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Get 3,000 Flying Club miles with Virgin Money International Money Transfer

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Virgin Money International Money Transfer has returned as a Flying Club partner – but only for a few months.

If you try this service now you can get 3,000 Virgin Atlantic miles when making your first transaction.

Virgin Money promises a best price guarantee on all international money transfers, although as this guarantee excludes internet specialists such as Azimo and TransferWise you should treat it with a pinch of salt.

In order to get ‘the best price on the high street’, you need to register an account with Virgin Money and provide the quote you received from any high street bank in writing within three hours of receiving it.  Virgin Money will then give you a matching quote.

Note the slightly confusing deadlines for this.

You need to be a Virgin Atlantic Flying Club member and not already have a Virgin Money International Money Transfer account

You need to open an account by 31st January but you have until 30th April 2018 to actually make your first transaction

If your first transaction is over £1000 you will qualify for the 3000 miles which will be credited to your account within 60 days

This is not necessarily a ‘no brainer’ deal.  The miles are worth around £30 at best and you need to transfer £1000.  If the Virgin rates are close to Azimo then you may come out on top but you should definitely do the maths first – the banks are not known for their great rates.

Full terms and conditions can be found here.

The Virgin Money page is here.

PS.  Remember that Virgin Money is also offering 6,000 Virgin Flying Club miles for opening an ISA at the momentdetails are on the Virgin Atlantic site here.


How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2024)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Virgin Points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 15,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

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

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

A generous earning rate for a free card at 0.75 points per £1 Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

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 comes with 40,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 40,000 Virgin Points.

The Platinum Card from American Express

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

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

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 Virgin Points

(Want to earn more Virgin Points?  Click here to see our recent articles on Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club and click here for our home page with the latest news on earning and spending other airline and hotel points.)

Comments (25)

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

  • the real harry1 says:

    I did a comparison Virgin vs HIFX, Moneycorp, Azimo – Virgin were easily the worst by a huge margin; the 3000 points/ £30 didn’t change that

    so you’d be better off buying the points or whatever & using a cheaper FX provider/ credit card

    vs the Post Office/ high street banks – no idea but I wouldn’t use them anyway as their rates are so poor

    if you can get your company to reimburse FX – that’s different

    • JamesB says:

      Thanks Harry, save me the hassle. Have my ISA to cancel next month which might be a last roll of the dice on that given the new 12 month condition. Hopefully the new credit cards will be worthwhile but not very optimistic.

      • Genghis says:

        If V ISA T&Cs remain as at the latest version, I don’t plan on doing it. I’ll actually invest now my LTV on mortgage has hit a nice figure for renewal.

        • the real harry1 says:

          do you reckon we can just leave a nominal £1 in the V ISA after 6 months? I wonder what would happen if you did that then fees ate up the £1?

          I might just do that with our current 6 month minimum ISAs, to see what happens – or give them a ring, they are pretty good at picking up the phone

        • JamesB says:

          Morning Snuffles, nice to put a face to you man 🙂 Biggest downside for us unable to attend is not being able to know folks personally and HFP starts to feel like it has an inner and outer circle. Also nice to spot a guy I know in the pics from first party post.

        • Liz says:

          Do we have to keep this last ISA open for 12 months ? My last payment is due at the end of this month?

          Has anyone received the 1000 Virgin Miles for auto converting their Tesco a/c yet? I had it diraried for 13/12 to check.

        • the real harry1 says:

          @ Liz it depends when you opened the ISA – they changed the T&Cs about September

          so for ISAs opened early on in the financial year, it was 6 months minimum

          then it changed to 12 months minimum – this cannot be applied retrospectively

        • JamesB says:

          @Liz, your cancelattion date would suggest you are on 6 month term, I think it was just that latest offer in last few months that changed to 12. Hope you enjoyed your visit to London and not adversely affected by weather.

        • Genghis says:

          @Liz. It sounds like you opened the account similar time to me. I have just withdrawn cash after the 6 monthly DD payment. The account had already been open 6 months. I’ll formally close it later this month.

