Alaska Airlines now letting you earn status from British Airways flights

Alaska Airlines is a little-known British Airways partner.  Whilst it is not a member of the oneworld alliance, you have always been able to earn and redeem Avios points on Alaska (which operates in the American North West) as per this page on ba.com.  It is a similar arrangement to the one with Aer Lingus.

Alaska also offers members of Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan the opportunity to earn miles when flying on BA.  Since January 15th, this has been expanded.  British Airways flights credited to Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan now count for status with Alaska as well.

I can see a scenario where – for a small number of people – crediting some BA flights to Alaksa might be beneficial.  This is especially true if you have already retained BA Gold for next year and so no longer need the British Airways tier points.

Why do this?  Because Alaska has an interesting range of redemption partners.

You can redeem on the usual oneworld mainstays such as American Airlines, LAN, Cathay Pacific, Qantas and of course BA.

But you can also redeem on Emirates, Aeromexico, Air France, Delta, Era, Fiji Airways, KLM, Korean and PenAir.

Most (not all) partners now allow one-way redemptions.  There are also some good deals in there – the best from a UK perspective is probably 85,000 miles for a RETURN Cathay Pacific business class redemption from Hong Kong to anywhere in Europe!

Emirates is a bit of an issue, as there is no award priced for London to Dubai.  You can only redeem from/to North America, which ironically means (if you live in the UK) having to book the Milan to New York flight I think.

You only need to credit 25,000 flying miles across Alaska and/or its partners to achieve MVP status.  This will give you a 50% mileage bonus on future BA flights credited to the programme.

Alaska may also be an option if you know you will be doing a limited amount of flying on Emirates, Aeromexico, Air France, Delta, KLM and Korean.  By crediting these flights to Alaska, you would be able to top up your account to a decent redemption using British Airways flights, or indeed a Starwood Preferred Guest points transfer.

At the end of the day, this is very much going to be a minority interest – but there will be value here for some people.

---

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:

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

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.

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.

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.

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.

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.