Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

New British Airways sale launched in World Traveller and World Traveller Plus

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British Airways rolled out its Bank Holiday Sale yesterday, which is actually available for booking until May 19th.

Depending on where you want to go, you can book for travel up to February 2016.

The special home page for the sale is here.

British Airways January sale

The sale ONLY covers World Traveller (economy) and World Traveller Plus (premium economy).  There are no Club World or First Class discounts at present – although you may be able to ‘upgrade using Avios’ and book your World Traveller Plus ticket directly into Club World.

Of course, the rates for upgrading from World Traveller Plus to Club World were increased substantially on April 28th.  You also need Avios reward availability to be showing in Club World for an upgrade to be possible.

Here are the summary terms:

Book before 19 May 2016

Travel dates (some exceptions apply):

World Traveller and World Traveller Plus to North America: to 29 February 2016

World Traveller and World Traveller Plus elsewhere: to 11 December 2015

Black-out dates apply.

The easiest way to check out the best prices to a specific destination is with the British Airways Low Fare Finder tool on ba.com. This will show you the cheapest price on any route, in any class, on month by month basis.

If you can be flexible with dates, there are some decent fares available.  The cheapest available seems to be (these are all World Traveller):

New York £383

San Francisco £517

Miami £462

Dubai £365

Delhi £463

Bangkok £486

Tokyo £489

Rio de Janeiro £462

The best thing to do if you are interested is to pop over to ba.com and have a look around.


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 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

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.

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

Huge 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, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) and NO FX fees 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.

Comments (32)

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

  • JQ says:

    For WT you’ll be getting reduced TPs as well.

  • Chico Dusty says:

    Plus, you need to book a ticket issued in Y, B or H to be able to upgrade it with avios, or at least that is what BA told me when I tried to upgrade my ticket last night.

    • Kev says:

      At the moment but due to change by the end of the year. Don’t know if this will also allow UuA for existing bookings.

  • idrive says:

    OT:
    BA is quickly loosing ground…The devaluation then all the rest and now…i got ANOTHER bonus from Virgin just now 20% when converting from Tesco CC from 01/05 to 19/06…when i have just converted a couple of weeks ago…BA bonus on the way? I hope so. BA promoting more deals as the one i missed in Business class from Germany ( was pulled early i tried to book yesterday and could not), I hope so.. Rob any ideas?

    • idrive says:

      I mean in our community

      • idrive says:

        and by the way, let’s see next year.

        • Worzel says:

          Understood, (our community).

          It was just a reminder that BA are doing OK-of course though, maybe different next year.

          Availability (East Redemptions) seem poor, as they were before.

          Hopefully not too far OT.

  • Nick says:

    OT: I see that silver status does not allow you to book seats in advance on HBO fares. Is this a new thing? Hardly a tragedy, but a bit annoying nonetheless as I’ve got loads of HBO flights this year.

    • Nick says:

      Gits.

      • Nick says:

        Utterly stupid, too. I’ve just read the article about being assigned random seats. So my wife and I (both soon-to-be-silver) will likely not be able to sit together on HBO fare flights.

        Brilliant, thanks BA. Another good reason to give you the middle finger and fly with your competitors. Some of the stuff they do really is idiotic.

        • Mark says:

          I guess there must be a few people now who have experience of travelling on these fares since the change came in.

          I would assume that if two people are travelling together and there are seats available together, that they would at least allocate you seats next to each other.

          • Nick says:

            I would assume that any other airline would…. let’s see what BA do! I’ll report back. as soon as I can.

        • Nickster says:

          not to be pedantic, but the changes have come and gone and youre all still here. still flying with BA. nothing will change until you ACTUALLY vote with your feet (and your wallet). BA loses nothing with people continuing to whinge (and to visit the BA related sites on blogs like HFP)

          • Fenny says:

            Just because we’re here doesn’t mean we’re all still flying BA. If it weren’t for the 83k Avios I need to use up, I’d be ignoring them like crazy. If I can get the flights I need with IB, I’ll use them.

          • Jason says:

            The last 4 years I’ve flown 100% with BA for long haul flights in premium cabins.
            This year it will be 25%. I’d say that is changing my strategy, the changes only came in this week.

