Why was I in Doha last week?

Starting tomorrow on Head for Points, I will be running a series of articles on my trip to Doha last week.  I will be looking at the Qatar Airways Boeing 777 and Boeing 787 business class products and lounges, as well as the new Hamad International Airport in Doha and the St Regis Doha hotel.

To avoid repeating myself numerous times in the different articles, I wanted to use this post to explain the background to the trip.

I have always written very positive things about Qatar Airways on HfP.  Even before they joined oneworld – and it became possible to redeem Avios for Qatar flights – they were a partner with bmi Diamond Club.  The airline has a good reputation, flies a modern fleet and, importantly, has a large and growing route network which can get you to pretty much anywhere via Doha.

Despite all this, I had never actually flown them.

The Qatar Airways office in London reads the site and got in touch to offer me a free return flight to Doha in business class.  It seemed a good opportunity so I accepted.  This was effectively worth 65,000 Avios and £385 of tax which would have been the cost had I redeemed for the same flights (London – Doha – Zurich).

However, Qatar did NOT pay for my transfers in London and Doha, my hotel stay at the St Regis Doha or my food and drink costs whilst I was there.  I settled all of those costs myself.  Neither did they pay for my connecting flight on the return from Zurich to London (long story ….)  The flights were booked in a way which meant I did not earn any miles or tier points from them.

I think that my Qatar Airways pieces are as objective as any of the other airline reviews on HfP.  Given that flights are high value products, though, it is only fair that you understand the background to the trip before you read the reviews.

ALL of the flights I review on HfP, of course, have been booked using Avios or other frequent flyer miles.  To that extent, I always have less ‘skin in the game’ than if I had paid hard cash for them.  Take my review of British Airways First Class on the A380 last month – someone who paid £13,500 of their own money for that flight – which is the fully flexible price – would presumably review it differently from someone who used 150,000 Avios points.

It was an interesting few days last week and I look forward to sharing it.

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How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

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, such as:

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:

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

(Want to earn more Avios?  Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)