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Up to 7,000 bonus Avios with BA’s weak new flying promotion

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British Airways has launched a new bonus Avios promotion to drive traffic on a few specific routes.  This can earn you up to 7,000 points between now and early December.

Unfortunately it is not incredibly generous.  As you will see from the fare code letters in the list below, which refer to the ticket types you must hold, you will only receive a bonus if you book a flexible or semi-flexible ticket.

Call me old and cyncical, but 500 Avios is not an exciting bonus in return for booking an expensive semi-flexible short-haul ticket.

It is not enough to persuade me to upgrade my ticket type, it would not be enough (for Dusseldorf, for eg) to persuade me to travel to London City instead of Heathrow and – if I was wedded to another airline for a particular route – it would not be enough to swing me to BA.

The bonus points you will earn are, per return flight:

7,000 Avios in First Class (F, A)

5,000 Avios in Club World (J, C, D)

2,500 Avios in World Traveller Plus (W, T)

1,000 Avios in World Traveller (Y, B)

1,000 Avios in Club Europe (J, C, D)

500 Avios in Domestic or Eurotraveller (Y, B)

Participating routes are:

Heathrow to Aberdeen, Baku, Bangkok, Buenos Aires, Cape Town, Edinburgh, Geneva, Hong Kong, Houston, Istanbul, Luanda, Moscow, Nice, Rome, Sao Paulo, Stockholm, Tel Aviv

Gatwick to Bari, Bordeaux, Edinburgh, Glasgow

London City to Dublin, Dusseldorf, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Rotterdam

The key dates are:

Booking dates 13 October – 28 November 2014
Outbound travel 13 October – 28 November 2014
Inbound travel 13 October – 12 December 2014

You can earn the bonus on a maximum of four return trips.  Depending on your travel patterns, it might make sense to move some trips AWAY from British Airways to preserve your ability to hit the higher bonuses later.

If I had a Club World trip coming up, for example, after four short-haul European flights, it would be more lucrative to do one of the short-haul flights on another airline in order to ensure I got the Club World bonus.

You must register for the bonus via this page at ba.com where you will also find full details.

The promotion is only open to UK members of the Executive Club.

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How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2025)

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

Get 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

30,000 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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large 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, and the standard card is FREE. Capital on Tap cards also have no FX fees.

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 1 Avios per £1 Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business

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

50,000 points when you sign-up 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 (22)

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

  • Stuart says:
    17 Oct17 October 07:08

    Good timing I have an upcoming trip to Houston in C/D

    Thanks

  • Alan says:
    17 Oct17 October 07:46

    Agreed, a totally rubbish promo – even worse when I asked them on Twitter they said it only applied on return flights from Heathrow, not vice versa, which seems to be (yet again!) discriminating against those flying from the regions for no good reason!

  • Mark2 says:
    17 Oct17 October 08:03

    Yes, pretty weak when you consider that yesterday I received 4000+ for spending £68 at Tesco!

    • Mark2 says:
      17 Oct17 October 08:13

      but I did have to pay £3.50 to amalgamate three 3V cards.

      • Polly says:
        18 Oct18 October 08:16

        Mark, is it a one off fee to coming the 3v cards, or does it depend on how many you combine?

        • Idrive says:
          18 Oct18 October 11:32

          1.75 for every transfer (23.25) obviously you move all balance of 23.25 (25-1.75) to the other card only once.

    • Idrive says:
      17 Oct17 October 08:33

      How so many?

      • Mark2 says:
        17 Oct17 October 09:13

        CC points: 68 + 1500 promotion + 68 x 3 (3V) = 1704 X 2.4 Avios = 4090
        and Amex 68 x 1.5 = 102
        so almost 4200

        • Idrive says:
          17 Oct17 October 09:18

          Ahh fine i had misread your post!

        • xcalx says:
          17 Oct17 October 09:41

          Are you referring to the 1500 CC new customer promo. I didn’t know it was possible to buy 3V cards for delivery or Click and Collect.

        • TimS says:
          17 Oct17 October 12:54

          A little misleading as you appear to be including your earlier purchase of the 3V cards on your Amex as part of yesterday’s grocery transaction.

          • Mark2 says:
            17 Oct17 October 15:51

            I would not have needed to buy the 3V cards (or replacements) if I had not spent them on this transaction, which I would not have made otherwise.

          • TimS says:
            17 Oct17 October 16:01

            To a degree, but you didn’t get 4000+ for spending £68.

            You received the equivalent of 3763 avios for the £68 spend and the remainder you received on a previous occasion for the earlier transaction when you bought the 3V cards (and inbetween the two transactions spent £3.50, earning zero Avios, to combine the 3Vs for easier churning).

            Still a better deal than the current BA promo though!

  • DV says:
    17 Oct17 October 08:19

    When the 319s are refitted with the 29-30″ seats, LCY may become a much more attractive option for DUS.

  • Idrive says:
    17 Oct17 October 08:35

    I’ rather stick to iberia then …got 1500 bonus for a £50 flight in August and now again for another cheap flight where i need to fly to!

  • Scott says:
    17 Oct17 October 10:40

    Shame about the outbound dates. Would have liked this to start after my TP year ends on the 8th Dec as anything earned will be wasted.

  • Lady London says:
    17 Oct17 October 11:02

    Maybe this is what BA is trying to offer UK members instead of the extremely lucrative promotion that is still currently ongoing that applies only to European members?

  • Alex Powell says:
    18 Oct18 October 01:17

    Hello All,

    First off sorry for posting on this post but it’s relating to BA Avios and I can’t seem to comment on other posts.

    I’m just about to hit the £1000 Spend in the first 3 months (2 weeks after getting the card!) to receive 9K Avios on my BA Amex, I remember trawling through Head For Points and I believe I saw something relating to if I upgraded my BA to BA Premium Plus I would receive some form of bonus or 2-4-1 Voucher?

    This isn’t to be confused with the £10K Spend on the Premium to receive a 2-4-1 or the £20K spend on the normal BA I have.

    If you could clarify if I would benefit from any bonus/companion voucher from upgrading alone to the BA Premium Plus (not taking into account the £10K spend offer on it).
    Kindest Regards,
    Alex

    • Polly says:
      18 Oct18 October 08:09

      You are correct, you get that secret bonus, but also if you are within a 12 month period of spend from the first date of your BA card, and you manage to complete a 10k spend, you will also qualify for the 2 4 1 voucher, once you actually have got the BAPP. Effectively you must hit the spend target after you have got the BAPP. Smart move too. Correct me if I am wrong Rob….

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