Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Amazing Qatar Airways £750+ business class flights to Middle East, Asia, Maldives, Australia

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

Qatar Airways is back with some more great business class fares out of Europe (and Scotland).

These deals represent exceptional value for business class travel, especially as Qatar Airways has an excellent reputation for the quality of its seats, food and service.

£775 to the Middle East is certainly good although admittedly diverting via Europe is hassle for a short route.  The upside is that, as your Doha to  Dubai / Abu Dhabi / Bahrain connection books into First, you should be able to access the new Qatar First Class lounge on the outbound.

Qatar 787 350 business class

£860 to Bangkok or Singapore is fantastic value, as is £816 to the Maldives over peak season.  £1,500 to Australia is laughably good value. 

Remember that Qatar Airways flights earn Avios and British Airways tier points if you add your BA Executive Club number.  Most of the Asian routes below will generate 560 tier points return (140 x 4).  The Middle Eastern routes, assuming you connect to Dubai or Abu Dhabi, would earn (140 + 60 x 2) 400 tier points return as the ‘domestic’ sectors book into First Class.

As with recent sales, Qatar is discounting heavily from selected cities in Europe.

The best deals appear to be out of Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Oslo and Stockholm at the moment.   This is not surprising – Qatar has to fill TWO Boeing 787 aircraft from Copenhagen almost every day in Business Class.  Scandinavian cities are competing against the cheap long-haul pricing offered by Norwegian.no.  Amsterdam is also a small country with big planes to fill.

If you have a particular route in mind, you should also try out other starting points.  Brussels has had some good deals in the past, for example.

Here are the fare rules for the current offers:

Book by November 6th

Travel between January 15th and June 30th 2016

Minimum stay 7 days, maximum stay 1 month

Here are some sample prices – remember that these tickets start in Amsterdam (full list here):

Bangkok – €1,310 (£935)

Ho Chi Minh City – €1,875 (£1,339)

Hong Kong – €1,680 (£1,200)

Kuala Lumpur – €1,865 (£1,335)

Perth – €2,390 (£1,707)

Phuket – €1,490 (£1,064)

Singapore – €2,155 (£1,539)

Tokyo – €1,875 (£1,339)

Here are some prices from Copenhagen taken from this list:

Abu Dhabi – DKK 9,995 (£957)

Bahrain – DKK 8,745  (£837)

Bangkok – DKK 10,445 (£1,000)

Colombo – DKK 14,045  (£1,345)

Delhi – DKK 8,845 (£847)

Dubai – DKK 8,095 (£775)

Hong Kong – DKK 11,145  (£1,067)

Kuala Lumpur – DKK 14,045 (£1,345)

Maldives – DKK 14,045 (£1,345)

Melbourne – DKK 16,545 (£1,584)

Perth – DKK 16,495 (£1,579)

Phuket – DKK 12,145 (£1,163)

Singapore – DKK 11,845 (£1,134)

Here are some prices from Stockholm taken from this list:

Bangkok – SEK 11,295 (£858)

Delhi – SEK 12,295 (£934)

Dubai – SEK 10,695 (£812)

Hong Kong – SEK 10,395 (£790)

Kuala Lumpur – SEK 16,395 (£1,246)

Melbourne – SEK 20,445 (£1,553)

Perth – SEK 20,395 (£1,550)

Phuket – SEK 12,745 (£968)

Singapore – SEK 12,195 (£926)

Tokyo – SEK 16,795  (£1,276)

Here are some prices from Oslo taken from this list:

Abu Dhabi – NOK 12,645 (£965)

Bangkok – NOK 11,945 (£912)

Delhi – NOK 9,845 (£751)

Dubai – NOK 10,795 (£824)

Kuala Lumpur – NOK 14,845 (£1,133)

Maldives – NOK 10,695 (£816)

Melbourne – NOK 19,795  (£1,511)

Perth – NOK 19,795 (£1,511)

Singapore – NOK 11,345 (£866)

Qatar Airways A350 Doha

Finally, there are a couple of deals from Edinburgh.  Dubai is £1,150 if you fly to the new airport or £1,250 to the main airport.  Other routes are around £1,800+.  Weirdly, Manchester to Dubai is £1,860 so you save £610 by heading to Edinburgh first!

