Big Avios devaluation on CX/JL redemptions

Over the last five years or so, British Airways’ Avios program was one that devalued most frequently and probably to the largest extent. Sadly it just took another hit overnight, and redemptions on Cathay Pacific / Japan Airlines have got a lot more expensive.

Note that British Airways no longer publishes a redemption chart, and they removed the Avios cost calculator too, to avoid to awkwardness when they run no-notice devaluation like this. As of today the chart above still holds for most of their partners, except for Cathay Pacific and Japan Airlines.

Here are the before/after charts for Japan Airlines and Cathay Pacific respectively (H/T FlyAsia):

Tokyo – Osaka (269 miles) now costs 10,500 Avios / 17,500 Avios per way:

Hong Kong – Shanghai (779 miles) now costs 12,000 Avios / 30,000 Avios per way:

Hong Kong – Beijing (1,234 miles) now costs 14,300 Avios / 32,500 Avios per way.

Tokyo – Ho Chi Minh City (2,685 miles) now costs 15,600 Avios / 46,500 Avios per way.

It is without a doubt horrendous news and Avios is no longer the best, or even a good way to travel within Asia, at least not if you aim to book business or first class. There isn’t any change to long-haul bands over 3,000 miles, but they were hardly good value anyway.

From the very limited data points I saw Iberia seems to have adopted the same pricing swiftly, and their partners awards are non-refundable so you wouldn’t want to book through them anyway. Qatar Airways however, is still showing BA’s old pricing for now.

Therefore it could make a LOT of sense to transfer your Avios to QRPC first and book there. Your tickets won’t be issued immediately though – you can only fill out a request form and their ticketing team needs to issue your ticket manually.