Snave

Not been on here for a while, very remiss of me.
I want to share this - it's only of any use if you live close enough to the border, sorry if it's been seen before.
If you fly USA to LHR with Air Canada instead of Canada to LHR with Air Canada, the cost saving is quite large. For my example I am using a direct flight from Toronto (YYZ) to LHR versus a flight from Syracuse (SYR) to LHR via YYZ. Ironically the YYZ to LHR leg is the same flight as the direct one.

OK that is not easy to read so look at these examples from cheaptickets.com:

Non stop Toronto to Heathrow:

1 traveler, round-trip (6 days, 5 nights) More flight details
Total airfare, taxes and fees: $ 921.20
Thu, Mar 24 Depart: 7:15 pm Toronto, Canada (YYZ) Air Canada 856
Arrive: 6:25 am next day London, United Kingdom (LHR)

Tue, Mar 29 Depart: 8:30 am London, United Kingdom (LHR) Air Canada 869
Arrive: 11:05 am Toronto, Canada (YYZ)


One stop Syracuse to Heathrow via Toronto, same flight from Toronto:

1 traveler, round-trip (6 days, 5 nights) More flight details
Total airfare, taxes and fees: $ 673.10
Thu, Mar 24 Depart: 3:10 pm Syracuse, NY (SYR) Air Canada 7403 operated by AIR GEORGIAN 1 stop
Arrive: 6:25 am next day London, United Kingdom (LHR) Air Canada 856

Tue, Mar 29 Depart: 8:30 am London, United Kingdom (LHR) Air Canada 869 1 stop
Arrive: 2:53 pm Syracuse, NY (SYR) Air Canada 7400 operated by AIR GEORGIAN


For me Syracuse is about 3 hours away, the cost saving for me would be US$280 each for Mrs Snave and me.

Anyone else find any use?

fledermaus

Interesting. I'd never thought of connecting flights from Syracuse, however I have a BA flight from TO on March 14th for $835 so the difference just for me isn't worth the hassle of driving to Syracuse and spending longer on the journey. After reading your posts I looked at changing at NYC and this is around $636 so for more than one traveler it would be worth considering. I would guess that parking is cheaper at Syracuse than Pearson.

lmartin999

US-UK routes are generally cheaper due to competition. Often starting in the UK is even cheaper (and often more flexible). My trips to the UK always start in the UK now. If you are allowed stopovers (which is the case on some fares, esp those originating UK) its even better. Throwing away the last segment (although technically not allowed) is another common trick as then you only need to get to the starting airport.

There was a time when in the UK where I routinely flew from AMS - LAX to go to Vancouver (and never went back to AMS) These days I do LHR-YYZ (stop) YYZ-NYC-YYZ (stop) YYZ-LHR (essentially I get a free weekend in New York sometime in the middle). About $1000 less than simple LHR-YYZ and all in business class for a reasonable economy fare

transatlantic

Wow, you might have just saved me $2000, YYZ-LHR-YYZ in april $4340.72 SYR-YYZ-LHR-YYZ-SYR $2582.52 for 2 adults and 2 kids! Syracuse is slightly closer than Toronto for me and I'm pretty sure parking is cheaper!

lmartin999

BUF is similarly priced.

dbd33

I fly out of Buffalo now and then. I stay one night at the HI Buffalo Airport and, for the cost of the room, the hotel provides a shuttle bus to and from the airport and allows the car to stay in their car park. The rooms aren't expensive so the cost of this is appreciably less than parking for even a few days at YYZ.

fledermaus

Flying from Buffalo was only around $100 cheaper than from Pearson when I looked for the March flights. It would have to be a fair bit more before I added on that extra journey and border crossing.

lmartin999

You will often see more variation according to dates than from YYZ. It also, as always, depends on availability in the lowest fare class, on all segments.
For example though, a departure between 1st and 12th April is $190 USD base fare from BUF and $712 from YYZ.
Of course you also have to fly BUF-IAD-YYZ or something similar with AC. This can be seen as good or bad depending whether you like earning miles.

misplacedheidi

Regularly fly from Syracuse to Newark, Newark to Birmingham, UK not Alabama :-).

Syracuse is like East Mids airport only smaller to put it into context. Had connecting issues but TBH there is usually a long wait at Newark, the connections are never missed.

If Toronto was cheaper, I would fly from there, but in winter it's not. You can do park and fly packages at the Candelwood estates hotel for cheaper than parking at the airport too if that helps.

Just waiting for the Canadian passport to speed up time at the border

pontcanna

Same thing when you compare SEA-YVR-LHR to YVR-LHR, all via Air Canada and using the same YVR-LHR flight. Several hundred dollars cheaper starting in Seattle.

G77

OK if you're already a Canadian citizen, but if you're a PR or on TWP then you'd need a return ticket to the UK on the way back in case you were denied entry to the US right?

transatlantic

Never thought of that! However if you have your US visa wavier from when you entered to catch the USA-UK leg can you just sail straight through on the return?