider booking it as two separate tickets. If something did go wrong and you missed the connection you’d potentially be left with £1000s to pay for a new flight or have to cancel your trip.

So I’d check how the online agencies are pricing the fare. If it’s significantly but they’re splitting it into two ticket bookings then personally I wouldn’t consider it worth the risk, tempting as the cost saving may be!

Cheap however, is not always cheerful as you are already seeing. I would not want to cart bags and stuff over to T3 if you are arriving into T5. It would make more sense if you were to remain in T5.

I would research the agent before you make any such booking irrespective of how you found it. Infact I would not use an agent at all but would book this via the airline directly.

Travelling with a change of planes prior to a long-haul sector with children seems like needlessly hard work, unless there's really no alternative.

Newark (EWR) is a pit in many ways, but has trains direct into central New York (Penn St, I think) and a bus to the Port Authority terminal. JFK has neither.

Into T3 and out of T5 in two/three hours is perfectly do-able, but see above. If your luggage did get delayed it would be a bad start to a journey. I have cured myself of my distrust of connections, but my bag did get stranded for 24 hours in (far away place) which was a pain coming back, but would have been a lot more of a pain going out. Put a change of clothes in your hand luggage.

Booking connections is a subtle dance of whether a missed connection is your problem or not, whether you can check your baggage through to the end (if you're into T3 and out of T5 presumably it's different airlines) and other issues. If it's not on one booking reference, it's best to assume the worst. If it's a BA code share GLA-LHR and then BA LHR-onwards it's probably OK. Similarly if it's Aer Lingus or a BA code share for the first leg. Conversely, the moment you buy a ticket GLA-LHR and another ticket LHR-JFK (or wherever) from different airlines on different booking references you are highly unlikely to be able to check baggage through, missed connections are your problem, and it's a world of pain awaiting you.

Cheaper tickets have more restrictions. It's way for airlines to continue to charge a premium for cancellable, refundable, rebookable tickets of various stripes. Those restrictions may or may not matter to you, depending on how flexible you are, how flexible you need to be, how good your insurance is, etc.

Just a side question OP, what was the PPI you got back from? Credit card loans?

I'm worried that time is running out to make a claim but my husband is adamant we've not been missold anything despite us having had a car loan in the early 1990's.

Angrybird thanks for flagging up that it was much cheaper to fly on Sunday. Am holding tickets that go from 1st-8th April for £1555 as opposed to the similar route that was leaving on 31st March - 7th April for £2404 - a great saving.

CuboidalSlipShoddy thanks for your very thorough reply. I hear what you're saying about avoiding a change of planes but our kids aren't that small and should be able to cope (hopefully!) There is always the risk of delays but we'll keep our fingers crossed. I just checked out United's fares and it would cost from £3-3.5k in total so double what we;re hopefully going to be paying with BA. It looks like we're flying in and out the same Terminals (T5) and it's all BA flight codes.

Thanks to everyone else too. I knew I could rely on Mumsnet

Have you checked prices on klm? I've had good deals Glasgow to NYC with them. Change in Amsterdam. Might be worth checking.

LizzieMacQueen PPI was mainly for loans going back to the 90s through Lloyds. Really worth doing it - there's threads on here that I wish I'd read before my DH went through a company who ended up taking LOADS of the money off us - still got a tidy sum though

Can you get to Edinburgh? You can go direct for about £450each.

Have you looked at United Airlines?

They have direct flights from Glasgow and Edinburgh to Newark.

We flew with them last year and really liked them. Also no charges for seat allocation

VodkaKnockers unfortunately United Airlines have abandoned their Glasgow-NYC flights for the winter (from October last year to May this year - they obviously have longer winters over there!) It's very annoying as I would have paid a bit more to have flown direct from Glasgow.

Their flights from Edinburgh are more expensive when you factor in the extras. I think we are going with the BA flights we have holding for £1500 for the 4 of us (includes all taxes and hold luggage for each of us and free seat allocation) Might come to regret not paying more for the direct flights by going to Edinburgh. Let me think of the logistics...

