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Bits: Norwegian launches Buenos Aires, two Avios wine deals ending

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News in brief:

Norwegian launches Buenos Aires from Gatwick

If you follow our Instagram feed, you’ll know that Anika is currently in New York testing out Norwegian’s Premium cabin.  We should get that review up in the next couple of weeks.

If it turns out well, you may be tempted to try out Norwegian’s latest route launch – Buenos Aires. 

The service is due to launch in February 2018.  There will be four flights per week on a new Boeing 787, and the lead-in economy fare is £299 each way.

This will be the second non-US route for Norwegian from Gatwick following the recent announcement that flights to Singapore will begin in late September.  It takes their total number of long-haul routes from London to nine.

Perhaps the British Airways paranoia about Norwegian is not entirely misplaced, although the airline is still losing money (albeit you would expect that as new routes take time to build up) and it remains to be seen how it would survive a return to high oil prices.

Norwegian 787

Two Avios-earning Laithwaites wine deals about to end

Both British Airways Executive Club and avios.com are running generous Avios-earning deals with wine group Laithwaites at the moment.  Both deals end on 30th June so you need to jump in now if you want to take advantage.

The deals are slightly different depending on what freebies you want.

The avios.com deal is here.   You receive:

A 12-bottle wine case, chosen from seven options between £52 and £58

2 Dartington wine tumbers worth £15

1,000 Avios points (250 Avios points if you are an existing Laithwaite’s customer)

Free delivery

The British Airways Executive Club deal is here.  You receive:

A 12-bottle wine case, chosen from seven options between £52 and £58

3 free bottles of rioja worth £36

1,000 Avios points (250 Avios points if you are an existing Laithwaite’s customer)

Free delivery

The only difference is whether you take the free rioja or the free tumblers.  Remember that you’ll need to give a BAEC number if you take the rioja and an avios.com account number if you take the tumblers.

Either way, there is one snag you need to deal with.

By ordering, you are signing yourself up to Laithwaite’s Wine Plan.  Every 8-12 weeks they will automatically send you another 12-bottle wine case.  It is very easy to stop this happening – simply amend your account online or give Laithwaite’s a call to cancel your Wine Plan membership, there is no penalty – but you must trust yourself to remember.


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 (54)

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

  • Matt says:

    I was rather hoping for a HT under the Waitrose story…

    • Rob says:

      Two people mentioned it to me 🙂

      Thank you Matt. And Kallum who emailed me 🙂

  • N says:

    Just had this – anyone else?

    “In order to ensure a better service on our AccorHotels.com website, we do everything we can to protect your personal information.

    Although the security of our database has not been involved, our systems have detected an intrusion risk on your account. A third party has been able to detect or has sought to detect your password. As a precaution we have, therefore, deactivated it. To access your account again you must reinitialise your password when you next connect. To do this:

    1. Go to http://www.accorhotels.com
    2. Click on the “Connect” button in the top right
    3. Then click on “Forgotten your password?”
    4. Enter your e-mail address and confirm. An automatic e-mail will be sent to you
    5. Follow the instructions in the e-mail.
    For the security of your account we strongly recommend:

    – To never tell anyone your password and change it regularly
    – To choose a different password for all the applications and websites you use
    – To be wary of e-mails asking you for information that concerns you; check the sender’s address for these e-mails; for the e-mails we send we most often use news.accorhotels@accor-mail.com.
    Thank you for your confidence and we hope to see you soon in our hotels.

    Your AccorHotels.com Team”

    • Memesweeper says:

      Your account may have suffered a sustained attempt to break in. Good work Accor in spotting this and stopping it. Do not assume there’s a problem at their end .

  • Joe says:

    Amex £100 off Naked Wines offer – worth

    • Genghis says:

      Not a statement credit I presume and hence non-stackable? I’ve had Naked wines before and they’re not too bad.

    • Lumma says:

      I used it before. The wine you get is decent and they add you to the waiting list to join their angels club where you pay £20 a month in. It’s easy to cancel and even if you forgot to do it before you get charged they give you everything back

  • Joe says:

    …it?

  • Jason Titter says:

    Does the BA offer work? When I select the mixed case I want and order it says my basket is empty.

  • Andrew says:

    It’s not just the arrangement that Waitrose had with Virgin that has ended, the one they had via my employees internal staff offers site has ended too:-

    Waitrose In-Store

    Hi

    We’re emailing to let you know that our in-store offer at Waitrose ended Wednesday 21 June 2017. All eligible transactions made up until this date will be awarded WOWPoints.

    We hope that this will only be a temporary removal and appreciate that this action could be disappointing to you. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. We are currently uncertain of a timeframe for the return of this Waitrose offer. Our goal is to have it back on the platform as soon as possible.

    If you do have questions regarding Waitrose, please get in touch with us via the Help Centre and we’ll be happy to help.

    • ADS says:

      Andrew – are the rest of the companies on your list the same as on the FC portal ?

  • Roger says:

    OT: Luggage with overnight connection and airport change.

    If my journey (JER_LGW_LHR_USA) involves overnight stay at london airports with airport change, can I add more luggage at my last trans-Atlantic flight out of last london airport?

    OR does BA transfer luggage for me between lhr-lgw?

    • Roger says:

      For example, can I fly HBO from JER_LGW and add more luggage (stay overnight at london home) at LHR next morning for my flight to USA?

  • rams1981 says:

    OT what’s the easiest way to sell those HP cartridges bought from the Tesco offer?

    • Rob says:

      ebay, in bulk. Don’t sell them as singles – it increases your workload and costs you more overall in postage.

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

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