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Bits: Qatar launches Cardiff with a 787, 500 Avios with £25 Amazon spend, Charles Tyrwhitt sale

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News in brief:

Qatar Airways to launch Cardiff with a Boeing 787

I must be honest.  When Qatar Airways announced its plans to launch flights from Cardiff, I assumed that it would use a short-haul aircraft.  This is what it does out of some other smaller cities.

This week, however, Qatar Airways announced that Cardiff services will start on 1st May – using a Boeing 787.  It will fly daily.

This is very bullish, because Qatar needs to create a brand new market for long-haul travel out of the airport.  It isn’t just about enticing flyers to switch airlines, they need to change behaviour and stop people driving down the M4 to Heathrow.  They have 254 seats to fill every day.

This is great news for Avios collectors in Wales.   Avios availability should be excellent on this route, at least in the early days as the route builds up.  We will hopefully see some good sale fares as well.

If you want to know about other Avios redemption ideas from outside London, this HfP article looks at Avios flights from UK regional airports.

Last chance to get 500 Avios or Amex points with £25 Amazon spend

Tomorrow is the last day for the fantastic American Express Amazon offer.  It is available for many – but not all – British Airways American Express, Amex Gold and Amex Platinum cardholders.

If you haven’t done yet, check your offers on your online statement page for a combination of:

Get 500 / 1,000 Avios / Membership Rewards points when you spend £25 at amazon.co.uk before 17th September using your BA Amex / Amex Gold / Platinum card

There are various rules about what you can and cannot buy to trigger the bonus.  The easiest thing to do is buy a £25 amazon.co.uk giftcard via this link and add it to your account via this link.

Avios Charles Tyrwhitt

12% off Charles Tyrwhitt shirts this weekend – and earn Avios

Finally, shirt company Charles Tyrwhitt is offering 12% off everything – no minimum order – this weekend with code UK12CT.

Tyrwhitt is an Avios partner and you will also earn 4 points per £1 on your shopping.  The site is here and the current clearance offers are here.

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 12th May 2024, the Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa card is offering a bonus of 30,000 points, convertible into 30,000 Avios. You must have a Limited Company to apply. Click here to learn more and click here to apply.

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.

Category

British Airways and Avios, Qatar Airways and Privilege Club

Comments (73)

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

  • TripRep says:
    16 Sep16 September 11:06

    Rob – I take it an Amazon account £25 top up doesn’t qualify for the 500 MR points, ie you need to buy & email yourself a £25 gift card and then apply it to your account?

    • the real harry1 says:
      16 Sep16 September 11:14

      top up is fine

      • TripRep says:
        16 Sep16 September 11:48

        ah ok, in that case I’m guessing the 500 MR pts offer hasn’t activated for a supplementary card that I’d copied it to, can’t complain, it was worth a shot.

        • Stu N says:
          16 Sep16 September 12:28

          Top up worked for me

          • TripRep says:
            16 Sep16 September 12:35

            Decided to go on the AMEX online chat, apparently it can take a few more days for different cards to process the offer, agent checked it out and can see in processing, so he’s confident that I’ll get the points.

            Thanks to you both for your suggestions/feedback! 😀

  • Tracy says:
    16 Sep16 September 12:14

    O/T Amex fine hotels and resorts query – i want to book 3 nights. OH and i are both platinum card holders, can we book alternate nights, me night 1, him night 2, me night 3 to maximize the $100 per stay credit? Would the hotel be awkward about it? We would prefer to stay in same room for all 3 nights but it wouldnt be the end of the world if we had to move rooms especially with 4pm late checkout each day.

    • Rob says:
      16 Sep16 September 12:39

      Hotel will be awkward as they are funding it. Do not recommend it.

      • Talay says:
        16 Sep16 September 14:39

        I’ve done this some years ago and had mixed results the first time so I cleared it in advance the next times we did it.

        Personally, I think it is a piss take that if you want to stay 5 days then you only get 1 offer but they happily give out the same offer for someone staying a single night. Clueless marketing IMHO as people staying longer have far more free time to use other hotel cost options such as the spa, room service, etc.

        I have threatened to do it of late and had the hotel simply offer the deal without having to jump through the hoops. Never had a hotel be so pedantic as to make us check out and then move rooms but I guess it could happen. I’d bet the vast majority would never be so petty though.

        Would i do it again ? Absolutely but I’d offer the hotel the option to make it easier on the check in staff by arranging it beforehand with their management.

