Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Amex’s Christmas promotions unwrapped

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

Yesterday I ran a post about earning double Avios when you shop at Sainsbury’s. Amex is offering double Membership Rewards points on all purchases until 31 December.

If you have a BA Amex, you will have had an email from Amex yesterday with links to various other shopping promotions. It was all a bit confusing, though, so I have ploughed through it all and picked out what I consider to be the most interesting bits.

This link (deleted as now dead) shows the shopping deals available with a British Airways American Express. Annoyingly, you need to register your card for the double Avios deals, otherwise you will not receive the double points. You are looking at:

Cash discounts at Hobbs, White Company, Urban Outfitters, Kurt Geiger, Aquascutum, Aspinal, Anthropologie, Heals, Furniture Village, World Duty Free, Heathrow Express (no better than the usual 10% though), Radisson Blu hotels, Millennium Hotels

Double Avios at Nike Store, House of Fraser, Monsoon, Accessorize, Boodles, Hackett, Fenwick, Kiddicare, Carphone Warehouse, thetrainline.com

20% off gift cards for Waterstone’s and HMV.

The latter two deals are especially interesting if you were planning to buy a Kindle, an ipad or any similar bit of kit this Christmas. Waterstone’s now sells Kindles, and HMV sells ipads and various other tablets (see their website).

It is very difficult to get a discount on an iPad – even at Heathrow you only save about 5%. The chance to get 20% off by buying a huge pile of HMV giftcards is tempting.

This would also be a decent way of laundering some cash through any Amex card where you were trying to meet a minimum spend requirement. Buy HMV gift cards or evouchers at a 20% discount, buy some ipads and sell them on eBay – at the very worst, you would come out quits as they should sell easily for a 10% discount. You then pay eBay, postage and Paypal fees.

This is obviously a very advanced game, however, and you should be 100% certain of what you are doing before you try it.

Meanwhile ….

Over at this link is the full list of offers available to holders of American Express Platinum, Preferred Rewards Gold and Green charge cards.

Most of the offers are the same as for the BA cards. The main additions are:

  • The Sainsbury’s promotion we discussed yesterday
  • A Virgin Atlantic deal that I will post separately so that it is seen by Virgin flyers who may have passed this thread by
  • Double MR points at Argos, Morrison’s Cellar and Co-Op Food stores
  • 20% off a 3-day Hertz rental

Click on the link above if you want to know more.

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – April 2024 update

If you are looking to apply for a new credit card, here are our top recommendations based on the current sign-up bonuses.

In February 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

Barclaycard Avios Plus card

Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

Get 25,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £10,000 Read our full review

Barclaycard Avios card

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard

5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £20,000 Read our full review

You can see our full directory of all UK cards which earn airline or hotel points here. Here are the best of the other deals currently available.

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the famous annual 2-4-1 voucher Read our full review

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

15,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Earning miles and points from small business cards

If you are a sole trader or run a small company, you may also want to check out these offers:

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 12th May 2024, the Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa card is offering a bonus of 30,000 points, convertible into 30,000 Avios. You must have a Limited Company to apply. Click here to learn more and click here to apply.

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

Huge 30,000 points bonus until 12th May 2024 Read our full review

For a non-American Express option, we also recommend the Barclaycard Select Cashback card for sole traders and small businesses. It is FREE and you receive 1% cashback on your spending.

Barclaycard Select Cashback Business Credit Card

1% cashback uncapped* on all your business spending (T&C apply) Read our full review

Category

American Express Gold card, American Express Membership Rewards, American Express Platinum card, British Airways American Express

Comments (48)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Ant says:
    23 Nov23 November 08:13

    Hi

    Trying to get HMV vouchers but it wont accept my log in amex details. Is this because i dont have a BA Amex card? I have a gold preferred and an SPG amex. Thanks

    • Raffles says:
      23 Nov23 November 09:17

      Gold Preferred should be OK as that offer also shows on the general Amex offers page. Did you use the link I marked ‘Over at this link’, ie the 2nd one for general Amex card holders?

      • Ant says:
        23 Nov23 November 09:34

        yes i used the second link, i also tried to go through the email they sent me but keep getting the message “log in not allowed”. Cannot find a number to call them either on the link.

