Happy Christmas everyone.

The beauty of this thread is to nick a bit of value ~ and to do Vegas right.  RF's are a red herring.  People try too hard to swerve $99 + RF and prefer $189 no fees instead.... makes no sense.

The real trick is just to compare the bottom line of what you will ultimately be paying for your stay.  Most of the time, your quoted hotel rate can be beaten by $50/per night anyway just by looking in the right place for a better price for the same hotel.  Do that, and be happy to give it to them back for the RF?

I had it in my head that it was May too.  Either way, I'll find out about it later on in June

Done both plenty of times, however not done BA for a few years, so they may have got better.  My two cents

BA Club is horrible as a seat, very uncomfortable, I used to fly for work and so wasn't picking up the bill, often came close to asking someone in premium if they wanted to swap on the way out.
BA flat bed the config used to require you clambering over the person next to you.
There wasn't a bar, on any of the planes that I flew.

Upper, the seat comfort was much better, and the herringbone formation means you can get in and out whenever you feel like it.
As a flat bed, it felt bigger than BA.  I'm sure the measurements are searchable somewhere, but as someone that fills up a lot of the allocated space ( ) I definitely felt the difference.
Bar was ok, I don't drink much on flights but it was somewhere to have a leg stretch

Flight times, Virgin has changed but it doesn't really matter too much to me, I usually pull an all-nighter last night in Vegas and I'm gonna sleep on any plane in any seat whatever the flight path/time, so I don't even think about it, other than to figure out what time to head to the airport.

I was trying to give balance, so I guess I should point out again that I don't have recent BA experience and they may have got better.  But re-reading what I wrote, it isn't a surprise that I chose Virgin out of the two and stuck with it.  It seems pretty easy to rattle up airmiles and with a little organisation I keep finding myself in Upper for < £ economy so I'll keep doing it.

Hope you got cold feet on this

Well every cloud has a silver lining.  Lots more players out there will have done their niags and need a stake.

Just playing around with some offer codes.... finding some offering Bellagio (may 26th-31st) for $59/night (+ RF obv...) At least that is a welcome sign of some returning rates long since forgotten.

Any thing for August anywhere?

Couldn't see anything, May was the limit.

Just playing around with some offer codes.... finding some offering Bellagio (may 26th-31st) for $59/night (+ RF obv...) At least that is a welcome sign of some returning rates long since forgotten.

not tried since they moved to LHR but upper rewards LGW to LAS were near impossible to get

I think this has been discussed before, but in my experience it has always been possible, you just have to put it in your daily routine to check a couple of times every day and things open up.  If you look once with exact dates in mind, chances are it's a "nah they don't have anything." On all my attempts, there has usually not been something there +/- 3 days first time I've looked, but in my experience the landscape does change if you check back often.  Last time it went from "Nothing for the whole month" to 2 seats available, which admittedly is unusual.

Thought I'd do the maths for myself just to see how much worse things have got....

Assumptions... tax = £500  Flying off-season = 135k miles Upper return  (good for early WSOP) Starting miles balance = 0  Upper reward flight availability reasonable

Buy 100k miles for £1515 - receive 140k miles

Take a little bit off if you want to get 135k exactly, take some more off if you already have some miles, add a bit more on for the actual tax if it is £5xx.xx

Upper = c£2k
PE = c£960 (assume 43k miles *30% bonus and £300 tax)
Econ = c£590 (assume 25k miles *20% bonus and £200 tax)

For those doing other routes for £200, fair enough.  But for some doing other routes for c£500, then I would think this starts to bring direct back into play.  And as always, no need to pay > £2k for an Upper ticket, just check the availability of reward seats first

I could use the old man's miles to upgrade at the airport.

Tell him to buy some more miles then!

Virgin offering 40% buy miles bonus for November.  The miles needed chart has definitely got worse from the days where 100K miles got you upper return to LV, but it is still a pretty simple maths play to consider buying yourself a cabin upgrade.

Being rolled for Vegas is ofc subjective, but I'd think for the average pocket, the best way is to separate the flight+hotel cost (by all means hammer that down as low as you can, or splash out as you like.)

I'd think £200/day is ok?  $20-$25 would get you a breakfast buffet in a decent spot, $50 would get you your other meal of the day.  Some days that might be $10 in a food court, another day it might be $100 in a restaurant.

For drinks, you can get as loaded up as you want by pseudo-playing slots and drinking for free (+tip) in the casino, and then drinks money out and about is moderate.  A few Ubers, etc, could see fun being had on that sort of budget.


It doesn't get you private tables, long nights in titty bars, show tickets, gambling or tasting menu restaurants, but pretty sure I could have a good time on that.

Of course, with more money, you have more options while out there and with 9 months notice, there is no real reason why most people can't scrape together a decent roll for it, imo.

A lot of people seem to be able to eat for a lot less than that (but I like my grub) so they would have some extra to throw around.  Some people definitely get it wrong though.... for example, they might spend (for easy maths) £1400 on a week's stay with flights, i.o.w. £200/day to be in Vegas.  They then hang around the bus terminal downtown and work out how to spend all day getting 3 bus connections for $5 to save a $10 Uber, seemingly not realising that it actually cost them £200 that day to be there.

Funny thing is....over the years we've had quite a few questions on here or on DM, "how many guys do you think could sleep in the bathroom" "what's the best way to walk to the Silverton buffet, I have a $1 off coupon" and then in the next paragraph  drops $5k at the tables.


I did hear quite a good ( I thought) solution to rooming on a different budget.  Something along the lines of £1100 for the room for the trip.  £400 for bed 1, £400 for bed 2, £200 for rollaway bed, £100 for sofa.  Those that want and don't mind paying for a bit of comfort can stag with someone that is on a very tight budget. 

Bungee might be a bit much for someone with a genuine fear of heights… zipwire over Fremont might be a little bit more compassionate

Simon - I think £800 for flights is a tad out of the price range I was looking for but really wouldn't want to be losing a day by treking around Europe to save a couple of quid.

Marky - A £1k budget works for the flights / hotel but preferably would like to come in close to half of this as it may make the difference for 2/3 people

The extra info helps a lot. Looks like it's a case of minimal pricing but a few comments. Note that you can't have it both ways....if you don't go direct then you ARE spending extra time travelling whether you want to or not. I'm not sure how much of a diversion is involved with budget flights but to beat 500pp I'd imagine it is hard to do without a time sink. And that still leaves ZEROpp hotel budget!

My suggestion would be to consider how many to a room you are ok with. If you book a hotel direct, it is the same price for one as it is for four. However, I could readily believe that 5 or 6 in the Venetian would be better located, more comfortable and lower cost than 3-4 in the luxor.  Obviously you aren't meant to have 6 in a room, but the room is twice the size of a std hotel room. You'd just need to be sensible about not drawing attention to yourselves and probably a well aimed $20 at the maid so she forgets to report you.

We haven't done one of these for a while, so it would be fun (sort of) to see what the collective can dig up on this one.  A few years ago, they were happening all the time.  No matter how great a price you find, someone always manages to shave £100 off ~ and even experienced Vegas travellers often learn a new booking route in the process, or at least other websites to check in the future.

It has been tilting in the past though to spend time trawling through results only to find out "oh, must be from East Midlands" or "oh, needs to have a poker room" etc.  There's only any point in someone spending effort on a particular route/dates if there is actually any chance someone might book it, so whatever the needs are, dates, budget, room type, pool shape, whatever, great to have them on the table to work with.

As for organising a stag, agree with Mark ~ "it's £xxx.xx booking on this link staying at this hotel on these dates."  Book it quick, or make your own way there, but that's where we will be."