          • Rob says:

            Whilst part of HFP is helping people use their Avios most efficiently, part of it is also educating people about the other options out there, whether for miles or, say, the £750 Qatar business class tickets we had recently.

          • Idrive says:

            I agree with Fenny and Jason the last few years I flew with BA whenever possible now I am considering equivalent alternative or cheaper options without question. Now I prefere the Eurostar to a flight to Paris at same price and if I stick to BA for some routes it’s because of status and the perks (luggage and seat selection) and priority at the gate. And thanks to Raffles we are also getting to know first hand some carriers we would otherwise not consider (for many reasons) or simply explore new routes and places also due to the promos (this is personal of course). Everyone have their reason and strategy, I am changing mine a bit.

          • Joe says:

            For me, the (avios) changes are not really a problem provided that they really do release 2 premium cabin seats on each flight, as promised. I will still use BA if that is the best option, as I always have. The changes mean that BA will be the best option on fewer occasions, but the companion voucher and routes offered mean that BA will still be the best choice on some occasions. However, the vast majority of my tier points come from other airlines.

            My main uses for this website are finding ways to earn clubcard points (a bit thin on the ground currently); learning about hotel schemes and making the most of of other airlines (e.g. I saved myself about £20 on some KLM baggage charges last week by signing up for their seemingly useless loyalty scheme – I learned about that on this site).

        • Aeronaut says:

          Nick – if there are two passengers on the same booking, then in all likelihood you’ll be allocated seats together. (Likewise for more than two passengers, though I guess the possibility of being split up increases with size of the group.)

  • Frank says:

    Ive travelled alot on HBO fares lately without status lately, and this has never been a problem as long as both passengers were on the same pnr.

  • Don says:

    Raffles, a couple of months ago I asked you about my FB miles saying that I would drop down to Ivory and was worried my miles would expire. You said your Mrs was in the same boat, but we didn’t have to use them for another 20 months. It seems ALL my miles expired on 1st April when I went from Silver to Ivory!

    So I don’t think this advice was correct!

    Its a pity because I finally found something I would spend them on!

    • jinx99 says:

      Duff advice but just see what you can do with a polite email.

      • Don says:

        Yes I’ll try it. But not expecting much with FB. I don’t understand FB. So even if you have status your miles expire? For me it was a drop down from Plat to Gold to Silver to Ivory. I’m just surprised that as soon as you’re Ivory they expire!

      • Rob says:

        Right answer to the wrong question ….!

  • Don says:

    I found the comment: I think I was clear what FB means…maybe Raffles though it was Flying Club not Flying Blue!

    Raffles thanks for your suggestions regarding using LH miles and the fact they don’t expire for 3 years.

    My FB Silver status lapses end of March and I think this means by miles expire forthwith. I’ve got 36k to use. Any good suggestions? I’d probably bite on a 50% EU redemption in J class but the o/w J awards are a pain cos I wouldn’t be able to get back cost effectively. I know you don’t bother with FB for obvious reasons so perhaps anyone can give me some tips.

    Cheers to all.

    Head for Points says:
    23 February 2015 at 8:22 pm
    NO! I looked this up last week because my wife is in the same boat. When you lose status THE THREE YEARS STARTS FROM THE DAY YOU LOSE STATUS.

    Don says:
    24 February 2015 at 1:13 am
    Thanks Raffles. So got a good while for both my useless M&M and slightly less useless FB miles!

    • Rob says:

      That comment I made was in respect of Miles & More. Looks like I badly misread your original comment, many apologies. Luckily you don’t seem to have suffered any loss since there was no way of extending their validity and you were not planning to use them. If it turns out you could have turned them into an iTunes gift card or similar, let me know and I’ll ping you one over of equivalent value.

      • Don says:

        Kind offer Raffles. I’m gonna try and get them back. No idea of how FB treat such requests. I quite fancy doing one of the 30k promos in EU J. So just to clarify? It had been well over 20 months since I took a KL flight, so was my status keeping the miles active? Weird programme if they then expire. The T&C make it all about 20 months.

  • flood says:

    Slightly OT but i got an email today from BAEC with details of a bonus on hotel points converted into avios. SPG bonus is 10%, all the others are 25%. Not much use to me, but may be of use to some. Not sure if it’s targeted or publicly available

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

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