Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

More Avios-earning Qatar deals inc Tokyo £1031, Jo’burg £932, Seoul £1083, Delhi £875

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We ran a long article on Monday covering some of the great business class deals offered by Qatar Airways during their current sale.  Remember that these flights all earn Avios and BA tier points.

Some of the best deals involved flying from Stockholm.  Good fares included:

Stockholm to Cape Town – £1,173

Stockholm to Dubai – £763

Qatar A350

Stockholm to Hong Kong – £965

Stockholm to Melbourne – £1,835

Stockholm to Tokyo – £1,193

Stockholm to Auckland – £1,440

A few other good options have come to light since then.  This page of the Qatar website shows the good deals available from Italy.

I was particularly interested in:

Pisa to Delhi – €1,009 (£875)

Pisa to Kuala Lumpur – €1,465 (£1,270)

Pisa to Maldives – €1,480 (£1,283)

Pisa to Seoul – €1,249 (£1,083)

Pisa to Shanghai – €1,259 (£1,091)

Pisa to Tokyo – €1,432 (£1,241) (drops to €1,190 / £1,031 when two travel)

Venice to Bangkok – €1,185 (£1,027)

These prices are based on one person travelling.  A couple will pay less due to the discount offered for two tickets.  You may also get an extra discount by using promo code VISA during the booking process.

You are obviously building in quite a diversion to travel to Asia via Venice or Pisa, but if you are relatively time rich and cash poor, have a sense of adventure or are simpy desperate for a British Airways Silver card at very low cost, these deals are for you.

Or try Cairo …..

If you are REALLY adventurous there are also some jaw-dropping prices out of Cairo although people are finding them difficult to price up.  I found business class flights to Johannesburg for under £700 which did price.  Melbourne comes up very easily at E£29,000 which is £1,275.

Whatever your view on the security situation in Cairo, it is unlikely to trouble you.  There is a brand new terminal now open and, attached to it, a brand new Le Meridien hotel.  Even if you need to stay overnight you do not need to leave the airport, although personally I think it would be a huge shame not to visit the Pyramids and the Egyptian Museum.

Flights to Cairo for cash are not cheap so it would make more sense to pair it with an Avios redemption.

The Egyptian deals in the Qatar Airways sale are listed here.  There are 22 Egyptian Pounds to £1.

Or try Sofia …..

Bulgaria is another option for business class deals if you want to try something new.  How about:

Sofia to Bangkok – €990 (£858)

Sofia to Zanzibar – €1,030 (£893)

Sofia to Johannesburg – €1,075 (£932)

Sofia to Beijing – €1,065 (£923)

Sofia to Singapore – €1,115 (£966)

Some of the above are based on two people travelling.  The flight from Sofia is on a short-haul A320 but should have a ‘proper’ business class seat like this:

Qatar A320 business class

In summary ….

Read my sale article from Monday (click here) to see my thoughts on the different Qatar Airways aircraft and their business class seating.

All of these deals end on 16th January.  You must travel by mid December and blackout dates apply as detailed in Monday’s article.


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 (102)

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

  • Matt says:

    O/T – anyone had an upgrade offer from Amex Gold to Platinum recently? I had read something about 15,000 MR points with a £1,000 spend, but according to two agents (on the phone and via secure message) no such offer exists…

    • Lev441 says:

      I got it back in the end of October….

    • Jonny says:

      Officially its nothing now.
      but if you email them you may get offered something – i got offered nothing but my wife got offered 10k.

  • Jon says:

    Just snagged AMS-HND on QR in July for £550/ea for two in business! 77W AMS-DOH and A350 DOH-HND. Searched on Google flights and it’s showing on up sporadic days in April – July. Could only get the July dates to book on the QR site (took me straight to checkout)

    • Mike says:

      I’m showing the same on Google flights but when going to qatar the return flight won’t price up at that 🙁

  • Tp says:

    I got the same fare in October also… All confirmed in R class for £560

    BRU-HND also available at £540 return in R however connection times at DOH not as good as via AMS.

    Best deal of the current sale – Book fast before they go!!!!!!!

    • Russtt says:

      That’s me booked for September at £550 as well from AMS to HND. Thanks Jon for sharing

      • the real harry1 says:

        Haneda? Blimmin cheap

      • s879 says:

        That’s an amazing deal but HND too far for us with kids. If there are any other deals similar to this price to other destinations please do share here as only a few days left.

  • Yan says:

    It’s a flash sale that lasted for a few hours…great whilst it lasted. Booked AMS-DOH-HND, NRT-DOH-BRU in July for 600 euros

    Highlight of an otherwise underwhelming ‘travel festival’!

    • Joe says:

      I trust you mean in J

      Well done to all that did!

      I literally saw and watched as all the circa €600 J promo fares literally disappeared in front of my eyes at around 4am – no joke! – c’est la vie!

      They must have pulled them as errors, there were so many and next they simply all disappeared- no way were they live bookings

      Promo fares all remain but much much higher than above

      • Jake says:

        I honestly thought that my booking would be cancelled once Qatar realised their “mistake” but it’s still live and me, my other half and brother are flying to Japan in business class for less than £1700! Think I’m still in shock!

        • Will says:

          Wow – this is insane! I’ve just picked up that Rob was reporting that in his article. Alas, went to the website and the fares are more normal. You’d struggle to get a Y fare for that ;))
          That sort of price i’d be tempted to take the Missus on an extended weekend food trip.
          Well done you.

  • K78 says:

    My apologies for my ignorance but am I missing something? I can’t seem to get any of the above prices from any of the European airports in any months *frustrated*. Is there a special link or page I am not seeing? Everytime I see an announcement on HFP about great deals, I never seem to be able to get anything close to what’s on here. So much so that I simply stop bothering to try. But I thought I would give the Qatar offers a try but it’s still the same??!!

    • Bob says:

      These fares can change awfully fast. Last monday morning when the sale started I made the mistake not to book AMS-BKK immediately for 1100-ish euros. Late afternoon it was already 1400 for my desired period of travel, which is still a great fare (booked it) but it shows how fast it can change

  • Mart says:

    Fingers crossed for any other offers.
    Japan not for us ,especially in winter.
    Summer holidays already booked.

  • Jordie says:

    booked AMS – DOH – NRT in November for £550. Great fare

    • Bob says:

      In Business Class? I received an e-mail from Qatar Airways regarding their sale and Amsterdam to Tokyo (NRT & HND) was shown as 1699 euro’s… when travelling with 3 or more..

      • Rob says:

        It was €630 on Thu night as a flash deal, I put it on our Twitter and Facebook feeds. Astounding deal.

        • Mike says:

          I managed to find one for May, perfect time of year. Had a very happy mother! Thank you Rob 🙂

  • Rimas says:

    After I booked AMS-DOH-NRT Return last night for October Half Term, I received an email from Qatar Airways Support asking for copy of my passport and CC bank statement. Sent all the info – will see how it goes.. 1,240 euros for 2. Bargain

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

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