Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Good British Airways Club World business class fares from Amsterdam

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

The British Airways Winter sale is now on.  Whilst most people focus on the deals available from the UK, there are actually some pretty impressive bargains available from European gateways.

Reader Tony dropped me a note with some interesting fares he had found to the Far East.

Amsterdam to Heathrow to Hong Kong, return, comes in at around £1,370.

Bangkok, with a similar route, is abound £1,320.

Other routes are also available if you have a dig around based on what interests you.  Sydney comes in at around £2,700 for instance, whilst New York is £1,400.  It is also worth trying other European departure cities.

These prices are even lower than the Finnair sale I posted about recently.  Whilst these flights are a bit more hassle than using Finnair (as you need to go to Amsterdam and back) you are guaranteed a fully flat bed on BA.  With Finnair, it could go either way depending on the plane.

The travel dates are the same as the UK BA sale – book by January 27th, for travel before June 15th.

These fares are semi-flexible as well.  You cannot get a refund, but you can change your dates (albeit the ticket will reprice to the cheapest ticket available on those dates).  A stop-over in London will add €200.


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 (22)

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

  • Polly says:

    OT… Can anyone confirm the final date for applying for the Marco Polo card on Platinum? Noticed some comments saying it states a March end date? Thanks

    • Rob says:

      Yes, it has been extended to 31st March. Post on this next week.

      • thesaver79 says:

        Oh no, I applied for the upgrade last week because I was worried I wouldn’t have enough time… I could’ve held my Gold Card for longer to enjoy the bonus MR points! Hopefully I will at least get my Priority Pass in time for my next trip in less than 2 weeks.

  • Boi says:

    I was actually going to ask about these as I checked for our dates in April and noticed HUGE difference.
    We are a family of 5 and heres how it pens out:
    1. AMS-LHR-JNB= 6100
    2. LBA/MAN-LHR-JNB=11777.

    I was wondering if I can do LBA-AMS(separate booking)-AMS-LHR-JNB then miss the LHR-AMS on our return. Will crew agree to check in our bags to london? I see there is an option with long LHR connection and I could argue I prefer to have my luggage during the 12 hr wait.

    Also, ba.com gives fare in euro while expedia gives in pounds. I prefer to book on BA ( as I have BAPP), is there a way I can get pricing in pounds or will I just have to pay in euro (with 2.99% fx fee)?

    • World Traveller says:

      I asume LBA-AMS (& return) would be direct with KLM.

      BA will not tag or through check a bag to a final destination where they or a partner airline does not operate the route. In this instance they’ll tag it to AMS, KL at AMS would tag the bag to LBA. You can try askin BA at JNB to only tag the bag to LHR, but think they would only do it if you have a substantial connection time.

      • Volker says:

        I usually travel on several connecting flights as I am “from the regions”. I have ALWAYS been asked if I wanted my luggage checked all the way through, and whenever I said no, I’d like to pick it up e.g. in LHR they made that possible without any fuss or discussions. I’m pretty surprised that others seem to have made some different experiences.

      • Boi says:

        I want to collect my luggage in LHR on return, don’t want to go back to AMS (will be making own journey from london to leeds). I am hoping/asking if BA in JNB will oblige and not insist on tagging luggage to AMS.
        Also, thanks for advice re: calling BA to get pricing in £, will try that as it will immediately hit spending requirements for my BA Amex (for bonus) that I just got and bring me very close to the 2-4-1!

        • Rob says:

          Book the flight from London to Amsterdam from Gatwick, you are then 100% certain to get your bags back at Heathrow.

    • Yaron says:

      I would suggest you contact BA reservations directly and ask for a quote in £ ( assuming you are just booking the ticket(s) originating in AMS). I did something similar last year when I needed to book a flight to the USA from TLV (fare was quoted in $). I contacted BA, explained I already had the ticket from London to TLV and that Expedia quotes the USA fare in £. Reservation agent was then able to quote me in £ and did not even charge the offline fee.

      This way I avoided FX conversion fee + benefited from using my BA Amex for a BA purchase

  • Richie says:

    There’s a lot more avios to be earned on British airways compared to Finn air

  • Lady London says:

    IIRC when I had a quick look at this offer, there was no problem doing an open jaw and returning just to London even though you had gone out from somewhere else. It did not add any cost and reduced it slightly on the routes I checked. Just select the multitrip option and book from there.

    • Boi says:

      nice tip-this will work perfect for me, it will allow me to have the “stopover” and I won’t make it back to AMS 🙂

    • creampuff says:

      Just tried the open jaw and ending the trip at Heathrow but it doubled the ticket price.

  • Dominic says:

    I frequently book CW tickets TLV-LON-USA-LON-TLV as I visit both Israel and the US on business quite often (I’m based in the UK). So I do these with stopovers (often quite long ones), and, with a bit of notice, the effect is approximately like buying a LON-USA CW return and getting a free CW return to TLV thrown in. BUT… I have found on each occasion that the fare has been lower by phoning BA and have an agent sort out the itinerary than if I have done it using Multi-Trip online – usually by several hundred pounds. And I use KVS to see the booking classes available, etc – but have always found this kind of itinerary pays to be done by phone!

  • creampuff says:

    OK so if Heathrow is my local airport but I want to buy one of these ex-Amsterdam biz fares, how does it work?

    To fly over to LHR-AMS, can I book myself on a separate ticket on the same aircraft which will presumably turn around at Amsterdam and fly right back AMS-LHR? Or will I have to go through immigration, collect my back, recheck my bag, go through immigration again etc etc?

    Are there any consequences to having my return “transit” through LHR and “missing” my LGW-AMS flight?

  • Londonbus says:

    The best example of this:

    LON-PEK/BKK-LON: £620 in Y, £1k in WTP, £2k in J

    AMS-PEK/BKK-AMS: £1,300 in J….

  • GoetersFourTwo says:

    Does anyone know if you can book, for example AMS-LCY-LHR-JNB and return, but miss out the AMS-LCY leg? For example, if you don’t check in for the AMS-LCY leg can you still take the LHR-JNB leg?

    • Rob says:

      Absolutely not. Under NO circumstances try this. The second that you fail to check-in at Amsterdam your entire flight will be cancelled.

      If it was that easy, everyone would be doing it ….

      If you live in London, one way around it (in terms of making it easier) is to remember that a stopover of under 24 hours is NOT a stopover for Air Passenger Duty purposes. What I do, when doing a trip like yours, is do the LHR-AMS-LCY on, say, Monday and then go home as normal and head back to the airport on Tuesday (within 24 hours of my last flight landing) for the long haul flight.

      • GoetersFourTwo says:

        Cheers for that, food for thought. We live in Wales but have family up in London so it could be possible.

        • Rob says:

          Don’t forget London hotels will be half-price in the Avios hotel sale on Wed-Fri this week!

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

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.