        • Liz says:

          Thanks for replies – I will see if I can find out which T&Cs apply before I do anything.
          @JamesB – good trip to London. Went down by train on Monday and we were only 20 mins late getting in – missed all the flying chaos. Back in style yesterday 1st class booked in the Virgin sale – paid a quarter of the price the lady opposite paid and she was only going to Newcastle – was very nice! Enjoyed our anniversary and birthday celebrations in the big city despite the cold! Travels over for 2017 – countdown to Oz in May!

        • Liz says:

          Just spent ages on to Amex online chat – we had 10 manual SS credits added this morning – without any chasing from me – I was going to phone them today. They are currently working on manual credits from 2-5 Dec I was told. Had to get them to confirm which credits I received as there is no info against the credit. Now missing 10 out of 44 transactions – 9 from 1 shop that is on the list and I have used the past 2 years but no emails received and one deli not on the list but they were a small shop which took Amex. So getting there slowly with mine. They said they are working on it. I reported back that out of 44 transactions I only got 11 auto emails and 11 auto credits – so if that is happening to everyone taking part they have an awful lot of checking and manual credits to get through.

      • JamesB says:

        @TRH1, probably not a good idea to alert them to it or T&C may change again. Better just try it to see if it works.

      • JamesB says:

        @Liz, glad it went well. Agree on train first class, so much more relaxing and enjoyable than taking the plane.Rge difference between standard and first on a deal is a lost wiped out by food and drinks provided plus the lounge too.

  • thehornets says:

    Slightly O/T: Does anyone know how Virgin Atlantic release rewards seats? Are they like BA where a certain amount of seats are released for each cabin att-355?

    I am hoping to get a family of four to the US West Coast in Summer 2019 and am wondering what Premium Economy availability will be like. I’m tempted to forget abour Flying club (and the hassle of trying to find seats) and just book the cheapest cash fare on whichever airline fits my need. Any thoughts?

    • Louise says:

      I looked a few weeks ago and lots of availability to San Fran over LA for Aug 18.

      Head over to V Flyer Forum if you haven’t already

    • JamesB says:

      I used to get very frustrated with it to HKG, on that route I was finding better availability about 3 or 6 months out. Was not like BA at all. Have you considere option of BA on a380 into SFO or the recently discussed service to Oakland? If either of those work you could convert the Virgin miles to Hilton to cover hotels.

      • Lady London says:

        Cash fares for the West Coast have been extremely competitive lately. Especially if you’re flexible as to which airport there you land in. Definitely worth checking cash fares out as seen many offers for summer. That way you’ll earn miles rather than spending them but up to you.

        • thehornets says:

          Thanks for all your replies – am coming round the opinion of benefitting from the competitive cash fares for flights and using the FC miles for hotels or (preferably) a rainy day trip!

          Will check out v-flyer too – thanks Louise

  • the real harry1 says:

    O/T people are reporting getting the free BA 2000 Xmas Avios credited to BAEC a/cs – none for us so far (flying tomorrow) but they are RFS redemptions so perhaps no surprise there – my wife has a revenue flight back on 2/1/18 & no 2000 Avios gift there either

    T&Cs may appear today

  • Gulz says:

    Tipoff for you guys. Lebara money transfer accepts Curve, and Curve recognises Lebara as a Business Service rather than a money transfer service. I recently transferred £3k and got an excellent rate with Lebara (much better than Virgin Money Transfer) and £3k virgin miles. The only limitation I found was that you can use Lebara to send money to Europe and India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria and Ghana.

    • JamesB says:

      Great, ghank very much 🙂

    • Gavin says:

      Hi Gulz, nice tip to use Curve on Lebara. Do you have a Lebara money referral link to share?

    • Gavin says:

      It appears that Lebara Money no longer accepts Curve, I tried. Debit or pre-paid cards are the only forms of payment.

  • Sam says:

    Sure it’s been mentioned a few times here, but of course American Express International Payments allow you to collect Membership Rewards. Not a huge amount and a few restrictions, but they all add up, and in recent weeks their rate has been better than our other international payment providers. Happy to refer!

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

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