Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Save 20% on almost all hotels, everywhere via an Aer Lingus AerClub promo

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AerClub is the Avios-based reward scheme for Aer Lingus, BA’s sister airline.  The ability to pay for hotels (and car hire and experiences, but we’re focusing on hotels here) has just been introduced to AerClub.

AerClub has been running an interesting offer.  You can save 20% on all hotels bookings made using Avios – or, more interestingly, part cash and part Avios.  You must book by 19th July but can stay until 31st December 2018.

You can find out more on the AerClub site here.

This deal has been implemented in a slightly odd way which makes it good value for using Avios – but very good value for using cash.

When you use Avios to book a hotel, you are given a number of options.  One is ‘all Avios’.  The last is usually ‘1000 Avios plus a lot of cash’.  There are few options in the middle.

Because the ‘all Avios’ option has been reduced by 20% under this promo, all of the other options have been reduced by 20% too.  This includes the ‘1000 Avios plus a lot of cash’ one.

I know this isn’t too clear.  It is easier to explain with an example.  Here is the Hilton London Paddington for 16th August booked via the BA ‘Avios for hotels’ booking portal which is not running this promotion:

…. and here is the same hotel via the avios.com hotel portal when you log in via an Aer Club account (if you don’t have one, open one at aerlingus.com and then log in at avios.com with the details):

How does the pricing compare?

The cash price of this room booked via hilton.com for non-members of Hilton Honors is £209.

This is in line with the price via the BA hotel portal, at £200 plus 1000 Avios.

Using the avios.com hotel portal (logged in with an Aer Club account) we get a far better deal – £160 plus 1000 Avios.

To book ….

You could book this hotel with ‘all Avios’ but you’re only getting the usual 0.55p per point of value compared to Aer Club’s heavily discounted cash price.

It is far better to just move 1,000 Avios from British Airways to your AerClub account and then, in this case, pay the £160 cash.

This same deal seems to work for ALL of the hotels in ALL countries on the avios.com booking site.  Some do not let you go as low as 1,000 Avios, however, so you may need to burn more points.

Remember that bookings via the Avios / BA hotel booking sites do NOT earn you loyalty points in the hotel scheme and do NOT earn you status benefits.  If you can get a 20% discount on the usual cash price via this Aer Lingus offer, however, you will struggle to beat that at most properties even if you are sacrificing points earning.

If you want to see the full details, look at the AerClub site 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

Aer Lingus and AerClub

Comments (61)

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

  • Chris says:
    18 Jul18 July 08:42

    Really quite O/T – Airportr question:

    All owners of bagge need to be present on pickup as they would be on checkin (For bags collected from hotel and checked onto flight for you)

    How creative can you be? I have 3 young children who hopefully won’t be awake at pickup, can all the bags belong to me and my wife or will BA insist on the carseats belonging to the children? We’re checking only 2 bags and the three carseats.

    Additional question – pushchair. How does that need to be handled, are we going to wind up having to traipse to the checkin desk regardless?

    • Nick says:
      18 Jul18 July 08:59

      there need to be enough people to account for the luggage allowance. So for example three people at one piece each, for three bags they all need to be there. But if you had a 3pc allowance you can check all the bags under your name and no one else needs to be there.

      For your buggy, presumably you’ll want it at the airport? In which case it’ll be gate-checked.

      • Chris says:
        18 Jul18 July 09:05

        Thanks Nick
        I’ll need to check the rules around carseats – the rules appear to specifically suggest that children get their allowance of two bags plus carsear(plus stroller) – no mention is made of an adult checking a carseat as standard luggage (which would allow me to acheive it with only one child present!)

        We’ve always obtained a backage label for the stroller at checkin – I assume though that if checking it at the gate we can obtain the label there too?

  • James says:
    18 Jul18 July 09:42

    OT: Iberia. I have had the full 90k avios credited. New account. They requested copy of passport and receipts for the tickets. I also included a screenshot of my Iberia account showing the details matching.

    • Robman says:
      18 Jul18 July 09:55

      I booked six flights but only received Avios for five flights. Old Iberia plus account. Wrote an email about 10 days ago but no word since. Not sure what to do now to get my missing 9000 points. Advice please.

