So this was extremely annoying.

A little over a week back, I logged into British Airways to do an award search for a domestic flight. Knowing that the flight I was looking for would be on American Airlines, I already searched AA.com and found the flights I wanted. I hoped it would be a bit cheaper using British Airways Avios.

After doing various searches, I kept getting an error message like the one in the image at the top of this post.

I searched a few other routes, just for the fun of it and continued to get the same message.

By the time I tried calling BA, I got a message to try back the following day.

The following day, I logged back into BA and again got the same error messages. I decided to call the airline once again. This led to increased annoyance and frustration. After waiting on hold for close to an hour, I decided to send a Tweet to @British_Airways.

I was close to hanging up but then decided to try one more idea before giving up.

I can’t recall if my T-Mobile plan includes free calls to Canada and/ or Mexico. I looked up the Canada Executive Club phone line and it was the same as the one I was having trouble with.

Then I looked up the number for Mexico. I checked the area code for the number listed for those calling from outside Mexico. It turns out that the 408 area code is for San Jose, California. This meant that dialing up the Mexico Executive Club phone number would be the same as a domestic call!

I called this number (while still on hold with my other phone). After a few prompts, a representative picked up the phone! (Good by awful British Airways hold music.)

After a brief chat, the rep found availability for the flights I was looking for. After wasting way too much time, I was happy that it wasn’t all for nothing.

After booking my flight I decided to do a Google search for the (outside) Mexico Executive Club phone number 1-408-352-9323.

It turns out that the trick I thought I had discovered was old news…

The second line in the search was for a FlyerTalk post. Oh, and the third link to come up was for a post from December 2016 from fellow BoardingArea blogger Points With A Crew.

Either way, if you encounter the same troubles I have, give the number above a ring. It might save you a ton of time.