When booking with Qatar Airways, it is important to NOT just look at the headline price. It is also important to get the right aircraft. You want to be booking onto a Boeing 787 featuring the latest impressive 1-2-1 business class seating which I reviewed here. The A380 and A350 aircraft have the same seating.

The Boeing 777 seating I reviewed here is fully lie flat but is in a more traditional configuration.  The A330 aircraft have recently been converted into flat seats although I am not sure that they are like.  The final A340 aircraft are due to be fully flat by February according to the comments below.

The good news is that Copenhagen, Oslo, Amsterdam and Stockholm are usually operated by Boeing 787 aircraft so you should get the newest business class product.

Apart from Oslo, which is further and uglier (!), all of these departure points are easy to reach from the UK and a pleasant place to stay for the night if a stopover is required.  I would have a serious look at these deals for your long-haul travel plans over the next six months.  Have a play around at qatarairways.com and see what you can find.

You should also do the maths and consider whether it is worth cancelling any Avios redemptions in order to rebook on a Qatar cash ticket.

The list of Copenhagen deals is here, the list of Stockholm deals is here, the Amsterdam deals are here and the Oslo deals are here.  Other destinations apart from those listed may well be available at sale prices if you search.


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 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

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

25,000 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 – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a 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

Huge 30,000 points bonus until 12th May 2024 Read our full review

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.

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

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

40,000 points sign-up bonus 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 (165)

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

  • pointsarb says:

    Ps. sorry did not know it was already on your feed.

    • Rob says:

      Not a problem. I know exactly how many spaces are available and if 100 HFP readers had jumped in chaos would have ensued! Hence Twitter and only Twitter.

  • andijs2000 says:

    So it took a little bit of planning, but have secured an Avios flight to Stockholm (ARN) (return) and an ARN-DOH-HKG with return a week later in April 2016.
    Needed an overnight in DOH on the return which has cost about £130 in the airport hotel but all brought in for under £1000 and all the extra Tier points for BA Exec so well on the way to Gold again.
    Usually do a business trip to HKG and China each spring, so looks like I’ve bagged a good deal on this.
    Thankyou Head For Points.

  • Ross Down says:

    OT – 12,000 Avios is back with digital Economist sign up. Link below:

    https://subscriptions.economist.com/GLB/partners/IberiaPlus/trpl/

    • Ross Down says:

      Sorry, 9000 Digital, 12000 Digital and print.

    • James67 says:

      Thanks, I missed out big time last year by procrastinating one day too long. I see they have not repeated the sam mistake again, however, I note that there is a 14 day cooling off period for EU residents. They wouldn’t be so stupid to post the points within 14 days, would they?

      • CV3V says:

        they added some new small print which requires you to keep the subscription for 12 months to get the avios payout. Question is when do they issue the avios?

        • Paul says:

          Takes several months now for the Avios to pay out. Also, cancelling proves a real bugger. Still a good deal though if you read the magazine anyway.

      • harry says:

        In order to qualify for the Avios in this offer, you must maintain your subscription for at least one year.

        £155

        • Polly says:

          There are some cheaper locations too, just pick a hotel in that country, and have the sub sent there! Hilarious. Think we chose Hanoi or somewhere equally mad. Just look for the cheapest country.

          • harry says:

            And you can normally redirect to a new address. I guess in a possible worst case scenario you could find a (say) £120 sub and get it redirected, pay for a year & get Avios @ 1p

          • harry says:

            ie read Economist as well, which is a good read

          • Lady London says:

            That sounds a great idea Polly. I might give thought to having a subsscription delivered to a school in a developing country.

          • Polly says:

            That’s another great idea to send it to a school. Might look for one in HKT, or the local hospital. Must check the cheapest country again, as we could do with another 12k on my daughters account, which we were too late to apply for, by one day!

  • Jack Flyer says:

    Amazing deals. I got the BRU-DXB and the ARN-HKG earlier in the year and now they’re back – £700 and £780 respectively. The airline is amazing. I cannot recommend enough. BRU departure even better as a nice Eurostar trip gets you there easily. Food fab, booze plentiful (not so much in the lounge though) and seats great. Staff very good but a bit disjointed. These really are the best deals going. The one I did miss is the £1350 ARN-MEL, but it will be back… Enjoy (and don’t forgot you’re practically BA Silver with one of these deals (after the 4 BA short hops you need).

