Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Bits: great Qatar Airways / HfP competition coming, 1200 Avios for £15 & FREE Now TV

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News in brief:

Head for Points launches a great Qatar Airways competition on Monday

Starting on Monday ….. you can win two flights, to pretty much anywhere, with Qatar Airways and Head for Points.

We have partnered with Qatar Airways to offer a fantastic new competition.  One Head for Points reader will win two tickets to (almost) anywhere on the Qatar Airways network.

The tickets are Economy class, but Qatar Airways will annotate them so that you will receive an upgrade to Business class at check-in if seats are available.  The ‘not guaranteed’ nature of this upgrade means that you may want to think more carefully about where you choose to go, but if Economy is not a problem then the world is pretty much open to you, including much of Australia and New Zealand.

The competition will only take 10 seconds to enter, so don’t miss out – make sure you take a look at HfP next week.

Qatar A350

Get 1,200 Avios with a £15 NOW TV Box

Last week I mentioned a £25 NOW TV box at Tesco Direct which came with 500 Clubcard points (worth 1,200 Avios or 1,250 Virgin Flying Club miles).

Tesco Direct has now slashed the price of the box to £15.  This makes it a VERY attractive offer – you get 1,200 Avios and a NOW TV box for £15 which could be resold on eBay or used by yourself, with the benefit of a generous Sky Movies or Sky Entertainment package with each box.

NOW TV is very similar to Google Chromecast or Amazon Fire Stick, connecting to your broadband and streaming content to your TV.  There are three versions, each of which comes with a different free gift:

The offer ends 24th May although I expect it to go out of stock quickly at this price.


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 (72)

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

  • Boi says:

    OT: what are the correct/successful contacts for virgin to chase the non posted 13500 points for virgin black cc sign up in clubhouse? I have only received 18500.

    • Peter K says:

      I chased via MBNA who sent me a letter (not email) saying they’d contacted Virgin America they’d be posted within 2 weeks. It actually 5 weeks. Virgin were useless. I did not get a reply from their CS until about 4 weeks AFTER they had posted saying they were going to look into it but have noticed they’d already been added!!

  • Peter K says:

    While this upcoming Qatar competition​ has merit, it does seem a bit stingey. Somehow the PR people seem to have missed​ the target audience of this site. I’m sure there will be lots of entries but not by those they really want to woo, those who only want to fly business and would pay for it.
    I’m not saying I don’t/wouldn’t fly economy, it’s just that this does not excite me and generate good PR/vibes on the same way business seats or even premium economy would.

    • Paul says:

      Deciding whether you enter is a bit like who you will vote for in the upcoming election – personally, I don’t mind a competition ‘for the many and not the few’!

    • Rob says:

      I agree and we have had discussions with Qatar Airways about this over the last fortnight. At the same time, it is a £1,000+ prize and we know many readers will value it.

      Qatar isn’t getting anything out of this – they haven’t even asked for the email addresses of entrants. It is really a ‘thank you’ to us for promoting their sale fares.

      It isn’t being organised by the marketing / PR team, as it happens. It is something my usual contact there has arranged.

      • The Original Nick says:

        Nice one Rob!

      • TripRep says:

        Rob – I will be entering, would even be willing to fly Econ to NZ, thanks for running..

        ps Any chance the Econ flights could marked “Upgradable with Avios?” 😉

        • Rob says:

          Can only upgrade AA and IB with Avios and only then when there is a BA sector in the booking 🙂

      • Henry Larsen says:

        Will this (also) be for UK residents only?

        • Rob says:

          Yes because the flight must depart the UK.

          • Henry Larsen says:

            Sorry, that’s an excuse not a reason. (As if non-UK residents can’t organise a positioning flight … )

  • n says:

    I can understand comments re competition being “off”, but there is a a large chunk (I imagine!) of readers/followers of this blog who travel in Y regularly and trips in J, etc are a treat.

    I will be entering – thanks Rob + team.

    • Fenny says:

      +1

      • Graeme says:

        agreed.. travel economy, stay luxury, that works for me. Obviously I’d rather do both but hey ho..

    • Peter K says:

      I fly economy, with business a treat, as well. However having down to Oz and LA in the past in

      • Peter K says:

        *having flown Oz and LA (direct) in the past in economy I would rather avoid doing so against if I could.

        I’m not saying it’s a bad prize or competition, and as it’s not from the Qatar PR team it’s real coup for this site, but it does not excite me. The really nice hotel I’d have extra money I could spend on (saved from not buying the flights) would do, but the flying experience wouldn’t.

        • Cate says:

          I tend to agree.

          Another suggestion would be a free companion first/biz seat for someone paying full fare in same class.

          Good luck to those applying !! 🙂

        • Fenny says:

          I travel alone, so 2 flights mean nothing to me. But I’m going to enter, because one flight means something to me. You don’t have to enter.

          • Peter K says:

            Quite true I don’t have to enter. And actually I won’t. Not because I’m posh but because my wife hates flying long haul now. I will recommend several friends enter however as they will really benefit if they win. If that brings more attention to HfP then that’s a good thing 🙂

  • FreddieTheFrog says:

    Bought a NOW TV box on the previous (£25) Tesco Direct deal and pretty happy with it.

    Setup was straightforward and we are currently caning the Sky Movies package 🙂

    Assuming I remember to cancel in time, I will come out even if not slighly ahead…

    • the real harry1 says:

      you can cancel now to avoid any further cost – & you’ll be able to continue watching until the month runs out

      NowTV are pretty good that way

      they gave me a free month of Sky Sports when I had a minor problem with a 1 Day pass

  • PaulW says:

    Will the winner earn points Rob 😉 thanks for arranging.

  • Clive says:

    Hope you keep it open all week Rob as I am away until Thursday so won’t be able to enter until then. 🙁

  • Moktar says:

    OT: Used my second free lounge club access at Amsterdam Schipol last week along with a guest. Been charged £15 on my gold card account. I thought one guest is allowed free. Should I contact amex or lounge club for refund?

    • Alan says:

      Free guest is only with PP through Amex Plat AFAIK. My understanding was that PRG lounge passes were always one visit only – so you had to use two if bringing a guest. No harm in a polite email to Amex though, they might be willing to waive it.

      • Peter K says:

        As above, the two free accesses you get with the lounge club pass the AMEX Gold card is for one person on two occasions, or two people on one occasion.

    • Leo says:

      Nothing to contact them about I’m afraid. You were correctly charged.

  • barnaby100 says:

    The 3 month entertainment ones are back in stock.

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

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