Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Bits: €100 status credit for an Avis rental, Qatar Airways sale extended, airberlin restructuring

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

News in brief:

Get a €100 status credit with any Avis rental

A reader sent me a link to this new Avis offer.  If you are signed up to Avis Preferred and make a booking in the current Avis sale, for collection at any point up to 6th April, you will receive a €100 Avis status credit.

If you are a regular user of hire cars, this could be an easy way to boost your Avis Preferred status to Plus (€1,000 spend needed) which comes with a free weekend rental voucher.  You don’t get the €100 to sepend as rental credit, however.

The current Avis sale runs until 31st January.

Avis bonus avios

Qatar Travel Festival extended

Just a quick note that Qatar Airways has extended the huge Qatar Travel Festival sale by 48 hours.  This means that you can still book until tonight.

The best of the availability has gone, unfortunately, but some deals remain.  The highlight was a flash sale to Tokyo last Thursday evening from Brussels or Amsterdam at €630 return in business class.

My two articles on the best deals on offer are here and here.

Remember that all flights on Qatar Airways earn Avios and British Airways Executive Club tier points.  Return flights to Asia from Europe will generate 560 tier points (140 x 4) which is 90% of a BA Silver card.

airberlin restructuring

airberlin restructuring unveiled

I have run a couple of articles about the restructuring at airberlin.  The airline is now unravelling under its huge debts, despite massive investment from Etihad, and will not survive in its present form.  There are even rumours that Lufthansa is poised to swallow the remaining long haul routes.

Phase 1 of the restructuring has now been unveiled and you can find the route-by-route details here.

What you have is:

a lot of airberlin routes being dropped

a lot of airberlin routes being transferred to its Austrian subsidiary NIKI

NIKI being injected into a three-way joint venture between Tui and Etihad

airberlin will now consist of its long-haul routes from Berlin and Dusseldorf, mainly to the USA, and feeder short-haul flights into those two cities.  It is this rump which may now be injected into Lufthansa.

If you want to take advantage of those outstanding Avios redemption opportunities on airberlin, time is getting short.  Here is Anika’s review of her £4 taxes business class flight from New York to Berlin last year.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 70,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (July 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 Card

30,000 Avios and the famous annual Companion Voucher voucher Read our full review

British Airways American Express Credit Card

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 Credit Card

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

50,000 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 points worth 0.8 Avios per £1 on the FREE standard card and 1 Avios per £1 on the Pro card. Capital on Tap cards also have no FX fees.

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 0.8 Avios per £1 Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business Card

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.

The American Express Business Platinum Card

50,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

The American Express Business Gold Card

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

Avis and Avis Preferred, oneworld alliance partners, Qatar Airways and Privilege Club

Comments (61)

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

  • Brian W says:
    18 Jan18 January 09:12

    O/T Bits: First buy on board flight on the red eye EDI – LHR this morning. Full flight and I was in row 15. Exactly 5 people bought anything in front of me (yes I actually counted). Assuming it was similar behind me that speaks volumes if you ask me. Took the two crew working from the front to the middle the whole flight to get to the middle having done 5 transactions, only two of these sales involved hot items which were eventually served from the galley half way through our decent from the holding pattern. Two other crew worked from the back to the middle and they finished first.

    All seemed like a farce if you ask me. What’s next Mr Cruz!

    • Gregor says:
      18 Jan18 January 13:14

      I flew from Gatwick to Jersey on Sunday afternoon, sitting in 6A directly behind CE. In the 20 minute window before descent the single trolley managed about half a dozen transactions and got to about row 11. Good luck to anyone hungry or thirsty at the rear of the cabin!

  • Laineyling says:
    18 Jan18 January 09:19

    Has anyone NOT had the bonus 18000 avios from the iberia plus deal post? I got the 700 straight away but have not had the 18000 and have followed up with an email. As yet no response. Just curious to know if they may still be working manually through a backlog

    • Toby says:
      18 Jan18 January 09:37

      Myself and my sister both have not got even the 700 let alone the 18,000. We both booked on avis.es as opposed to the avisiberia.es site.
      I sent a request a week or so ago and got this reply:

      Thank you for requesting your points / miles through our website.
      Your request has been accepted by Avis and your standard points / miles will be reflected
      In its next account statement after an additional validation of its loyalty program.
      Extra points / miles will be noted only if you comply with the Terms and Conditions established in the
      promotion.
       
      For more information, contact the customer service of your loyalty program.
      Thank you for renting with Avis

    • BillyBoy says:
      18 Jan18 January 14:59

      Had the 700 but not the 18000 however I returned the car on 13/12 and T&Cs say they could take up to 8 weeks to post so not going to bother sending chaser email until at least 08/02….

