BA news: restrictions on kids to South Africa, service changes, special meals dropped

A few British Airways service announcements have dropped into my inbox in the last few days.  Here is a round up:

New restrictions on taking children to South Africa

This seems to have come out of the blue, and does sniff of excess bureaucracy.

From 1st October (EDIT, September 2014 – this has now been delayed until June 2015), you MUST take a FULL birth certificate with you for each child if you are travelling to South Africa with children under 18.  You will not be allowed into the country without one.  The birth certificate must name the parents and those must be the two people travelling with the child.

Even worse, if only one of the two parents is travelling, you must produce an affidavit (presumably a formal one drawn up by a solicitor) from the other parent giving permission for the child to enter South Africa.  If the other parent is dead, a death certificate must be produced.  If the parents are separated, a court order must be produced to prove this.

If you are with a child who is not your biological child, you must produce a copy of the passport of the biological parent and an affidavit from them, as well as the birth certificate of the child.

Don’t even ask about the situation for unaccompanied minors which is even more complex.

I can see the market for family holidays in South Africa taking a big dip ….

Special meal changes

British Airways is dropping the following special meals across all travel classes from 1st October:

• Fruit platter
• Bland meal (no jokes please)
• Jain meal
• Seafood meal

Existing bookings which include one of these meals will be respected.  If you have already booked but have not already selected one of these special meals, you will not be able to do so after October 1st.

Service changes for Summer 2015 timetable

British Airways is dropping a number of flights from the Summer timetable, which runs from the end of March.  If you are booked to any of these destinations you may want to check that your flight has not been cancelled.

New York Newark – 6 of the 20 weekly services are to be dropped.  This is an aggressive reduction.   BA is also removing the Boeing 787 from this route with all services operated by Boeing 777’s.

Buenos Aires – 2 of the 7 weekly services are to be dropped (it will return to 7 for the Winter timetable)

Cape Town – 1 of the 10 weekly services to be dropped.  The Boeing 747 service will not be selling First Class but will be sold as Club World with customers able to book themselves into the old-style First Class seats if demand justifies it.

Accra – 3 of the 10 weekly services to be dropped. The upside is that it is the Boeing 767 services which are going, the Boeing 747 flights will remain.

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How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2023)

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 9th January 2024, you will receive 30,000 Membership Rewards points (convertible to 30,000 Avios) with American Express Preferred Rewards Gold. You receive 25,000 points if you spend £3,000 in three months and a further 5,000 points if you hold the card for 15 months. You can apply here.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 9th January 2024, you will receive a huge 100,000 Membership Rewards points (convertible to 100,000 Avios) with The Platinum Card. You receive 75,000 points if you spend £10,000 in six months and a further 25,000 points if you hold the card for 15 months. You can apply here.

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.

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.