Flights: Chiang Mai to London

[Stubby]

Good afternoon, forum,

 

I'm flying to the UK soon after a long absence. It's my first long-haul flight for almost 10 years. Can anyone recommend an agency that offers the best prices? Or is it just better to search online and book via the web? I'm not in a rush, so I'm not fussed about one or two stopovers.

Thank you,

 

Stubby

[Nick Carter icp]

Go to Google flights and either book with an agency or directly there .

Avoid extraordinary cheap fares with small agencies

[Harrisfan]

9 minutes ago, Stubby said:

Good afternoon, forum,

 

I'm flying to the UK soon after a long absence. It's my first long-haul flight for almost 10 years. Can anyone recommend an agency that offers the best prices? Or is it just better to search online and book via the web? I'm not in a rush, so I'm not fussed about one or two stopovers.

Thank you,

 

Stubby

Google cheap flights to uk.

[Nick Carter icp]

10 minutes ago, Harrisfan said:

Google cheap flights to uk.

 

  Do not use an agency called cheapflightsUK

[Stubby]

Thanks Nick, and Harrisfan, I appreciate your responses ;)

[Chalky0w]

Kayak.com is good.

 

- It searches a lot of other providers (trip.com, Expedia, airlines own, etc.) for best prices.

- Allows you to be flexible on dates by picking +/- 3 days either side i.e. lets you search a full week in one go which you can then repeat for each week in a month for example if you’re flexible.

- Ability to filter results by number of stops, departure time, airline, etc.

 

[Yagoda]

Skyscanner is the best way to do it.

[connda]

🤔 Hummmmm???  👜 🛄🪴

 

 

[Stubby]

49 minutes ago, Yagoda said:

Skyscanner

 

It might be good if I could get it to load in English, Yagoda. For some strange reason, the pages are in Dutch. I'll try again later.

[SMIAI]

Which dates approx.?

[Stubby]

1 minute ago, SMIAI said:

Which dates approx.?

5, 6, 7th will work. Why do you ask?

[SMIAI]

This month? That's short notice.

Returning?

[SMIAI]

It's an anonymous forum. You can give approx. return dates if you want some assistance 🙂 

A week? Three weeks? A month? Three months? Six months?

[Yagoda]

26 minutes ago, Stubby said:

 

It might be good if I could get it to load in English, Yagoda. For some strange reason, the pages are in Dutch. I'll try again later.

Should be english it always is for me

[Stubby]

16 hours ago, SMIAI said:

This month? That's short notice.

Returning?

 

[Stubby]

16 hours ago, SMIAI said:

This month? That's short notice.

Returning?

I won't be returning until November at the earliest, but I might not get back for 15 months. I'll know more after I get back to the UK. Because the return date is uncertain, I plan to just get a one-way ticket, SMIAI.

[Stubby]

16 hours ago, Yagoda said:

Should be english it always is for me

It's working this morning, thanks, Yagoda. I'll take a look later.

[worrab]

Get into Google and have a look at different airlines and their prices. You can then book direct with them. 
No doubt I will be corrected, but I think you can only fly into Europe from Chiang Mai then onto London or to Bangkok, then to London.

I have done Thai Airways, Chiang Mai to LHR via BKK, in the past so that it is just one airline to worry about and luggage is straight through.

[treetops]

6 minutes ago, worrab said:

No doubt I will be corrected, but I think you can only fly into Europe from Chiang Mai then onto London . . . .

 

Consider yourself corrected.  Chiang Mai only has international flights to elsewhere in Asia, nothing to Europe. 😉

 

OP.  Where in the UK are you heading?  The ME airlines have good coverage to most regions, or if you don't mind a few hours in the wrong direction first you might find some bargains with the Chinese ones.

[Nick Carter icp]

1 minute ago, treetops said:

 

Consider yourself corrected.  Chiang Mai only has international flights to elsewhere in Asia, nothing to Europe. 😉

 

OP.  Where in the UK are you heading?  The ME airlines have good coverage to most regions, or if you don't mind a few hours in the wrong direction first you might find some bargains with the Chinese ones.

 

   Five hours flying East to Hainan , then 15 hours flying West to the UK .

20 hours flying time , instead of 12 hours flying time, just to save 20 Quid

[scorecard]

21 hours ago, Nick Carter icp said:

Go to Google flights and either book with an agency or directly there .