    • jen says:

      When was £1350 arn-Mel? I don’t think I have seen Australia flights this cheap other than ba error. I may have to go to oz in the new year but don’t really want to commit yet, except I assumed this is as good as it gets?

  • Londonbus says:

    So let me get this right:
    BA rev ticket to say Copenhagen.
    then QR CPH – DOH – BKK/BKK – DOH – CPH
    BA rev ticket back.

    Then all you need is two more BA flights and you have silver?

    • VP says:

      Not really. CPH-DOH-BKK will give you 560 tier points. Since the last devaluation the cheap fares give 5 tier points. So if you take 4 of those you get 580 points and are still 20 short for Silver. However, if you have any Business class flight or higher priced flights giving 10 tier points then you are good.. Do check the class and tier points on the BA calculator

      • VP says:

        obviously that was CPH-DOH-BKK return and the 4 flights in question are BA short haul revenue flights where cheapest fares earn you only 5 tier points

      • Polly says:

        No, you can buy the next class up which gives you 10TPs per sector, which I am doing for our DUB flights. Last sectors this week out and back next week, then silver. Thrilled to bits. Repeat every two years! So retain silver…can’t wait …

      • James67 says:

        From BKK one can take a ‘jolly’ to Hanoi on QR J to get extra TPs required. Other inexpensive options would include MAS to KUL or Sri Lankan to HK or Guangzhou.

    • Polly says:

      James were you on BA or MAS ? We love the BA F to HKG as a jump,off too, sleep most of the way. It is an amazing experience. Know you don’t like the Doha layover but it was good for us to try it on our last trip. Not at all a bad option if people are looking ex EU .

      • Jason says:

        I’d stay at the airport hotel on the 8hr package and catch the connecting flight in the morning. They have 2 4ft beds in the twin rooms and you can see the Qatar lounge from your room( well we could from our room 🙂 )

        • James67 says:

          That means they could probably see you from the lounge too!
          Did your Maldives dilemna resolve itself yet? Don’t worry about rain, highly unlikely to be persistent at begining and end of thie season and may not see any at all. Besides, IMO rain in tropics and subtropics is fun, not like here, much heavier and dramatic and at times the power of it is quite spellbinding. Everything, including yourself, dries out very quickly too.Even if you cannot take advantage of this sale, remember you were happy with your originl plans or you wouldn’t have ade them so don’t let it spoil your trip.

          • Polly says:

            Tropical rain??? Love it. There’s something spectacular about their downpours. All over very quickly, and the forests seem revived instantly. Short showers usually, but worth it.as it’s mostly dry rest of the day. Think we had a couple of bad showers recently in HKT . But worse was the effect of the Indonesian fires. Oh developed v b cough from the effects. We did go,to,PHI PHI island on a local boat which didn’t help either… So mostly any time of the year ok to travel.

      • James67 says:

        I have done both: loved MAS (apparently now MAB, whatever that stands for) a380 but it’s too expensive post devaluation. Currently my trips are BA, booked WTP to Glasgow in sale last winter and UUA both directions for £904 all in rtn. Slept over 9 hours so cannot complain. I loved DOH as a transit airport, the problem is that if you go from the regions it is often a middle of the night transit which I guess can probably be avoided on some LHR schedules. Will only consider exEU when I can make a short break out of it or I have run out of avios and AA miles.

  • Mud Island Mlungu says:

    Picked up 2 tickets Odlo to Maldives for £813 each…. Sweet…

  • James67 says:

    OT: AA reducing earnings on BA. Interesting that they did not wait until they devalue their own scheme. Hopefully changes to AAdvantage are not so imminent as many believe.

  • Rob says:

    FYI, today has seen the biggest divergence ever between HFP articles published on the same day. This articles has been read 9x more than the one on the Emirates Elite credit cards!

    • James67 says:

      Surprising it surpassed one of the 3V articles, exciting as the sale may be. How about number of first time visitors?

      • Polly says:

        QR sales = 3V activity! Now sadly we only got QR sales to focus on, long may they last.
        Bit worrying about this AA deval. Didn’t get anything from my a advantage account, announcing this change. We were banking on upping our AA accounts from our BA J flights. Once we get silver that is, we don’t need the avios or TPs .

      • Rob says:

        I was talking purely in terms of the ratio, not total numbers.

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

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.