To get to Edinburgh to pick up a United flight we would have to taxi to the train station, get a train to wherever it is you pick up the tram to the airport - or get a taxi to Glasgow City Centre and get on the bus to Edinburgh Airport. So a bit of a faff.

The United fare looks like it's coming out at £1850 so £350 more than BA. It looks like the only direct United flight goes at 09.15 so getting to Edinburgh Airport for 07.15 would probably involve us driving there and we don't want the hassle of airport parking fees (no idea how much they are BTW) So that would be an early start leaving home at 05.00? 06.00? again problematic if we want to do it by train. Probably would be better to stay at Airport Hotel in Edinburgh and that would cost... but might it be worth it??

Am fully aware I am thinking out loud here! I wish I could tell whether there is a hold baggage allowance in the United Fare. I can't tell without inputting all passenger details and virtually committing to pay. Anyone else know?

Feck I've just been back on the United site and the fare is coming out at over £3k for the 4 of us not £1850. Am going to look into WOW now - that is coming out at £2,500 when you book all the seats and factor in taking personal bag on board for 3 of us and checking in one hold bag on all the legs. Change at Rakjavik so not direct...

BA it is I think and let's just hope they're not planning any strikes at Easter!

Make sure you clear your cookies or use a private browsing session. You've not really helped yourself posting here (conversely) as people helping you by looking up flights have made it seem like there's lots of interest in the flights, hence the price goes up.

laura

re your comment:-
"It looks like the only direct United flight goes at 09.15 so getting to Edinburgh Airport for 07.15"

Actually you would need to arrive there 3 hours in advance so it would be 06.15am.

What about using a taxi to take you all direct to the airport rather than taxi, train and then tram?.

I would also think twice about changing at Reykjavík as well; that is simply going to add more time to an already long day. As you are flying to the East Coast anyway you are far better off going direct. Also would you have to change at Reykjavik on the return leg?.

Really LurkingQuietly? Is that how it works. Damn. How does clearing your cookies or using a private browsing session avoid this price inflation?

attilathemeerkat I suppose even spending £70-£100 on a taxi might be worth it to avoid the hassle. Have never taken a taxi from Glasgow to Edinburgh. But even so, looking at the prices of the United Flights (it's the WOW ones that change at Rekjavik) we'd be paying in the region of an extra £1-1.5k for the convenience of not changing planes at LHR and that's not an inconsiderable amount of money. And I can't see how I can get the United flights any cheaper as, if LurkingQuietly's theories are true, the prices is hiking up because of the interest I'm showing by researching it online. Which is mightily annoying!

If the United flights are direct and from Edinburgh then I would pay the extra cost rather than transit through Iceland (which as a country is very expensive). As its around 7-8 hours to the East Coast from the UK it is worth it to go direct both ways rather than changing in Iceland (particularly on the return leg as that flight is an overnight one). It really can and does add hours to an already long day.

Otherwise I would look at flying from Glasgow to LHR and transferring onto a direct flight to NYC. The BA one you originally had would give you plenty of time. If you have a choice of airport I would go for Newark rather than JFK as well (having used both previously).

Make sure you clear your cookies or use a private browsing session

Agree - the airlines track you and increase the fares - try a different laptop or phone

Can you fly to Edinburgh instead? Or Dublin -

Will definitely try and clear my cookies - am using a laptop but if I used the home desktop computer would it still show up as me as it's from the same WIFI account?

We have the BA flights on hold flying via Heathrow Attilathemeerkat so unless a private browsing session brings some cheaper United Flights from Edinburgh I think we'll be sticking with this option

To get to Edinburgh to pick up a United flight we would have to taxi to the train station,

Airport hotels the night before, including a week's parking, barely cost more than a week's parking. And take a lot of the hassle out of things.
I think most times we've travelled as a family for a flight anything before about 3pm it's what we've done, and it's a nice start to a holiday. Over a bank holiday weekend the airport hotels will be essentially empty and they'll take any business they can get. Over the weekend, even the Heathrow Sofitel is relatively cheap.

would it still show up as me as it's from the same WIFI account?

No.