Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Avios hotels sale now live – get 50% off on cash as well as Avios bookings!

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The Avios ‘50% off hotels’ sale is now available for booking.  However, I recommend you use this ba.com booking link as that one seems to be working properly (ie displaying all the hotels, not just a few).

What I did not expect is that the ‘pay with cash’ price has also been halved. 

Avios wing 11

This means two things:

You are only getting 0.57p per Avios if you choose to use your miles to pay, since they have halved both the ‘pay with Avios’ and ‘pay with cash’ prices.  I wasn’t expecting that.

With cash prices halved, there are some exceptional deals to be had.

The super-luxe Conrad Algarve, for example, is available through the peak Summer season at half-price.  Even the half-board packages are half-price!  August 3-9th, for example, is £1,290 (or of course you can use Avios) for a Deluxe Double half-board. On hilton.com, you would be paying €3,546 Euro for (advanced purchase) dinner, bed and breakfast.

In Prague, 14-16 March, the InterContinental is available for 950 Avios and £105, the total for 2 nights, WITH breakfast.  The cheapest rate at intercontinental.com is €192 WITHOUT breakfast.

In Budapest, one of the best hotels in Europe – the Four Seasons Gresham Palace – is available for Valentine’s weekend (14-16 February) for £230 + 4,400 Avios for two nights, with breakfast.  fourseasons.com wants €590 for the same thing.

You need to book by noon on Monday for travel by 30th September.

The small print says “Amendments and cancellation are permitted subject to the Avios cancellation and amendment terms where a fee as stated on avios.com will apply.”  Not sure what these are though!

The participating cities in this round are, as a reminder:

Vienna
Dubrovnik
Prague
Copenhagen
Berlin
Budapest
Istanbul
The Algarve

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 12th May 2024, the Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa card is offering a bonus of 30,000 points, convertible into 30,000 Avios. You must have a Limited Company to apply. Click here to learn more and click here to apply.

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.

Category

British Airways and Avios

Comments (115)

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

  • Ant says:
    10 Jan10 January 14:34

    Just booked the Orient Express Hotel in Istanbul cash only for £105 total for 4 night double room! Everywhere else it is around £250!
    Avios advised me, via chat, “If you are paying in cash this is exactly the same as paying using Avios. If you wish to cancel or amend your hotel you can do this outside 14 days of arrival for a £25.00 per room admin fee. Within 14 days of arrival the costs are on a sliding scale.”

  • emad says:
    10 Jan10 January 14:37

    Ok, I will go for Intercontinental Prague (20th -23rd Feb) 3 Nights
    It will cost 15,000 Avios + £105 for two people (inc Breakfast)

    Any thoughts on this guys?

    • squills says:
      10 Jan10 January 14:41

      It’s an amazingly low price 😉

      • squills says:
        10 Jan10 January 14:44

        Oh sorry, I thought you wrote OR £105 – but you didn’t. 15K + £105 isn’t so brilliant, not too bad though

        • Rob says:
          10 Jan10 January 15:09

          If you value Avios at 1p, that is only £80 per night with breakfast for an InterContinental. I paid nearly £80 for breakfast for 2 at a Four Seasons last weekend.

  • renwaldo says:
    10 Jan10 January 14:47

    Not sure what’s going on but I can’t seem to replicate the offer. Looking at the FS in Budapest on the mentioned dates, on Avios.com (on incognito mode in Chrome) I get:

    82,300 or
    61,700 + £115 or
    49,350 + £190 or
    37,050 + £260 or
    20,550 + £350 or
    8,250 + £420 or
    £469

    Is this right or has it just sold out or something?

    • renwaldo says:
      10 Jan10 January 14:51

      and on the BA link…

      Total for room(s) and car rental:
      96,000 Avios
      76,800 Avios + £110.00
      62,400 Avios + £195.00
      48,000 Avios + £275.00
      33,600 Avios + £360.00
      14,400 Avios + £470.00

      Doesn’t really seem as astounding as the 4.4k + £230 that you highlighted in your article?

    • Rob says:
      10 Jan10 January 15:11

      I now get ‘Four Seasons Hotel Gresham Palace is not available for the nights you requested. Please browse through other hotels with availability below.’. Looks like another HFP reader beat you to it.

      However, same weekend, the Corinthia is just 13,050 Avios for 2 nights with breakfast and I think that has just had a multi-million refurbishment.

  • squills says:
    10 Jan10 January 14:51

    Might have got the wrong end of the stick here, sorry 😉 No massive glitch after all then.

  • Jason says:
    10 Jan10 January 15:14

    Managed to book Prague intercontinental 13 – 16 march for the same price quoted by raffles for two nights – £105 plus 950 avios. Must be a glitch somewhere as wouldnt have thought it would be the same price for three nights as it is for two!

    • Lady London says:
      10 Jan10 January 17:59

      Some hotels are showing 3 nights for price of 2 offers and it seems if your booking falls into their offer period for the 3 for 2 then you get this too.

  • emad says:
    10 Jan10 January 15:21

    OK, the site is playing up
    I finally got to book Prague intercontinental 20 – 23 February (3 Nights) for £100 + 1900 Avios
    Also flights for two to Prague for £70 + 18,000 Avios

    Total £170 and circa 19,900 Avios (Not bad me think) 😉

  • squills says:
    10 Jan10 January 15:57

    Shame we don’t need any hotels as we only ever go to Hotel Squills anyway 😉

    Roll on kids leaving for Univ is all I can fondly think of lol – wife & I used to travel all over the place, Australia, Thailand etc – before we became 5. At these prices, we could do it, but all our school hols are already booked up a year ahead in the land of my wife, can’t do anything outside as nobody would be fool enough to look after the kids in our absence, sob sob 😉

  • Avios Hotel Sale - Cash Glitch - FlyerTalk Forums says:
    10 Jan10 January 17:11

    […] […]

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

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