Best & cheap Business Class

[turneeri]

Decided to treat myself and go Mel-Lon business class (mid-July '08 - yes I know it's late planning but just checking it out at this stage!) - only because I can still remember doing this trip economy and promised I would never, ever do it again!
So I've had a bit of a look at prices and am comparing premium economy vs business but not sure whether to risk premium economy and (fingers crossed) hope it's a good experience (and apply for upgrade) or go all out for business class knowing that it will be good (i.e I've never flown business class internationally before so a newbie for this category)

What do the experts suggest and is there such a thing as a cheapish business class ticket??

Thanks!

[jpk]

Finnair generally have some cheap business deals - i priced up MEL-LHR last week at about 7k which is pretty good. QF Y+ is around the 5k mark. CX also sometimes have specials on certain flights (usually need to overnight in HKG) around 7k as well.

Star alliance deals are said to be cheaper than One World but I have no experiences in this area.

The answer will to a certain extend depend on your budget...

[NM]

A few other options to consider:

NZ have premium economy via AKL and HKG
VS Upper Class can be good value at times
EK has some reasonable prices to a lot of places in Europe
AF have some good business class fares to Europe (using QF to Asia and AF via CDG)
SAS have some good business class fares to Europe (using TG to BKK and SAS from there)

QF's business class prices are going to be high unless you have access to some good corporate deals. Same goes for CX, BA and SQ.

[dajop]

You can get a good overview of different options on the Best Flights website. It is a good starting point for further research.

[Travel Guru]

I always found TG to offer the best product in the lower price point.

Good seat, good service, excellent price.

TG

[clifford]

If you want to save yourself a few dollars, I see that www.expedia.com (NOT .au) has BKK-LHR business class fares available for AUD 3,000 return on Finnair. You can book online.

You could pick up a cheap fare from Oz to BKK for under $1,000 (can be cheaper still if you fly an LCC), so the total cost would be under AUD 4,000.

There are other options you might want to consider, such as TG from SIN for about $3,700 (www.zuji.com.sg).

[Batesy]

Try Malaysian Airlines Via KL. Great seats, good service one of the best lounges going around in KL. Can get for around $7000 from MEL. QF closer to $12,000

[sr81]

If you are over 55 then Thai have some good deals. My father is joining me after a conference for some Russian exploring and got MEL-ARN/FRA-MEL for about $6500 (inc taxes). All legs are in business class.

[Travel Guru]

Try Malaysian Airlines Via KL. Great seats, good service one of the best lounges going around in KL. Can get for around $7000 from MEL. QF closer to $12,000

Depending on the route, on some such as IST, they are using old product which is apparantly pretty disappointing, but on the major routes they're great

TG

[turneeri]

thanks to everyone who have responded so far. I've been looking at Thai and Malaysia. Would love to use Emirates but they've got quite expensive from when I last flew with them although that was in economy
Unfortunately(!!) I'm not in the over-55 age group.

Has anyone actually flown Qantas Premium Economy to London yet?? - I'm a QFF - Bronze Clum member so would like to use Qantas but so far can't justify the cost (even to myself!!) of their business class fares.