Virgin Atlantic has launched a very generous deal with Avis .
If you book a car for 2+ days you will pick up 6,000 Virgin Flying Club miles!
Full details of the offer are on the Virgin Atlantic website here.
There are surprisingly few catches to this deal if you look at the small print.
Booking date: until 28th February
Rental dates: collect by 30th June
Qualifying countries: USA, Canada, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia
Rental requirement: 2+ days in a Group C or higher vehicle
There appears to be no cap on the number of times you can earn the miles. The 6,000 miles consists of 500 base miles and a bonus of 5,500. This increases to 6,500 miles for a rental of 7+ days as a rental of a week earns 1,000 base miles.
Importantly, there appears to be no requirement to use any specific Virgin Atlantic Avis discount code. This means that you can use any cheap Avis rate to which you have access and still claim the miles.
I would be happy to value 6,000 Virgin Flying Club miles at £60 – especially as redemptions on KLM and Air France should be available to members within the next 12 months – so you could even make a small profit on your car rental.
You can see full details of the Virgin / Avis partnership on this page of the Virgin Atlantic site, but confusingly the promotion information is over here on the Flying Club site.
(Want to earn more Virgin Flying Club miles? Click here to see our recent articles on Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club and click here for our home page with the latest news on earning and spending other airline and hotel points.)
About Head for Points
Does Asia include Aus and NZ as far as Avis are concerned? Not clear from the booking site.
Keen to know this as well
+1
What are the cheapest Avis rates that many HfP readers will have access to?
If not already done, peruse the FlyerTalk AVIS forum – codes posted there regularly.
Also, if you have AMEX Plat, ring AVIS and have it applied to account for an AMEX Plat discount whenever you log in to your AVIS account. One can then compare this to any AWD codes sourced from FT or elsewhere.
Beware that some posted on FT are corporate codes which may require ID at pick up.
The link provided by Virgin to book now does not give the opportunity to add an AWD code? Any way around this?
Probably doing that would nullify the Virgin bonus. I’ve not read the T&C but I’m sure it is mentioned.
I live in YYZ, this is perfect. 3 rentals will allow me to redeem a fight in PE to LHR via JFK. Need to figure out how this works.
The terms seem remarkably easy. I’ve just reserved a group C car for my wife with a BA flight (amazingly the 2 day rental dropped the overall price by £40!).
I wonder if she can credit the rental to her Virgin Atlantic number when she picks up the car on Saturday?
On a similar note – has anyone had the bonus avios from the BAEC Avis Chiristmas offer yet? I have had the miles for the car hire but no bonus 5000
Hi Dale. I’m still waiting too. Same as you, got the miles but not the bonus 5000.
Perfect timing – cost for a group D was slightly less than the cheapest deal found and booked with a broker a couple of weeks back for a 2 week trip to Florida, so 6k miles for less than nothing – many thanks!
skyscanner 2 days Malaga March 6-8 group C £20.17 ( ECO £11)
Avis through Virgin link same dates and car group £108 plus 6000 Virgin miles.
Not for me.
Be aware that often these cheap deals in Spain often require some form of addition insurance and/or you have to prepay for more fuel than you can use in just two days…
That’s why I’ve just upgraded my gold Amex for precisely that reason 😉
Also amex plat . fuel was full to full so pretty much like for like. I was once hit with a 7 euro car cleaning fee which was hidden away in the TCs
I once booked a car with AVIS in Jamaica via Virgin Atlantic website thinking it was a great deal versus AVIS .co.uk but when I picked up the car, the basic insurance wasn’t even included so I had to buy insurance locally. Not such a good deal ! I know Caribbean is not included in this promotion though .
Meant to say , on Avis.co.uk, the basic insurance was included , where as it was not on the link to Avis friend m Virgin
5500 bonus miles sounds great, but always compare with the competition. I just priced up a 48h rental in Germany:
Avis – £137 for a VW Polo (“discount code applied!”)
Sixt – €75 for a VW Golf (drops to €62 when I put my Sixt loyalty card details in)
Oh, and the last three times I’ve booked with Sixt Germany I’ve paid for a Golf and been given an Audi A4.
Newbie question… If you don’t book via Virgin but book via another means (e.g. Amex) how do you claim the miles? Thank you
Add the number via Manage My Booking on the Virgin site using the 6 character booking reference to bring it up. Or do it at check in.
Just tried that but no dice. AVIS didn’t like the 6 digit booking ref that BA gave on the voucher: “Please enter your reservation number in one of the following formats: XXXX-XXXX-NN-X or XXXXXXXXNNX (X must be a number and N a letter) ”
Have suggested my wife just shows her Virgin Atlantic card when she picks up the car at AVIS desk at T5.
can you share the link to manage bookings in the virgin site? I’m not able to find it.
I’ve had so much crap from Avis-Budget, namely spurious extra charges and miles never posting, that even if they offered 20,000 Avios/miles I wouldn’t waste my time or money on them. At some point you have to do some simple maths and decide if the hassle and agro is worth the time and money spent on it. In my case, definitely not.
Do you think you would get the Virgin miles if you book via avis.co.uk using a BA AWD?
Oddly there are no rules to say you won’t (but keep a screenshot).
I need a car for 6 days, can i do 3 x 2 day rentals and get 3 x bonus?
No, not unless you swap the car every 2nd day!
Just did a oneway from vail to Denver , 2 days for 68 pounds , good code. .
Do you get second driver free with virgin
Has anyone got the 6000 miles posted?
Second driver is free