Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Earn bonus Heathrow Rewards points on fashion purchases

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

News in brief:

British Airways drops Bremen flights

SUN-AIR of Scandinavia, a British Airways franchise partner, has announced that it is dropping its BA-branded flights from London City to Bremen and Manchester to Bremen from 25th February.

In a cynical but economically sensible move, SUN-AIR / BA has managed to avoid paying €250 in EU compensation to every passenger.  Cancellations made 14+ days in advance do not qualify for compensation, and this move was made exactly 14 days in advance.

Customers impacted can rebook to Hamburg or Hannover.  Manchester passengers will find this especially galling as they must now fly Manchester – London – Hamburg / Hannover – train to Bremen which will add at least four hours to their travel time.

Refunds are also available but cheap replacement flights will be difficult to find at short notice.

New Heathrow Rewards fashion promotion launched

Heathrow Rewards is offering bonus points on fashion purchases at the airport between now and 14th April.

This applies to purchases at Accessorize, Bottega Veneta, Bulgari, Burberry, Chanel, Dior, Gucci, Harrods, Hermes, Hugo Boss, Jack Wills, John Lewis, Kurt Geiger, Lacoste, Michael Kors, Mulberry, Paul Smith, Prada, Reiss, Smythson, Sunglass Hut, Thomas Pink, Ted Baker, Valentino and Zara.   It specifically excludes Harrods Signature stores and Louis Vuitton.

The bonus is awarded as follows:

500 points when you spend £125 – £199.99
1,000 points when you spend £200 – £299.99
1,500 points when you spend £300 – £399.99
2,000 points when you spend £400 or more

Registration is not required.

This offer should double up with the ‘3,000 points for joining and spending £150 in one day’ promotion AND the current ‘50% bonus when you convert your points to Avios’ offer.  The standard conversion rate to Avios is 1:1.  You can also convert to Virgin, Lufthansa, Emirates and Etihad.

Aer Lingus new business class

Aer Lingus boosts Newquay – and promises Las Vegas

Aer Lingus, BA’s sister airline, is expanding its service from Newquay to Dublin to seven flights per week for Summer 2017.  This will allow passengers to connect more easily to North American long-haul services.

Whilst this can be booked on Avios, the high taxes quoted via avios.com (£98.10, plus 8000 to 9000 Avios depending on date) may make a cash booking on aerlingus.com more attractive.

The Aer Lingus CEO, Stephen Kavanagh, has also announced plans to fly from Dublin to Las Vegas.  No start date has been announced and the airline has not decided whether to run it as a Winter-only route or year-round.

This would be a welcome Avios redemption, offering very low taxes and the impressive new Aer Lingus business class seat pictured above.

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 65,000 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 (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

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

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

Aer Lingus and AerClub, British Airways and Avios, Heathrow Rewards

Comments (49)

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

  • Sandgrounder says:
    11 Feb11 February 06:19

    Ryanair have dropped Bremen from Manchester too, but it is still pretty cheap from STN. On the Tuesday after the BA cancellation you can still get a same day return for £26. Not quite as convenient of course, and with the early morning departure from deepest darkest Essex you might need to take a taxi.

  • pauldb says:
    11 Feb11 February 06:34

    Bear in mind that to avoid compensation, BA must inform you of the change more than 14 days out, not just cancel it and change your booking.
    They must also reroute you to BRE under EU261, whatever the notice period, not just offer you HAM, but they seem to try pretty hard to duck this responsibility in similar situations.

  • BA Sucks says:
    11 Feb11 February 07:29

    It is the 14 day notice period. Call me cynical, but this is the sort of thing that Vueling does….

    • ADS says:
      11 Feb11 February 10:10

      is this the shortest notice that BA have cancelled a route in recent times ?

      it feels like the actions of a banana republic type of airline !

      • Save East Coast Rewards says:
        11 Feb11 February 12:04

        It wasn’t BA cancelling the route, it’s operated by EZ so they’ll have made the call.

  • Anna says:
    11 Feb11 February 07:34

    I’ve had 3 flights from Manchester to Bremen cancelled, 2 avios and 1 cash booking. It certainly is galling as all 3 of the trips I have booked to travel with BA this year have now been changed or cancelled! I was really looking forward to a Christmas shopping trip to Germany on the Dornier jet with refreshments included, but will now presumably have the inconvenience of flying via Heathrow with BOB.

    If we now re-book, will we have to pay extra avios and/or cash for the Man-Heathrow sector?