Avoid extraordinary cheap fares with small agencies

 

Nowadays extraordinary cheap fares with several stopovers can mean:

- Several airlines involved.

- Passenger has to collect their own check-in luggage at first (and other) arrival points, go through passport stamping to enter the arrival country, then go to airline check-in area to confirm booking / confirm a a seat number t and to check-in big luggage. Then go back to passport area to depart that transit country.

 

BUT When I explored this is discovered that I needed to get a visa in advance of arrival to be able to enter the 'transit' country and probably have to pay the standard visa (cost ?). I emailed the airline I would have to transit to and asked if they offer any assistance at all. Answer 'NO, your problem'.

 

[treetops]

2 minutes ago, Nick Carter icp said:

 

   Five hours flying East to Hainan , then 15 hours flying West to the UK .

20 hours flying time , instead of 12 hours flying time, just to save 20 Quid

 

I agree, it's not for me but people are doing it and the OP said he wasn't in a rush.

 

He's never going to do 12 hours from Chiang Mai anyway.

[Nick Carter icp]

2 minutes ago, scorecard said:

 

Nowadays extraordinary cheap fares with several stopovers can mean:

- Several airlines involved.

- Passenger has to collect their own check-in luggage at first (and other) arrival points, go through passport stamping to enter the arrival country, then go to airline check-in area to confirm booking / confirm a a seat number t and to check-in big luggage. Then go back to passport area to depart that transit country.

 

BUT When I explored this is discovered that I needed to get a visa in advance of arrival to be able to enter the 'transit' country and probably have to pay the standard visa (cost ?). I emailed the airline I would have to transit to and asked if they offer any assistance at all. Answer 'NO, your problem'.

 

 

   They are extraordinary cheap fares because no one wants to go on them and quite often there isn't enough time to get the connecting flight .

   The situation you mentioned about happened to a South African woman who was on my BKK-Lon flight with Air India stopping over in Mumbai . She had an internal flight from Mumbai to Delhi where she would fly from Delhi to South Africa. 

   She didn't have an India visa , so she wasn't allowed to board the flight in Bangkok .
   She had to buy a new flight ticket 

[Nick Carter icp]

7 minutes ago, treetops said:

 

I agree, it's not for me but people are doing it and the OP said he wasn't in a rush.

 

He's never going to do 12 hours from Chiang Mai anyway.

 12 hours and 45 minutes then  

CM-BKK 1 hour 10 minutes

BKK-LON 11 hours 35 minutes

[fredwiggy]

Try Cheapoair and Justfly. Best prices I've seen and used them for many years.

[treetops]

1 minute ago, Nick Carter icp said:

BKK-LON 11 hours 35 minutes

 

We don't even know if he's going to London yet and he'd need a big tailwind to do it in that time.  Only one flight in the past week has broken 12 hours.

[Nick Carter icp]

Just now, treetops said:

 

We don't even know if he's going to London yet and he'd need a big tailwind to do it in that time.  Only one flight in the past week has broken 12 hours.

 

   My point was that it can be an extra ten hours flying time , if you get a cheap flight 

[Patong2021]

21 hours ago, Chalky0w said:

Kayak.com is good.

 

- It searches a lot of other providers (trip.com, Expedia, airlines own, etc.) for best prices.

- Allows you to be flexible on dates by picking +/- 3 days either side i.e. lets you search a full week in one go which you can then repeat for each week in a month for example if you’re flexible.

- Ability to filter results by number of stops, departure time, airline, etc.

 

 

Not really. Kayak is a flight aggregator and it promotes the flights where it is compensated.

Kayak is part of the   sales group that includes;   Booking.com, Priceline.com, Agoda,  Cheapflights, Rentalcars.com,  and Momondo

 

IMO  as a frequent flyer, Google flights is a more reliable search engine. I find a fare on  Google and book direct with the airline.

[Nick Carter icp]

Just found a   flight from Phuket to London for 7000 Baht on May 15 th

[Stubby]

Thanks for all the suggestions, folks.

I've viewed the suggested services and they seem to offer the same flight choices at similar prices. I'm not in a rush, but I'm going to avoid those 29 hour flights that use different planes for various legs. I'm thinking it might be easier to just pay a bit extra and let an agency do the searching and booking for me.

Stubby