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Avis offering £20 one-way UK car rentals over Christmas

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If you are travelling to or from a UK airport over the festive season, this could work for you.

Avis is offering one-way car rentals between 29th December and 3rd January for £20.

You can book here.

Avis offering one-way UK car rentals over Christmas

This is valid from Gatwick, Heathrow Terminals 2-4, Heathrow Terminal 5 (separate pick-up area), Luton and Stansted.  It is not valid for trips to the airport.

This could be your cheapest route home after your flight.  It isn’t clear if you would earn Avios or other miles as well but there is no harm adding your number to your booking.

I did a dummy booking from Heathrow T5 to Avis Battersea for 3rd January and it priced at £20 for Ford Fiesta (Group B) and £25 for a Group C to E.  You can’t argue at that price.

How to get FREE car rental status and other benefits via UK credit cards

How to get FREE car rental status and other benefits via UK credit cards (April 2024)

If you hire a car in the UK, you can get special benefits (discounts, upgrades, free additional drivers etc) if you have elite status with a car rental programme. You can get elite status for free via certain American Express cards.

The Platinum Card and American Express Business Platinum

The Platinum Card from American Express and American Express Business Platinum come with two free car hire status cards. Your supplementary Platinum cardholder can also receive status in their own right.

From Avis, you receive President’s Club status in Avis Preferred. This gets you up to 25% off standard rates, a free additional driver and a guaranteed one class upgrade. For weekend rentals you will receive a two class upgrade, subject to availability.

From Hertz, you receive ‘Five Star’ status in Hertz Gold Plus Rewards. This gets you up to 15% off standard rates, a free additional driver and a one class upgrade, subject to availability.

Hertz also offers Platinum cardholders a 4 hour grace period on rentals. Your final day is treated as 28 hours, so a 1pm pick up with a 5pm return the following day is only charged as one day, not two days. We wrote about the Hertz / Platinum 4 hour grace period here.

The Platinum Card also comes with full car hire insurance with no obligation to pay for the rental via American Express. You can refuse any attempts to sell you additional insurance at pick up. This benefit has substantial value if you rent on a regular basis.

You can find more details on the two Platinum cards, and apply, in our full reviews linked below. You can apply here for the personal card and here for the business card.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is an excellent card in its own right. You receive 20,000 Membership Rewards points for signing up (convert to 20,000 Avios amongst other things), four airport lounge passes and £120 of Deliveroo credit. Even better, your first year is free.

There are two car rental benefits:

  • you receive Preferred Plus status in Avis Preferred
  • you receive a special package with Hertz – 10% off best available rates at participating locations, a one class upgrade for rentals of 5 days or more, subject to availability, and no additional driver fees

Find out more about the benefits of American Express Preferred Rewards Gold in our review. You can apply here.

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

Category

Avis and Avis Preferred

Comments (77)

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

  • Mike says:
    24 Dec24 December 18:50

    Just to say if you really can be bothered with the arbitrage (and I haven’t read the small print about multiple bookings in one day)

    And you’re outer west London based

    And you have any form of travelcard / bus card on your oystercard

    You could book

    Avis T1234 (Bath Road, Near Harlington Corner) to Avis Yeading (tesco extra) – 5 miles – 10 minutes

    And get the 140 bus back many times, and shift their whole fleet from the Bath road to Yeading.

  • James says:
    25 Dec25 December 08:03

    Thanks for flagging Avis promotion. Managed to book a car from Heathrow on 1st January, returning to a central London location 2 days later for only £4.

  • Paul says:
    26 Dec26 December 14:42

    OT:
    I have been holding off signing up for the IHG Premium card, thinking if I sign up right at the end of the month (when the bonus points offer ends) there is a chance I might get status for two years.
    However, I was looking over the terms of the offer and have spotted this:
    “Bonus points will be credited if a spend is made on the card within 90 days of the account being opened. Application and first spend must take place before 31st December 2015 .”

    This suggests I have missed the boat on that offer now – there is not much chance of me receiving the card before the end of the month.

    Does anyone remember from previous offers if they got the full bonus when spending on the card after the offer ended?

    • Rob says:
      26 Dec26 December 18:02

      Someone else mentioned this to me during the week. It is, I agree, a crazy clause – if you’ve got 90 days to make the spend, why have this exclusion?

      As I’ve never seen a rule like this before (and IHG has only done an extra bonus once since the card relaunched) we have no track record to go on. Based on the wording it seems too risky to try now.

  • Jtz says:
    29 Dec29 December 13:49

    Hi, I managed to get the 3000 points from Heathrow rewards by scanning receipts. Is it better to double up with avios or ba?
    Thanks in advance

    • Rob says:
      29 Dec29 December 16:38

      Makes no difference as you can move points from Avios.com to BA (and back again) for free, unlimited times, using the ‘Combine My Avios’ function on either of their sites.

  • Chris says:
    29 Dec29 December 21:41

    Thanks Rob. Submitted my status match to SPG Gold. Received an email today from HHonors congratulating me on being matched to HH Gold – expires March 31, 2017.

    I’ve been HH Gold on and off over the years ( generally earned through an X stays fast track and do genuinely value its benefits.

    Thanks once again for the tip! Great site as always 🙂

  • Oz says:
    29 Dec29 December 22:59

    Thanks, my Club Carlson Concierge successfully matched to Diamond. That’s perfect timing for me as my Hilton Gold was due to expire at the end of Feb!

  • Marc says:
    30 Dec30 December 16:48

    Submitted Hilton status match requests on the website two days ago both of which have been successful.

    I had a punt as an existing Gold for a match to Diamond from Best Western Diamond (itself a status match from IHG Plat some time ago) fully expecting it to be declined but my account has just been upgraded,

    OH has matched a new account from Accor Plat (from Amex Plat) and has also been upgraded to Diamond – Hilton Visa also on the way

  • ElectroDuende says:
    5 Jan5 January 12:49

    I submitted my Meliá Rewards Gold status about two weeks ago… and no news for the moment.
    Don’t know if Meliá is known enoguh in USA to be had in account…

    Also, my Hilton account doesn’t show any activity in the last year… would this also have something to do?

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

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