Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

New British Airways Club World (£1,500) and First sale – travel until September 2016

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British Airways launched its Autumn premium cabin sale yesterday. Flights are bookable until 12th November.

What is interesting about the sale is that you can book until September 2016 on many routes – a substantially larger window than usual.  The absolute latest date is 15th October 2016 for Tampa, Orlando and Lima.

It is important to note that there are black-out days on many routes – see the terms and conditions on the offer page.  These are generally based on specific days of the week being blocked off rather than continual periods of time.

British Airways

Full sale details can be found on ba.com here.

The key question, of course, is “are the prices any good?”.

In some cases, the answer is definitely “yes”.

It isn’t often you find Club World fares at £1,500 from London, but this price is available for:

  • Boston
  • Calgary
  • Chicago
  • Miami
  • Montreal
  • New York
  • Philadelphia (£1,353)
  • Toronto
  • Vancouver
  • Washington
  • Cancun
  • Kingston (£1,291)
  • Punta Cana (£1,290)
  • San Jose Costa Rica
  • Abu Dhabi
  • Amman (£1,320)
  • Bahrain
  • Beirut (£1,229)
  • Cairo (£1,351)
  • Dubai
  • Lagos
  • Tel Aviv (£1,125 – but First is better value at £1,187)
  • Bangalore
  • Chennai
  • Mumbai
  • New Delhi

Other routes are also available – albeit for more than £1,500 – with South Africa being the major destination to be excluded completely.  First Class is generally available for an additional £1,000 return.

Before you book, you should try two additional things which may make your trip even cheaper:

Price the same route starting in Dublin.  It will occasionally be cheaper, although you need to factor in the cost of getting to Dublin and back.  Shanghai, for example, is just €1,200 (£866) over Christmas and New Year.

Try using the ‘flight and hotel’ or ‘flight and car’ option on ba.com.  If you don’t need a hotel, only get a quote for a hotel or car for one night and pick the cheapest one possible.  Due to the way BA prices these products, it can work out cheaper than just booking a flight.  You are under no obligation to pick up the car or stay in the hotel – your return flight won’t be cancelled!

One other benefit of booking a ‘flight and hotel’ or ‘flight and car’ package is that you don’t need to pay for your trip now.  You can pay a small deposit, from £150, and settle the balance nearer to your travel date.


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2024)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous 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

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

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

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending £15,000 Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points. These points convert at 1:1 into Avios.

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

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital on Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

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

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus.

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

There are also generous bonuses on the two American Express Business cards, with the points converting at 1:1 into Avios. These cards are open to sole traders as well as limited companies.

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

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

Comments (102)

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

  • James says:

    Miami is £858 from Dublin currently.. Great deal.

    • RK says:

      £810 return on a lot of dates over the next two months. Even saw one for £793 going on a Tuesday. J prices keep going down… You can force at least two US internal connections for no extra cost to get the TPs up. I have booked for £840 return and 520 TPs.

      • James says:

        You’re right, I didn’t look at dates before Easter. £786 possible on certain dates in January!!

      • JK says:

        I don’t see these fares in ITA matrix. Are they only on BA.com?

        • James says:

          Kayak and google flights show lots of availability

          • RK says:

            When I booked via google flights, it took me through to the Irish version of AA.com to book. I tried changing to the UK version to pay in pounds but the fare was £200 higher for the same routing. Not sure if I was doing something wrong. I booked in Euros on the Irish site in the end.

      • Jim says:

        what extra stops did you force to get up to 520 tier points as that sounds interesting!?

        • RK says:

          DUB-LHR-MIA out (180 TP)

          MIA-CLT-DCA-JFK-LHR-DUB back (booked on AA so 340 TP – the DCA to JFK leg booked into business so that’s why its not 360). Generally this fare only is allowing 2 domestic legs in the US but the DCA-JFK flight slipped through.

          For an extra £30 or so I could have done some awkward routings involving either Madrid or Helsinki for an extra 40 TP, it wasn’t worth it.

          • Jim says:

            Thanks

          • RK says:

            My schedule didn’t allow extra stops on the way out but I checked last night and you can add similar stops out for no extra cost, bringing the TP haul up to 680 for £840.