    • the real harry1 says:
      11 Feb11 February 07:42

      no extra Avios (with an onward RFS connection) but you have to pay cash for the taxes/ fees – which can be pretty close to a cheap cash fare so you might not exactly be making much of a saving

      • Anna says:
        11 Feb11 February 07:52

        What I’m asking is – I’ve paid 16,000 avios plus £70 fees for the 2 RFS from Man-Bremen, but now I have to connect via Heathrow, will BA make me pay this again for the Man-Heathrow leg, even though they’ve forced me to make the change? On a short-haul booking via Heathrow you pay for both sectors anyway now, but this originally was a direct flight from Man so only one set of avios/fees were charged.

        Man-Heathrow is around £150 return – BA is the only airline to fly this route so there’s no competition to drive down prices.

        • pauldb says:
          11 Feb11 February 08:06

          No they wouldn’t make you pay any extra.
          But the issue is that BA don’t fly Heathrow-Bremen. They will try to fob you off with an alternative of Hannover or Hamburg but they must reroute you to BRE.

          • Anna says:
            11 Feb11 February 08:34

            It doesn’t have to be Bremen – in brief the trip was a Christmas treat for 2 bereaved family members. What I didn’t want was to have to drag them through Heathrow and be charged for an M & S butty on board! Any German city would be acceptable.

      • Alan says:
        11 Feb11 February 08:51

        Yes there is an extra cost – for RFS you now pay Avios and taxes for each leg in the same way as separate bookings. It’s only for longhaul connections where there is no extra Avios cost, but still extra taxes/fees.

  • Anna says:
    11 Feb11 February 08:07

    Would I be within my rights to request Man-Billund-Dusseldorf as an alternative on Sun Air? This would avoid Heathrow and allow to fly on the Dornier.

    • Rob says:
      11 Feb11 February 08:21

      Probably not. BA issues guidelines to agents and this is not listed as an option.

      • Anna says:
        11 Feb11 February 08:35

        So what do they propose? Are they going to provide train tickets to Bremen?

        • pauldb says:
          11 Feb11 February 09:12

          Like I said they’ll probably want to put you to HAJ/HAM and no further. In some circumstances they allow alternatives with a limit of 200mi of BRE but I don’t know exactly when. EU261 is clear they need to reroute you to BRE which I believe is intended to mean on another carrier (via PAR/AMS/BRU) but I think BA will resist this and it will be a fight, shamefully. If nothing else they are dodging they’d be dodging their duty to inform you of your rights, which include the reroute option.

          • Anna says:
            11 Feb11 February 14:41

            Does “comparable transport conditions” just mean they have to fly us there, or would it also cover the fact that on the original flights we would have been provided with food and drink and a certain baggage allowance?

          • Anna says:
            13 Feb13 February 10:01

            See the most recent post for the start of my saga trying to get BA/SUN AIR to rectify this!

  • Nate1309 says:
    11 Feb11 February 08:40

    I miss the NQY-CWL-MAN flight

  • Sam wardill says:
    11 Feb11 February 08:43

    Surely they’ll be stung for some compensation for people with return tickets?

    Regardless this seems like a cynical and unnecessary strategy.

  • Graeme says:
    11 Feb11 February 09:21

    OT – hence in ‘bits’…

    This issue with Mac/Safari users being jumped to the fifty shades ad is still happening.

    • Steve-B says:
      11 Feb11 February 09:29

      Yes, will be glad when the advert finally expires!

      • Graeme says:
        11 Feb11 February 09:36

        very irritating albeit solved by using chrome.. perhaps Safari users are specifically targeted due to the content of said film 🙂

      • Rob says:
        11 Feb11 February 09:42

        14th

        • jimmy says:
          11 Feb11 February 12:55

          It’s pretty disgraceful Rob that you haven’t had it pulled

          Its p!ssing off so many people (who use Macs….they’re pretty ubiquitous by the way) and you seem to care little (soft words alone don’t cut it)

          Are you pursuing the BA model, cash at any cost?

          • Danny says:
            11 Feb11 February 14:01

            Not an issue for me….

          • mark2 says:
            11 Feb11 February 15:54

            Some people are very easily annoyed.
            Get a mainstream computer and the problem disappears.

          • Crafty says:
            11 Feb11 February 19:09

            I’m not sure getting a new computer is a proportionate response to suggest for an irritating advert…

          • Joe says:
            11 Feb11 February 21:16

            Thanks Mark for your advice. I’m happy with my ‘computer’. You stick with yours, literally.

    • RussellH says:
      11 Feb11 February 13:37

      I take it does require MacOS Safari to work? No sign of it on Windows Safari.

      But surely Safari comes with an ad-blocker if it that annoying?

      • Graeme says:
        11 Feb11 February 13:56

        Indeed an ad-blocker solves this but I would have thought Rob would not want to encourage site visitors to employ a tool that hides a significant element of his revenue stream…

        For that reason I leave mine off normally on this site

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 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

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

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

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 SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

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!