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How you can earn Virgin Flying Club miles shopping at Waitrose

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Our other article today includes ways of topping up your Virgin Flying Club account.  One of these ways is earning miles at Waitrose.

I realised that we haven’t actually mentioned this partnership for almost two years, and it is possible that a lot of Head for Points readers don’t know about.

Via a deal with Virgin Atlantic, you will earn miles in Virgin Flying Club for every £1 you spend in-store at Waitrose.

The earning rate varies by account, and seems to change based on how much you spend at Waitrose and how your spending pattern fluctuates.

For purchases under £20, you earn a flat 1 Flying Club mile per £1

For £20+, you need to log in to your Virgin Flying Club account and check.  I am currently earning 3 Flying Club miles per £1 until 26th April.

This is, for £20+ purchases, more miles than I would earn at Tesco via Clubcard (1 Clubcard point per £1 which converts to 2.4 Avios or 2.5 Virgin Flying Club miles).

This would also allow John Lewis shoppers to buy Waitrose / John Lewis gift cards in Waitrose and collect the extra miles.

This offer is part of the Virgin Atlantic in-store shopping scheme.  To sign up, you need to visit this page of the Virgin website and register your credit cards.   Make sure you register your partners cards as well if they are also likely to visit Waitrose.

If you don’t already have a Virgin Flying Club account, you may want to sign up purely to take advantage of this deal.  At the very worse, you can redeem 12,500 miles for a £50 voucher valid at many Virgin Group companies or for Theatre Tokens.  It is also worth remembering that you can transfer Virgin Flying Club miles into Hilton Honors points (at 2:3) and IHG Rewards Club points (at 1:1) with a minimum transfer of 10,000 miles.


How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2024)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Virgin Points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses.

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 15,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

15,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

A generous earning rate for a free card at 0.75 points per £1 Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

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 comes with 40,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 40,000 Virgin Points.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

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 Virgin Points

(Want to earn more Virgin Points?  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.)

Comments (149)

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

  • chris says:

    O/T

    My Hilton Gold status ran out at the end of March.

    I was staying at a Hilton from 31st march ’til 5th April, i’ve been awarded points but only have been given a 20% silver bonus not an 80% gold one. Am I right the entire stay is classed as a gold stay given in checked in on 31st?

    • Peter 64K says:

      With Hilton it’s usually the check-out date status/ promo that applies to bonus points it seems.

      • chris says:

        Thanks,

        I enquired as to why this was, they gave me 5k points in my account as a gesture (i was only looking the extra 3k so they have +1 with me,

  • Gemma says:

    O/T

    BA Amex on-line account
    Avios points collection (very specific query!)

    I had a transaction post as confirmed this morning (it is dated Friday 5th April and it was ‘pending’ over the weekend as expected)

    I understand the associated Avios earned will post tomorrow morning, always the following day once transaction is posted as confirmed.

    However, tomorrow is also the day the monthly accrued Avios will be swept across to my BAEC.

    My (very specific) question is, will the Avios earned from this most recent transaction definitely be swept across to BAEC (tomorrow) ?

    • Scott says:

      I don’t know for certain, but I suspect not. I’ve noticed previously that after the monthly sweep, I sometimes have a small number of Avios remaining. I’ve never investigated in detail to check what dates they were earned, but in your scenario, it feels a bit too soon for them to go across.

      • Dev says:

        For a sweep today, they usually use the Avios balance from yesterday.

  • Waddle says:

    Any tips on how to empty a BAEC account in my household with less than 1,000 Avios in it? I don’t have an Iberia or Avios.com account so transferring in and out isn’t really doable.

    • Peter 64K says:

      Why not set up an avios.com account so you can move them in and out, as you don’t have one. Most likely the easiest option and no skin off your nose having the extra account 🙂

  • Nathaniel says:

    Avios.com used to do the same thing (as the Virgin Atlantic site) with registered cards giving extra points. Has this been replaced anywhere?

    • Grant says:

      It certainly used to be offered on BA’s shopping portal but I’ve not noticed it more recently when signing in, so it may have been withdrawn.

      • RussellH says:

        Still there the last time I looked, but you cannot add / delete / update cards “while they review the offer”.

      • Alex Sm says:

        Just be careful with all this – registering all your cards for all websites. Some of them do not give you rewards if you register the cards with other similar schemes. I has this in the past with Caffe Nero if I am not mistaken

    • Dev says:

      Still there but adding cards functionality isn’t there as RussellH has noted above.

      • Chas says:

        I’ve had my cards registered on BAEC shopping site for over a year, and never recyanything. Then 6 months ago I found the same functionality on Virgins site, and registered my cards there too. It seems to work really well with Virgin. Seems like the BA one is just broken.

  • Tom says:

    OT: How long does it take to add a Virgin account to Amex MR? I have been waiting about 5 days for my account to be verified and I could do with them in there now!

    • roberto says:

      Had the same issue I suggest you phone and it should be done instantly. Mine was.

  • RussellH says:

    OT:-

    2 Questions:

    1) How long does it take for an initial points transfer from Heathrow Rewards to Aer Lingus?

    2) BA Holidays are supposed to give you one Avio per £1 of the cost of the package. Got 699 last year posted the same time as the final leg of the return journey. I have the flight Avios, but nothing (yet) for the holiday package. Looking at the “Claim Missing Avios” link, BA Holidays does not seem to fit any of the categories. Any help / advice gratefully received.
    Thanks.

    • Stu N says:

      Holiday Avios can take a couple of weeks to come through. I’d give it a month from your return flight then phone BA Holidays (just go through the new booking/ flight and hotel option on the phone) if they still haven’t appeared.

  • GeoffB says:

    Your link to the Virgin Atlantic in-store shopping scheme did not work. I logged on to the Virgin website, found 3 shopping partners then a few other partners but nothing related to Waitrose. Can you help please?

    • Rhys says:

      It’s the second link, where it says “To sign up…”

      • GeoffB says:

        Sorry…. the second link on which page?

        • Grant says:

          If you have logged in and registered cards then you don’t need to do anything else. Any spend at Waitrose on one of the registered cards will earn points.

          If you need to register a card(s) then click My Shopping at the top, then Instore Cards from the drop down menu. There is a ‘Register Card’ button on the subsequent page.

        • GeoffB says:

          Thanks Grant, all done now. It’s a completely different subset of the website

  • Dev says:

    Haven’t had any posted since the end of January but I do receive the points pending emails. Haven’t received any points for spend at Byron, which is participating in the InStore offer.

    • Nick_C says:

      I ate in Byron last Thursday and got an email from VAFC this morning advising points pending.

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