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Excellent LATAM (Avios earning) business class fares to South America for December

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If you don’t have your Christmas plans lined up yet, LATAM is offering some excellent fares to South America.

These fares will earn Avios and British Airways Executive Club tier points if credited to BA as LATAM is a BA partner.

These deals are only valid for travel in December 2018.  Christmas is included in theory but you might struggle to find availability unless you leave early in the month.

You must book by 21st August.

The only direct routing available is Heathrow to Sao Paulo.  Other destinations are available with changes on the way, either in Europe or the Americas.

Some options include the ability to route via Madrid or Frankfurt with a BA / Iberia connection in Club Europe / Business Class which is good for another 40 tier points each way.

Typical pricing booking on the LATAM website is (all checked as of yesterday):

Sao Paulo – £1280 (direct)

Rio de Janeiro – £1314

You can also route through to other cities in the region such as Manaus or Recife for a similar price.

It is also worth looking at third party booking sites such as Expedia or Opodo as they may offer lower prices.  As with the recent Gulf Air promotion we covered, smaller airlines like LATAM are often happy to dump capacity via third parties at lower prices than they charge direct.  It is also worth trying a ‘flight and hotel’ or ‘flight and car’ package via Expedia to see if that brings it down even more.

Be careful on the seating as not all aircraft have fully flat seats.  Our review of LATAM’s brand new Boeing 787 seat, which is good, is here.

Your best option to maximise your miles when paying is American Express Preferred Rewards Gold.  This offers double points – 2 per £1 – when you when you book flight tickets directly with an airline.  Our review of Amex Gold is here.

The LATAM website is here.

HFP-Barclaycard-Avios-Card

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (June 2023)

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 £12,000 Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 13th June, the sign-up bonus on The Platinum Card is doubled to 60,000 Membership Rewards points – and you get £200 to spend at Amex Travel too! Apply here.

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

60,000 points AND a £200 Amex Travel voucher until 13th June! 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.

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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.

EDIT: Applications for this card are temporarily suspended due to IT issues with the British Airways On Business SME loyalty scheme.

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 bonus and a £200 Amex Travel credit every year 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.

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oneworld alliance partners

Comments (35)

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

  • Matt says:
    9 Aug9 August 07:41

    O/T can reward flights booked through Iberia Plus (for BA flights) using the 90k promotional avios be cancelled for a full refund minus the €25 penalty after December 1st?

    • Chris says:
      9 Aug9 August 07:54

      I would have assumed not, or at least that the refund would be followed by a debit of 90k points for promotional avoid essentially unspent at Dec.

      But as with all these things there’s only one way to be sure – and that is to take the gamble

      In any case of course if anyone did answer your question in the positive, publicly, you can rest assured it’d be a self un-fulfilling prophecy…

    • Lady London says:
      9 Aug9 August 20:39

      I’m expecting to be able to move mine if I need to. Because the promotion didn’t say anything about not being able to move any resulting flights. But they did have to be booked by 1st December
      I’ve sent Iberia a legal notice informing them that I am not accepting the more restrictive conditions they sneakily tried to impose, in an email sent after the promotion when flights under the promotion had already been booked

      If you wanted to refund I think this might be a bit different . But I am fully expecting to be able to change mine. Not that I’m planning to . But as my work and travel can be unpredictable I needed to maintain my right that existed at the time I bought under the promotion, to change the bookings I made using the miles, the same as is normal for any other avios booking.

  • Adam says:
    9 Aug9 August 08:15

    I am flying to Brazil with Latam in a couple of weeks, Do you know which planes I should be avoiding so I don’t get stuck without a flat bed?

    • David says:
      9 Aug9 August 22:19

      The 777 is very comfortable, and I didn’t really notice it not being entirely flat. Don’t get a middle seat. Screen is big, service good, best sleep I’ve ever had on a flight.

      Don’t worry too much!

  • Frenzie says:
    9 Aug9 August 08:37

    Rob, can you please include how many avios and tier points would these flights earn?

    A lot of your readers will find this very useful:

    Thanks a lot.

  • Kai says:
    9 Aug9 August 08:56

    Are we sure Z code is point earning with BAEC?

    Also, my BAEC membership year ends on Dec 9th. If I fly on Dec 8th or 9th will the TP still count towards my status this year? Just fear it might reset to zero immediately before those flights are credited, thanks.

    • Rob says:
      9 Aug9 August 09:11

      Yes we are. It was a BAEC typo – they put R instead of Z online. They don’t have R.

    • Rantallion says:
      9 Aug9 August 09:29

      Your tier point-earning year will end 8 Dec. Flights taken on 8 Dec should be automatically credited to your old year. Flights taken on 9 Dec and later will credit to your new year. If you want flights taken after 8 Dec to be credited to your old year, you can ask BAEC for a fortnight extension and they should allow you to credit flights taken up to a fortnight after your year end to your old year.

  • Matt says:
    9 Aug9 August 08:57

    O/T I have a £17k settlement fee to pay later this year for BMW finance. They say they accept all forms of payment except credit cards. Does anyone think curve will work backcharged to a credit card? If so any recommendations on which travel reward credit card with offer the best return? Or is there another way to earn a reward on this payment?

    • Anon says:
      9 Aug9 August 09:08

      You could try negotiating with Billhop. Normally this would be an expensive way of paying but they might give you a preferential rate which would be worth it if there’s the possibility, say, of earning one or even two BA companion vouchers. Of course this would depend on how many cards you have in your family and when the spend year re-starts. I’m going to be in a similar position (though less money involved!) next Spring so this is what I would be looking at.

      Also, there is no reason that Curve wouldn’t work if your credit limits are high enough.

    • Rob says:
      9 Aug9 August 09:10

      Unless you can pay it online in chunks the Curve day, week, month limits will hit you.

    • TGLoyalty says:
      9 Aug9 August 11:26

      Can you overpay the monthly? Or make a one off payment say 2-3 months before settlement? I paid my monthly for years with my amex then had to settle after a write off and ended up just using a bank transfer / debut card as they wouldn’t accept a credit card and it wasnt worth any fees to chase credit card points.

  • Michael C says:
    9 Aug9 August 09:22

    This is an amazing price for GRU, where usually there’s nothing on offer.
    Having said that, if it’s a non-flat, for me you’re getting nearer premium economy, as LatAm isn’t really famed for its food/IFE….Great points, though!

  • Russ says:
    9 Aug9 August 11:08

    I’ve experienced quite a delay/job getting points credited to my new BA exec account which had gone into my old exec account post flight. Seems they’re not automatically swept over to the new account. Mentioning this because I have 4 flights on Latam coming up which were booked crediting the points to the old BA number.

  • LondonFoodie says:
    9 Aug9 August 11:45

    Any idea how to know if the 787 is used?

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