      • Peter K says:
        18 Jul18 July 12:02

        therealharry1 has written about this a lot in the comments over the past few days. Have a scroll through (usually long comments) and there is info to be found in them.

      • the real harry1 says:
        18 Jul18 July 16:18

        Yep plenty of info last few days and have a read of the Flyertalk Iberia threads covering the 90K promotion.

        One common problem is the flaky IB IT – it was timing people out after 20 mins, so your bookings may not all automatically have held on to your IB ID number. This is why a lot of people got 8 or 9 successes x9000 but missed out on one or two. Without the IB number, you won’t get the points so not worth appealing.

        Check this by looking at your flight confirmation emails, which should all hold your IB ID number.

        If they’re all there & you’re missing points, you’ll need to scan all 6 confirmation emails and start emailing CS @ IB.

        • BJ says:
          18 Jul18 July 17:27

          Have you figured out how the likes of me and Alan can get the 90k having not bought any flights at all?

  • Jon says:
    18 Jul18 July 09:55

    Unless I am missing something, I am not getting the cash + 1000 avios options. Admittedly am booking for a week but even when I select for 1 night, I don’t have that option for 1000 avios. I’m going to Aerclub and then it’s redirecting me to avios.com to book hotels with avios. What am i missing?

    • Rob says:
      18 Jul18 July 10:11

      It doesn’t go as low as 1000 for pricier bookings. I tested this with a 1m Avios Maldives quote!

      If you book each night separately it might work?

  • KBufferr says:
    18 Jul18 July 10:38

    OT – I need help with the Marriott Platinum Challenge. I needed to complete 9 qualifying paid stays by 31/8/18 to qualify. I have only completed 5, but I also had 5 nights/1 stay as a points redemption within the qualifying period. My account is now showing Platinum (although I cannot see when this status expires). Is this because of a system glitch as my account is showing 10 nights now, or is this something to do with the SPG merger? Should I still continue to complete the 4 remaining stays by the end of this month?

    • Rob says:
      18 Jul18 July 10:53

      Looks like everyone on it has been upgraded. My guess is that they want to close the book pre merger. Wait a few days before cancelling the rest in case it is a mistake.

  • Rob says:
    18 Jul18 July 10:54

    You won’t get 20% – Hotels.com Rewards gets you close but of course needs 10 nights.

  • Boi says:
    18 Jul18 July 11:00

    OT:
    I have an aerclub account I created while living in Ireland. That only has 250 avios. I cant see a way to link it with my UK avios.

  • KBuffett says:
    18 Jul18 July 11:44

    OK, i’ve got a couple of mattress run’s booked in for Friday / Sunday! Do you know how to find out the expiry date of status?

    • Rob MC says:
      18 Jul18 July 15:11

      You should have had an email from SPG regarding the upgraded status. Check that, mine is march 2019 which I think matches a lot of other people. The other option is to call up Marriott and ask

      • KBuffett says:
        18 Jul18 July 16:05

        Yes, I’ve had that. If I complete my challenge will the expiry date get extended?

        • Rob says:
          18 Jul18 July 16:43

          You are fine to 2020 – SPG emails are always written look this.

      • Rob says:
        18 Jul18 July 16:44

        It isn’t 3/19. Your current year ends 3/19. You then get rolled over to 3/20. Odd but that is how they do it.

        • KBuffett says:
          18 Jul18 July 18:32

          So are you suggesting that I shouldn’t complete the rest of my challenge?

          • Rob says:
            18 Jul18 July 21:21

            If booked, do the stays. You are then guaranteed Plat to 2020. At the moment you don’t have a leg to stand on if they downgrade you in 2019. If you can cancel the stays you need to have a think about the cost and time involved vs the marginal benefits between Feb 19 and Feb 20 – and the % chance they do downgrade you.

  • Rob says:
    18 Jul18 July 12:15

    Odd question but how do I know if there is 20% off the price? I have no idea what the original price should be!

    I’m seeing the same price when I access avios through aerlingus and avios.com..

    My “username” (email address) is the same for both aerlingus and avios.com

    • Rob says:
      18 Jul18 July 13:03

      Open the BA.com hotel booking site in another window!

      • Rob says:
        18 Jul18 July 15:42

        Trying to book The Grand Hotel & Spa in York,UK.

        Same price on both for me.

        Maybe this hotel isn’t discounted?

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