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Why are British Airways Singapore redemptions pricier via Iberia – and are there others?

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An interesting quirk with the Iberia Avios redemption chart was picked up in this thread on Flyertalk.  For some reason Singapore, when flying BA, is in a more expensive redemption zone than it is when booked via British Airways Executive Club.

This isn’t meant to happen.

When you book a British Airways flight using Iberia Plus Avios – as many HfP readers may be doing if they earned 90,000 Avios via the recent Iberia promotion – it prices off the same chart as BA flights booked on ba.com.  It also uses the same peak and off-peak dates.

In simple terms, for long-haul flights the Avios and taxes required for a BA redemption should be identical whether you book via Iberia Plus or BA Executive Club.

On short haul, Iberia Plus asks for more in taxes because Reward Flight Saver does not apply.

Here is an example of what happens with Singapore.  Here is a First Class reward flight booked via British Airways Executive Club, as 280,000 Avios (Zone 8). Click to enlarge:

…. and here is EXACTLY the same flight booked via Iberia Plus, showing a cost of 400,000 Avios (Zone 9):

This is almost certainly an error.  It isn’t as if this is a destination where BA cheats with the distances – Cape Town, for example, should be in Zone 7 but British Airways puts it in the cheaper Zone 6.  Iberia agrees and treats Cape Town as Zone 6.

However, I’m interested to know if there are any other destinations where Iberia is charging a different Avios rate to British Airways.  It would obviously be preferable if Iberia was cheaper.  Let us know if you find any.

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.

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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, Iberia and Iberia Plus

Comments (95)

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

  • Archie says:
    19 Jul19 July 13:12

    Apologies for OT: Is it possible to transfer my wife’s Virgin miles to my Virgin account?

    • Rob says:
      19 Jul19 July 13:46

      No

      • Archie says:
        19 Jul19 July 13:48

        How about opening a household account (like BA’s)? Or you need to have a status in VS?

      • ChrisC says:
        19 Jul19 July 16:20

        Yes you can transfer them over if you pay – using the gift miles function

        Only VS golds can have a HHA account

        Ability to use miles from different accounts only works if there are enough miles in each account to pay for a whole flight sector. If say you needed 30k for an upgrade and had 23k in one account and 7k in another you can’t pool those..

    • @mkcol says:
      19 Jul19 July 15:03

      However if you & your wife are travelling together, you can do a redemption booking using both sets of miles even if one account doesn’t have sufficient on its own. Call them up to sort it out.

  • Akkers says:
    19 Jul19 July 13:51

    Seems like this article has done the trick – thanks Rob! Certainly when I do a dummy booking now I am getting correct pricing whereas before I was getting incorrect pricing. So many thanks for getting this sorted for me Rob! Now just need to wait for T-355 for seats I want to be released.

  • Robman says:
    19 Jul19 July 14:14

    Off-topic, when can we expect another Qatar Airways business class promotion, maybe even the one which requires you to buy 2 tickets to get the reduced price? I need to be in Durban in late September and also require 560 remaining points to keep my gold card for the following year. A Qatar business class flight ex-Europe to Johannesburg would be perfect but at present all I’m seeing is fares from £2400 upwards. Any advice appreciated thanks.

  • Chris says:
    19 Jul19 July 14:52

    Redeemption from Hong Kong appears to be in the same situation too 🙁

  • the real harry1 says:
    19 Jul19 July 15:14

    O/T datapoint I picked up a Mokka for my £1 Europcar trip to LHR, pretty happy with that as it fits 2 big cases & 1 cabin bag in the back. Nice driving height, I guess you’d call it a small SUV.

    Also got lucky with T-24 & moved us up the plane 7A & row 10 for the kids – looks like exit row still shows good promise for tomorrow 🙂

    • Mark2 says:
      19 Jul19 July 15:21

      did you mange to get a £1 car back?

      • the real harry1 says:
        19 Jul19 July 15:23

        Getting a free lift with my wife 🙂

        But I think £1 hires from LHR are rare as hen’s teeth

    • Tony says:
      19 Jul19 July 15:59

      Problem is with the £1 rental, it’s luck of the draw what you get. We had – I think – a Clio last time I did this, which was fine as it was for two of us going away for a weekend.

      Would be wary of trying it if I had a party of five plus suitcases to move…

      • the real harry1 says:
        19 Jul19 July 16:09

        Yep I was slightly concerned, only 4 as my wife is following next week but still… 🙂

        As it is, the 2 in the back will have Mr Bags in the middle lol – cue plenty of moaning, I’m sure.

      • Kavajo says:
        20 Jul20 July 06:10

        I’ve done this a few times and called the office the day before, asking for a larger car. Last time got a 9 seater van. I think it’s supposed to be at least a group C.

    • Abhey says:
      19 Jul19 July 16:56

      Got a Jaguar xe on the £1 deal. Nearly thought about changing to a later flight.

    • Lev441 says:
      19 Jul19 July 18:30

      I had an extremely disappointing experience. With Europcar – booked the £1 from my local branch, got there to be told they’d given the car to someone else as I wasn’t there at band on 10am. Didn’t recieve any missed phone call or voicemail even though they claim to have tried ringing me ‘loads’. Really screwed up my days plans.

      • the real harry1 says:
        19 Jul19 July 21:31

        they broke the contract, there’s consumer law etc

  • Graham Walsh says:
    19 Jul19 July 15:37

    OT Not sure if this has been posted, but been off line working in the US. Good video on LHR and it’s costs https://youtu.be/wdU1WTBJMl0

    • Pareet Shah says:
      19 Jul19 July 18:22

      Saw it yesterday, really interesting. It’s a great YouTube channel

      • James says:
        19 Jul19 July 19:01

        Interesting article but some of the financials and mechanisms described aren’t correct. I sign off enough HAL invoices and sit on cost governance forums, as an airline, to know!

  • Delbert says:
    19 Jul19 July 19:44

    After yet another BA IT meltdown can we expect to see Alex Cruz in his Hi Vis tomorrow.

  • Samuel says:
    19 Jul19 July 20:57

    Can we use the power of HFP and make CX correct their IT glitches when trying to search for direct flights on CX using BAEC?

    I can find seats on SIN-HKG-TYO but when I search HKG-TYO or HKG-SIN v.v. there are no seats in any cabin!

    • Rob says:
      19 Jul19 July 21:14

      This can be done on purpose. Iberia does it (you might find New York – Madrid – Santander when you can’t find New York – Madrid) and American has started doing it.

      • Margaret says:
        19 Jul19 July 22:52

        BA have done this for years. I had to book JFK-LHR-EDI 2 years ago when i needed to fly home as the first flight want available on it’s own. I have family in Edinburgh, so it was fine (If tiring!)

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