Bits: BA quietly changes Sharm tier points, good Turkish Airlines Istanbul business class deal

News in brief:

British Airways cuts Sharm el Sheikh tier points

A HfP reader contacted me yesterday to complain about British Airways cutting the tier points on flights to Sharm in Egypt.

A quick check confirmed that this is true.  When BA restarted the route from Gatwick, it offered 140 tier points each way.  This was presumably done to match the tier points offered to Cairo.

Sharm, however, is being flown with a short-haul aircraft and is sold as EuroTraveller / Club Europe rather than World Traveller / Club World.  Someone at BA has now decided that it should offer the standard 80 tier points each way awarded on similar routes.

Whether this is right or wrong is not the issue – although Sharm should now be put into Reward Flight Saver if the route is now short haul, surely?

The issue is that a number of people have booked return trips to Sharm purely to pick up 280 tier points in Club Europe.  Having this reduced to 160 tier points is a blow.

I would hope that British Airways will do the right thing here and award the tier points offered at the time the flight was booked.

£263 business class flights to Istanbul on Turkish Airlines

Turkish Airlines is offering some excellent business class deals to Istanbul at the moment.  For £263 return, you can fly from Gatwick to Istanbul in Business.  As long as you take the flight to the main Ataturk airport, and not SAW, this gets you the impressive A320 business class.

Pay a little more (£312) and you can fly from Heathrow.  Pick your departures correctly and you can book this offer onto the 1-2 Boeing 777-300 services flown to and from London each day.

Turkish has a very well reviewed lounge complex in Istanbul, although I have never visited myself.

Turkish is a member of Star Alliance so you would not be earning any Avios from this flight.  Your outbound travel date must be between 2 November – 17 December, 4th January – 10th February or 23 February – 28 March.  During the booking process you are told that your ticket is ‘Business / Flexible / J’ but this is not true, unsurprisingly – there are no refunds for cancellation as the detailed fare rules show.

You must book at the Turkish Airlines website before 25th October.

---

How to earn Star Alliance miles from UK credit cards (September 2024)

None of the Star Alliance airlines currently have a UK credit card.

There is, however, still a way to earn Star Alliance miles from a UK credit card. 

The route is via Marriott Bonvoy. Marriott Bonvoy hotel loyalty points convert to over 40 airlines at the rate of 3:1.

The best way to earn Marriott Bonvoy points is via the official Marriott Bonvoy American Express card. It comes with 20,000 points for signing up and 2 points for every £1 you spend. At 2 Bonvoy points per £1, you are earning (at 3:1) 0.66 airline miles per £1 spent on the card.

There is a preferential conversion rate to United Airlines – which is a Star Alliance member – of 2 : 1 if you convert 60,000 Bonvoy points at once.

The Star Alliance members which are Marriott Bonvoy transfer partners are: Aegean, Air Canada, Air China, Air New Zealand, ANA, Asiana Airlines, Avianca, Copa Airlines, Singapore Airlines, TAP Air Portugal, Thai Airways, Turkish Airlines and United Airlines.

You can apply here.