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Important deal updates: Accor, British Airways ex-Dublin, Tesco conversions

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There have been a few important updates on some of the deals I have covered in the last couple of weeks.  Whilst I don’t normally do this, I thought it was worthwhile spending an article running through some updates:

Get 1,050 free Le Club AccorHotels points

Last weekend I told you how to earn 1,050 free Accor points via completing a quiz on their website.  Later in the week, I showed you how to convert these to Avios despite being below the usual 3,000 point threshold.

Accor has now pulled this promotion.  It appears that there was substantial abuse of it in China with many thousands of accounts opened and the points fraudulently used.

It looks like some innocent accounts have been caught up in this.

If you transferred your points to Iberia and your account reads: “FFP Systematic Transfer : Iberia” then you are OK.  If it says “Account Regularisation” then it appears that your points have been removed by Accor.

Book British Airways Club World flights to Hawaii for £945

On Friday I wrote about the British Airways Club World deals available out of Dublin.

One of these was a £945 return business class deal to Honolulu.  This fare has either sold out or been removed by BA.  Hawaii Club World / business class tickets are still available for €1,846 (£1,340) which is a more widely available price – excellent value for what is, in theory, not a sale fare.

The other Dublin deals are still available – see my original article for details.

Tesco Clubcard bonus points are now in – check your account

If you transferred Tesco Clubcard points to your British Airways Executive Club account last month, your 20% bonus (capped at 4,800 Avios) should now have arrived.

This whole process has been a bit farcical.  Initially it wasn’t clear who was targetted, we were then all surprised to see that the bonus did not post instantly and, finally, someone made a big mistake and gave everyone a flat bonus of 480 Avios instead.

The 480 Avios should have been removed and replaced with the correct figure.

All in all, this promotion was substantially more confusing and messy than it had any right to be.

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 12th May 2024, the Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa card is offering a bonus of 30,000 points, convertible into 30,000 Avios. You must have a Limited Company to apply. Click here to learn more and click here to apply.

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.

Category

Accor Live Limitless, British Airways and Avios, Tesco Clubcard

Comments (112)

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

  • Volker says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:13

    The T&Cs of the Tesco/BAEC Avios promotion stated that you had to have received a promo email prior to the conversion. Therefore, Mrs Volker and myself waited till the very end of the promotional period but neither of us received this ominous email. Hours before the deadline both of us converted £100 worth of Tesco CC points, and luckily we both received the bonus a couple of days ago. Hopefully there will be another conversion bonus soon as this one did not really make a difference to the amount of CC voucher money in our accounts. Nevertheless, we’d like to thank Rob – without HFP we would have missed this opportunity.

  • harry1 says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:26

    You would hope that Accorhotels would get together with IB & easily identify new/ rogue accounts either end, I guess the timeframe is short enough to catch these rogues since the points are still in transfer.

    Maybe that’s partly why Accorhotels are so u̶s̶e̶l̶e̶s̶s̶ slow 🙂

  • Jaz says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:36

    I posted this on the original article, but appreciate it may no longer be read. I’m confused about the best way of earning Avios and/or tier points for a business class fare in this sale:

    I understand from comments above that making a business class booking through AA and crediting to BA Exec will attract First class Avios and Tier points for the internal US leg (on two-tier flights.) However, how does base earning rate work – the BA site indicates that AA business class earns 125% of miles flown whereas BA is 150%. If I book an AA flight through BA do I get 150%, but if I book direct with AA I only get 125%?

    • Alan says:
      20 Dec20 December 09:45

      It doesn’t matter who you book with, the key difference is whether the flights are booked under the BA or AA flight numbers. AA flight numbers in two-class domestic aircraft will earn 210TP when >2000 miles, BA flight numbers on the same flight only earn 140TP. BA flight numbers earn slightly more than BA. There’s no TP difference for the transatlantic flights, so you can put them under BA for slightly more Avios, but then use AA flight numbers for the internal US flights. BA are perfectly able to book under AA flight numbers if you do it over the phone (the BA website won’t do it and is pretty-useless for anything other than simple itineraries, the AA multi-city tool is a bit better).

  • Luke says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:53

    TESCO –
    Yes, my 20% bonus has arrived now.

    ACCOR –
    When I log in, I’ve still got my 1,100 points, but I get: “Your Le Club Accorhotels card is blocked: please contact your Customer Service via the “Contact us” section below the main menu.”

    I don’t know if this is to do with the Iberia transfer or not.

  • tall trader says:
    20 Dec20 December 09:56

    Likewise. Tesco is a complete joke

  • Jim says:
    20 Dec20 December 10:21

    I see headforpoints is being accused of being one of the reasons the Hawaii offer was pulled

    http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/25887853-post1295.html

  • mark2 says:
    20 Dec20 December 10:27

    I agree that Tesco IT leaves a lot to be desired, but it sometimes fails in our favour.
    I have used many, many ‘save £13/9 when you spend £90’ vouchers to buy gift cards because Tesco IT does not correctly implement the T&C. This means that since the demise of 3V/pay.com I have been able to buy lots of paid Visa cards and use the vouchers to pay the charges, the last time yesterday so I am still getting the extra points from the cake magazines. Since I buy little other goods from Tesco this costs me nothing. In the past I have used them to buy 3V and B&Q, garden centre etc. cards and have gained several hundred pounds and thousands of points. Wasn’t the ClubCard processing was knocked together by a couple in their spare time and then sold to Tesco?
    Another glitch that is to our advantage allows me to get 1000 Virgin miles each quarter by switching to auto convert and then back. BAEC bonus and Virgin miles just received.

    • Shelagh2002 says:
      20 Dec20 December 15:26

      Hi Mark2, can you please explain ‘Another glitch that is to our advantage allows me to get 1000 Virgin miles each quarter by switching to auto convert and then back. BAEC bonus and Virgin miles just received.’ Is this the world’s best kept secret or am I too new to this game.

      • Liz says:
        20 Dec20 December 18:30

        You are only supposed to get the 1000 bonus virgin miles for auto converting to virgin once but I have received it 3 times in the past but not this time – you have to remember to switch your Tesco points back to vouchers after the relevant date and before the next Tesco vouchers post.

      • Rob says:
        20 Dec20 December 18:30

        Virgin offers 1k occasionally for activating Tesco auto-convert – appears this is repeatable ….

  • Jon Dear says:
    20 Dec20 December 10:31

    RE: Accor. my account shows “We have not observed any activity on your account in the past twelve months” despite playing the 1100point game and my points history is showing “Account Regularization 0 -1100” this happened at the exact time I did the IB transfer. strange.

    • BeThatGuy says:
      20 Dec20 December 11:05

      I got the same silly message despite my account showing entries for 2 seperate stays in Accor properties since September !!!

      They really are f****ing useless :O

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