      • LaineyLing says:
        18 Jan18 January 15:06

        ahh I realised that we mistakenly booked a category B car which was not eligible for the promotion, so sadly no Avios for me. Very annoyed at ourselves as we didn’t need the car and only rented it for Avios! =P teaches me for next time.

  • Concerto says:
    18 Jan18 January 09:26

    Remember that, for the €100 status credit, you have to rent for at least 7 days.

    • BillyBoy says:
      18 Jan18 January 15:03

      The promo T&Cs actually say the following:

      Advertised percentage discounts are available across a wide range of
      vehicles and locations, within UK, France, Germany, Spain, Italy,
      Portugal, Belgium, Switzerland, The Netherlands & Austria the discount
      applies to any length of rental.

      For all other countries the offers applies to rentals of 3 days or longer.

  • Jake says:
    18 Jan18 January 10:00

    I have a question about silver status I wonder if someone can help.

    I’ve got 8 sectors in J with QR this year to Thailand and Japan. I don’t have any status with QR or BA and won’t do any BA sectors to qualify for status. On that basis, should I still credit the flights to BAEC or QRPC? I’m guessing BA for Avios?

    Thanks

    • Rob says:
      18 Jan18 January 10:59

      How would you top up your QR miles if you are short? Not an Amex partner etc.

      Redeeming them for a short haul BA flight would be a bad deal due to expensive short haul redemptions and full taxes (no Reward Flight Saver) so don’t go banking on that idea.

      The only good plan would be exploiting their definition of ‘Europe to Europe’ redemptions, eg is UK to Russia OK? Or UK to Turkey? A UK to Amsterdam would be ludicrously pricey compared to BA’s 9k plus £35.

      • Ro says:
        18 Jan18 January 23:28

        you can purchase QR miles if you are short or transfer from spg.
        Seem to be several benefits to QR gold/plat compared to BA silver/gold.

    • Polly says:
      18 Jan18 January 16:03

      Jake, you will do v well on baec. Surely you would get lots of tier points plus avios with all those trips. Very easy to do 2 return HBO flights to get silver, indeed sounds like you could be gold with all those TPs.you would be crazy not to do couple trips at 5 TPs per sector, have lunch, come back that evening, anywhere, jersey wherever. My friends missed out on their silver last year for that very reason, and has been so P….ed off since. Went to bronze. We are in similar sit, all QR going to baec, but doing 2 HBO returns to eu on BA. Metal to qualify and retain that card.
      We even flashed our BA silver cards in Vietnam this trip to access the VIP security lane for crew and VIPs. And nobody batted an eyelid. Couldn’t believe how cheeky we felt! But it saved an hour queue in both HCMC and HAN! Hilarious…

  • Harry says:
    18 Jan18 January 10:47

    Thanks for the AVIS piece. I went in and found myself a three day rental in Malta next month for just UKP13.81 [$17], including the Airport fee. At that rate, I really don’t care too much about a bonus I am unlikely to use. I cancelled my Hertz reservation for the same car at $36!

  • mark2 says:
    18 Jan18 January 14:42

    Another OT

    I have booked through Holiday Extras a stay and park at the Thistle Heathrow when we go away. It is very convenient for an early flight and I fancied a ride on a pod which is longer than I had imagined when I looked at the map. The only slight concern was that the reviews were not very good. I noticed that better rooms are available direct but no Amex Statement credit so I spoke to HE on webchat.
    I asked about upgrade and they said ‘you can upgrade the room to a deluxe room it would cost you an extra £12.90 – you would get a newly refurbished room, king size bed, bottled water and a Nespresso coffee machine’.
    So for £188.04 I got a deluxe room with breakfast and 20 days of parking (less 15% statement credit) which would have cost £243.20 from Thistle direct.

  • the real harry1 says:
    18 Jan18 January 15:11

    EON’s current new tariffs are incredibly uncompetitive so nobody should stay with them anyway – the last good one v19 expires about Feb 10th

  • Rob says:
    18 Jan18 January 17:26

    Unless they cancel loads of flights after you’ve booked a prepaid hotel, as happened last time I promoted a Vueling sale!

    • the real harry1 says:
      18 Jan18 January 17:38

      I’d be tempted to take my kids to Spain for a few days at half term if we had a nearer airport & they weren’t so lazy 🙂

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

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 50,000 bonus points (worth 50,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Special offer: Get 30,000 bonus Hilton Honors points until 14th August 2025

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? Get the only free credit card with points which convert to Avios

Get points worth 20,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold

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.

Got it!