        • Tracy says:
          16 Sep16 September 16:51

          Yeah, a three night stay should get more resort credit than a one night stay IMHO. Will contact the hotel directly and see what they say…..

      • Tracy says:
        16 Sep16 September 16:57

        Really? I wouldnt have thought they would care that much. We regularly alternate nights for stay credits & bonuses, especially with hilton. Never had any issues, albeit never for a resort credit, maybe thats a bit more of a money grab lol.

        • Rob says:
          16 Sep16 September 19:44

          I think if you asked the hotel for £85 a day because you’d juggled the names every day they might feel differently! With Hilton Honors promos they probably admire your ingenuity.

  • Cate says:
    16 Sep16 September 14:22

    OT – can I force transfers into an Iberian account which hasn’t satisfied the 90 day rule bit by buying IB avios and then transferring points in from elsewhere immediately afterwards? I take it you can then spend the points in the Iberia account on flight redemptions without waiting 90 days? Thanks

  • TripRep says:
    16 Sep16 September 14:27

    O/T: the EU261 lawyer compensation companies will be rubbing their hands… 🙂
    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/sep/16/ryanair-cancels-up-to-50-flights-a-day-to-improve-punctuality

    • Talay says:
      16 Sep16 September 14:52

      You could see someone taking personal vengeance against that odious Irish hobbit.

  • Boi says:
    16 Sep16 September 14:31

    OT:
    We are yet decide where to go for October half term. We have 2 hilton visa cc certificates.does anyone know if they will be accepted for a 2bed villa/apartment in Hilton villamoura in algarve or is it just for rooms? Honors required is 130K. We need that as it is 2A3Kids.

    Secondly I only hear people praising Conrad algarve but it doesn’t have 5 people occupancy options unfortunately.
    Anyone stayed at Hilton vilamoura?

    • Rob says:
      16 Sep16 September 16:05

      The credit card certs are only good for ‘Standard Redemptions’ which means the basic room, unless a hotel is feeling generous. If you email you may be offered a price for an upgrade.

    • pointsarb says:
      16 Sep16 September 19:20

      Yes our family of 4 has Boi. Booked cheapest room and contacted hotel direct to negotiate diamond upgrade. Ended up with the 2 bed villa you mention and highly recommended.

      One of the best kids clubs I’ve seen too including a zipline suitable for adults who wish to behave like kids for a few minutes!

      • Boi says:
        16 Sep16 September 20:06

        Thanks. That’s encouraging. Will contact hotel and ask nicely…

      • ankomonkey says:
        16 Sep16 September 22:10

        Also stayed at May half-term quite a few years ago. It was barely warm enough to swim outside and found the food quite average, but agree that the kids club is pretty good.

  • Roger says:
    16 Sep16 September 16:26

    Completely OT-

    Any recommendation for buying this?
    http://www.ebuyer.com/796583-hpe-proliant-gen10-entry-opteron-x3216-1-6ghz-8gb-ram-microserver-873830-421

    My 5 year old NAS has died and looking for home server / NAS.
    Not too geeky and something that would work without fiddling too much,

    • John says:
      16 Sep16 September 17:11

      I dunno, if you are running a server from your home, I’d build it myself. It’s been about quite a few years since I had time to fiddle with computer innards (learning about premium travel is partly to blame) but is 8GB RAM sufficient these days and has AMD’s reputation improved?

    • Alan says:
      16 Sep16 September 20:23

      Personally I’ve gone for the QNAP TS-451+ and found it very reliable and with plenty of core software/add-ons available – bought it on the back of a PC Pro recommendation a year or so ago. Don’t know anything about the ClearOS on the HP.

      • Graham Walsh says:
        16 Sep16 September 23:55

        I have QNAP’s as well for all my storage and then backed up to a cloud service.

        • Paz says:
          17 Sep17 September 17:10

          I have QNAPs too. Good support and range of spec – varying budgets, different drive bays, CPU power etc so unless you’re able to build your own I’d recommend QNAP.

    • HAM76 says:
      18 Sep18 September 12:13

      We use Synology. Unless you need certain Windows Server features, I would simply go with a NAS…

  • AlanG says:
    16 Sep16 September 18:21

    I am booked on the first arrival into Cardiff. Looking forward to it, and doing it just in case they pull it before I get the chance again!

  • abe mozes says:
    16 Sep16 September 23:44

    Forget the 12%! Link below for 3 for £55.

    Ctshirts.com/lucas

    Enjoy

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