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See the ‘Pay with Avios’ for food and drink prices

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As a follow up to my main story below on charging for food and drink on board, BA has now sent me some sample ‘pay with Avios’ prices:

Mature cheddar cheese ploughman’s – £3 or 375 Avios

Lightly salted hand cooked crisps – £1 or 125 Avios

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Water – £1.80 or 225 Avios

Tea or coffee – £2.30 or 300 Avios

G&T (Anika, please note 🙂 ) – £6 or 750 Avios

Wine – £4.50 or 575 Avios

It could have been less generous, I suppose. At around 0.8p per point there are worse ways to spend your points (but obviously far better ways too).

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How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2025)

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

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

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, and the standard card is FREE. Capital on Tap cards also have no FX fees.

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 1 Avios per £1 Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

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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.

Category

British Airways and Avios

Comments (74)

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

  • Barry cutters says:
    29 Sep29 September 17:27

    I love percy pigs

    • Rob says:
      29 Sep29 September 18:39

      Colin The Caterpillar. What I miss most about banking is that when someone had a birthday (one every 10 days) they would head down to the More London M&S and buy a couple of Colin The Caterpillars.

  • Kian says:
    29 Sep29 September 17:37

    Just called them regarding on a few economy short haul flights I booked in advance for next year. The assistant offered 1,000 Avios per passenger per booking. I am not able to cancel them and book with other airlines since the flight prices on other airlines are roughly the same as what I paid or even more expensive now.

  • Scott Rice says:
    29 Sep29 September 17:52

    It’s a disgrace – they are penny pinching everywhere now – pay for luggage (even if gold); pay for seats; pay for food and now for a bottle of water.

    I like using avios on short hall breaks etc.

    The lounge is going to be full of people ‘panic stocking’ for the flight.

    Soon scratch cards !?!?

  • Will says:
    29 Sep29 September 20:23

    If they take it a step further maybe it could be a good thing.
    1. Widen the food selection
    2. Allow you to pre order and pay in advance
    3. They simply bring you your order to your seat with no faffing about.

    They need to genuinely make the quality something worth charging for and get around the stress in the cabin of payments.

    I also think they should offer free drinks,

  • Clive says:
    29 Sep29 September 22:15

    Will the next step be restricted lounge access like in the US?

  • Jim says:
    29 Sep29 September 23:07

    I actually think BoB will make my weekly shuttle runs more entertaining. Filling an empty coke bottle with 2 cans of the Cornish beer in the GF lounge. Lift one of the loo rolls too. Hell why not hey? If BA are going to be petty I will be too. EU261 when applicable ? I’ll claim instead of taking the view that flying is public transport and I won’t always arrive on time. Treat me like a thick piece of meat and I’ll behave like a cow. Moo moo.

  • Peter K says:
    29 Sep29 September 23:23

    I may be in the minority here but this is actually a BIG improvement for me. Before this I had basically no food anyway as no real free alternative for my wife and I was available. This made BA basically a non-option. Now I have a reason to utilise Avios short haul especially as i can buy food with Avios as well. RFD is actually back on the menu for us now, no pun intended.

    • Peter K says:
      29 Sep29 September 23:24

      * previously no gluten free option

    • Barry cutters says:
      30 Sep30 September 00:27

      I’m not gluten free but agree with you. Before you were given a biscuit or a mini pack of Crisps. Now I will have the option to buy something more substantial. I think this is an improvement . And paying for drinks . It’s not the end of the world , how many drinks do you really want on a 2h flight, I guess it’s different if you are going on holiday as a family of 4/5 , but 90-% of my Europe flying is for work, so I’m entitled to claim food/drinks anyway. this was bound to happen. How could they possibly afford to keep up against easy jet/Ryanair if they have to provide unlimited free drinks -never mind the lost sales revenue

      • Will says:
        30 Sep30 September 09:15

        How they compete is simple, they’ve got a monopoly on LHR, their prices are higher than LCC’s and they still get full planes plus they have things like lucrative contracts with Royal Mail to put European mail in the cargo bay (that’s why there are about a million flights a day to Düsseldorf afaik).

        If the prices come down then great. If they remain expensive and there’s buy on board, hmmm.

        You actually get more leg room on Ryanair!

  • Nick_C says:
    29 Sep29 September 23:56

    Surely people will simply buy their food at the airport and take it on board? Good news for airport shops.

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

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