  • Dominic says:
    23 Nov23 November 10:04

    It would probably be wise to point out the (slight) risk with buying large amounts of vouchers. If the company were to go into administration, you could end up with nothing. A few years ago I would have thought this was a very tiny risk, but since Comet and similar stores going under, it’s quite feasible.

    I assume most people doing this would almost immediately turn the vouchers into goods, but worth flagging.

    • Raffles says:
      23 Nov23 November 11:56

      Yes, definitely some risk, esp for HMV, although it does not seem in short term danger. Waterstones is now owned by a Russian oligarch who bought it for fun, so that is safer.

      • Cliff says:
        23 Nov23 November 11:59

        But as you are buying the voucher’s using the amex, would you be covered by purchase protection ?

        • Raffles says:
          23 Nov23 November 12:30

          Issue may be that you are buying the vouchers from a third party, which is who you contract with. If SVM supply the vouchers but HMV goes bust, you are relying on Amex goodwill. As the website is Amex branded, though, I assume they would pay up.

        • Dominic says:
          23 Nov23 November 12:36

          I am not a specialist here, but I think that Section 75 coverage (which is the area of law that gives you protection) would not apply because the store fulifilled the contract in question, which is to provide you the vouchers. Whether they honour the vouchers is a separate breach of contract. You could obviously make a small claim against the store, but if they’re bust then that doesn’t help.

          As Raffles says, you may be able to rely on Amex’s goodwill.

  • John smyth says:
    23 Nov23 November 10:06

    For that admiral insurance the page your link to says you need to have registered your card for the promotion by the end of oct.

    • Rome77 says:
      23 Nov23 November 10:13

      Yes I did notice that John – I believe that’s a typo and that the real end date is 30 Novemeber.

      The email I received yesterday said:
      “American Express Cardmembers enrolled in the Membership Rewards programme need to register their Card between now and 30 November 2012”,

      The T&C at the link I provided says:
      “An American Express Cardmember, who enrolls for the offer by providing their American Express Card number and confirmation details between 18 September and 30 November 2012”

  • Cliff says:
    23 Nov23 November 10:20

    Such a shame that the HMV airside at T5 Heathrow does’nt stock Ipads. It would have been even cheaper !

  • mrtibbs1999 says:
    23 Nov23 November 10:59

    The HMV and Waterstones vouchers will sell on ebay for almost face value. So rather than convert them into ipads etc you are probably better off just flogging them. That is unless you can find something on hot uk deals at either of those stores that you can sell for more than you paid!

    • Raffles says:
      23 Nov23 November 11:58

      If you do want an ipad, I would order evouchers and immediately order off the HMV website. Easier than paying postage for paper vouchers then finding your local HMV is out of stock.

      • Cliff says:
        23 Nov23 November 12:10

        I think that only paper vouchers are available

        • Raffles says:
          23 Nov23 November 12:28

          Interesting. The website says paper, gift cards or evouchers, but when you click through it only says paper.

  • Ant says:
    23 Nov23 November 12:38

    After failing to order using my Amex acc which has a Gold & SPG card, I j got my friend to order the vouchers with her Amex Ba card and it worked. So i guess you can only get them if u have a BA amex.

  • Ben_mw says:
    23 Nov23 November 13:43

    Just be careful if you’re aiming for double MR points at the Coop. Of my 4 local shops, only 2 accept Amex, so maybe just check before you spend an hour doing your shopping!

  • Colin says:
    23 Nov23 November 17:42

    Sat to Sun UK travel insurance: man of 51 (never thought to lie about my age!) was £3.07.

    Well worth a punt for 1500 MR!

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Latest Forum Posts

Get 40,000 bonus points (worth 40,000 Avios) and £300 dining credit with The Platinum Card

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get £10 when you spend £150 on your free Currensea card

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? SPECIAL OFFER TO 12TH MAY EARN POINTS WORTH 30,000 AVIOS WITH CAPITAL ON TAP

Get 20,000 bonus points, four airport lounge passes and your first year free with American Express Gold

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!