  • Yagamimo says:

    Can’t seem to find any availability for Tel Aviv in First – perhaps they’ve stopped on this route?

    • LondonFoodie says:

      From March 27th, the BA165/BA164 has First. Before that shows as NA.
      I think this was announced quite a while ago – BA was flying the 2-class A321 it got from the BMI acquisition on the route, which had the strange 2/1 1/2 set-up in CW, and really nice wide screen in WT. The flight will be operated on a 777 going forward. (The evening flight has been a 777 for a while)

      the BA167 at 5pm is dropped.

  • Boi says:

    How do you book hotel/car for one night only? All I can see is booking for same duration as flights….

    • Rob says:

      On the ba.com home page (not any internal page), click ‘flight and hotel’ in the booking box and it shows the option.

  • Cheshire Pete says:

    Hmmm, decisions decisions! I had bagged a CW return from LHR to Atlanta over next Easter, just to get to the the US for a Cruise from Miami. Having paid 100,000 avios (and companion voucher) and about £550 in tax I can now see a route from Dublin to Miami for £852 in Business !

    Now, it was our intention to then get an internal flight from Atlanta to Miami to get to the cruise port, which would have been another additional cost!

    Is this a no brainer? I should get my Companion booking refunded and my taxes and re book while these Sale prices are so good!?

    • Sebastian says:

      I would say yes. However, with all the sales that keep on arising you’ve got to question if this is simply the way things are going. Tbh, I am starting to get the feeling that Avios are only worth using for First Class flights now, whether that be in the form of a entire Avios booking or via an upgrade on a sale flight.

      • Cheshire Pete says:

        Yes indeed! I noticed to book directly on American Airlines it is £880 (so a bit more), but on the MIA leg from PHL they book you into ‘First’ as A class, whereas on BA they book you into ‘I’ class which is Business. The ‘A’ class via AA direct would earn more tier points…..

    • Rob says:

      I assume the cruise dates are fixed, so you don’t need the cancellation benefit of a redemption.

      You need to get to Dublin, with all your luggage – see what that would cost.

      Factoring in the Avios you earn back, it does seem a sensible plan.

  • Daniel says:

    Hi Guys,

    need advice. I was considering three good trips for my next wedding anniversary and I don’t know if it is worth it to extend it to Hawaii.

    Three options:
    DUB – PHL – LAS – LAX – CRT – DUB – for around 1150 GBP in J, domestic First all on American
    DUB – PHL – LAS, SFO – CRT – DUB (road trip Vegas to San Francisco) – around 1200 GBP

    or extreme:
    DUB – LHR – LAS – LAX – Hawaii – PHX – CRT – DUB – 1330 GBP (funny enough to get Hawaii included with good pricing, you need to fly on BA (Dub – LHR and than direct to LAS). I just don’t know if 6 days in Hawaii is worth flying for so much time (2 overnights)?

    Any better ideas?
    THIS SALE IS GREAT!

  • sunszajn says:

    No slae on Maldives for August 🙁

  • Simmo says:

    Lots of cheap business fares to the East from Cairo at the moment too.

    CAI-BKK (Etihad – AUH) £777
    CAI-BKK (Egypt Air – direct) £827

    Just need a Qatar ex-eu to BKK to come up (like Aprils £800ish deal) so I can cancel my BA Avios redemption

    • Andrew M says:

      Yes, some excellent ex Cairo fares with Etihad. Does anyone know how often they run the triple Etihad Guest points promotions and when the next one it likely to be?

      • lostantipod says:

        4x points right now on business and first. Might be a targeted promo though.

  • Martin says:

    Ex DUB to NYC for new year is under £1k, great deal

    • Katy storie says:

      If the long haul section of the flight is with American Airlines can you still accrue tier points towards BA status or should I start an AA account as well?!
      Would part pay in avios be a good idea towards these business flights do you think/recommend?

      • Daniel says:

        Yes you can if you credit it to BA.

        Use BA EXEC Avios Calculator to see what are you getting.

      • Rob says:

        AA flights count for BA status.

        Part pay – depends what current rate is and how you personally value them.

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

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