Flights to Europe and using Avios?

The problem is going to be finding availability for flights on BA or their partners. I did a quick search for flights from both Phoenix and LAX to Barcelona and there were very few left this summer, at least in June or July. For Venice back to LAX I found none until August.

If you do find flights on the right dates, you will see that 50K Avios will not cover the journey to these cities. You can fly RT to London from either Phoenix or LAX with 50K Avios (25K each direction), and then pay for the tickets from there. This might be your best option as for many dates the intra-Europe flight was the limiting factor on reward flights. If you pay for the short flights you do not need to find available reward seats. But even the flight to London and back with your Avios will incur some cost----$153 for the outbound flight if you use American Airlines or $128 if you fly BA. I did not check the other half of the roundtrip, but it would be slightly higher, so around $300 for the roundtrip in addition to your 50K Avios. And then add the cost of the flights from LHR to Barcelona and back from Venice.

It turns out BA flights with Avios are not the best deal in Economy. They have a better value when used for business class.

If you want to fly the whole way with Avios, you would need more Avios, as those flights to Barcelona or Venice "cost" 32,500 Avios each way, plus $465. You can pay more and use fewer Avios---for example 52K Avios RT plus $665 plus the price of the 2000 additional Avios you would need to buy. That might come out the same as the option I set out above (Avios to LHR and paid tickets from there) but there may not be any flights available.

You won't know for sure until you check your actual dates. If you do want to try this, try to be flexible with dates and cities your fly into and out of. You can book Avios flights one way at a time and that might make the search easier, but if you do that start with the Venice back to US leg as that appears to be the most scarce. If you cannot find anything, consider the roundtrip LHR booking I outlined above, and then buy the short-haul tickets. That does carry some risk however, as the tickets are separate and you are not protected if your flight from Venice arrives too late to catch the flight from LHR to the US. I would allow a minimum of 4-5 hours between those flights if they are not on one ticket.

The other option would be to pay the $25 fee for booking by phone and let the British Airways agent look for the flights.

Do note that if your flights are on BA, you will get hit with massive fuel surcharges - probably at least $300 RT in addition to the taxes. Have you looked to see if you can fly using Iberia (connecting in Chicago) - this will save you quite a few $ than using BA. AA is extremely stingy with their award seats (at least compared to United)

They are not called "fuel surcharges" any more. But the extra charges for BA reward flights are high. I listed them above. It is generally agreed that flying in Economy is not the best use of Avios. It was not any cheaper to fly on AA with Avios---actually more expensive for the flights I found. No Iberia flights showed up in my search. Maybe they would if one called the agents?

You can also use Avios points now with Aer LIngus, Iberia and Vueling. (They, along with BA, have the same parent company.)

Since Iberia is a Spanish airline you might want to look into using them for your trip. And if you don't have enough points, you can always buy them.

Thank you for your replies. It makes me think that Avios points are not worth trying to collect.

Sig, if you have the points, use them. Last year I flew RT from Miami to Madrid to Rome on Iberia. The only negative was I had to pay $255 in taxes and fees. But it was still a heck of a lot cheaper than purchasing a ticket. I would try to get an open jaws ticket to Barcelona and returning from Venice. It may take a bit of doing, even calling Iberia customer service, but you could save a bunch of money to spend on better things!