Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

NEW: Get a 20,000 Avios sign-up bonus with Capital on Tap’s new small business Mastercard

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EDIT:  This article is now out of date.  Capital On Tap has relaunched with just one Avios card, Business Rewards, which is better than both of the cards described below.  Click here to read our review of Capital On Tap Business Rewards.  We still have a higher sign-up bonus for our readers!

Capital on Tap has launched a second small business Mastercard, the On Tap Club card, which earns Avios – and we have negotiated a higher sign up bonus for our readers.

This card offers a generous 20,000 Avios when you take it out, with an extra 500 Avios for you as a Head for Points reader.

Back in February we looked at the new Capital Club small business Mastercard.  This was the answer for all of the people who have emailed me in search of a good travel rewards card for their business purchases.

You can find out more about Capital Club here.  The card has a £99 annual fee (tax deductible as a business expense) and earns 0.5 Avios per £1 spent.  There is a sign-up bonus of 5,000 Avios if you spend £5,000 within three months.  As this Capital Club article explains, you also get 250 extra Avios as a HfP reader.

Capital on Tap has launched the ‘On Tap Club’ card for bigger spenders

There is now a 2nd way to earn Avios with a small business Mastercard via Capital on Tap.

And, as with the cheaper Capital Club card, we negotiated a special extra sign-up bonus for Head for Points readers if you use our promo code when you apply.

This is the card:

Earn Avios with On Tap Club Mastercard

It’s called the On Tap Club card.

Interest rate information:  Your interest rate is based on your business profile and can be as low as 9.9% APR.  The standard interest rate for marketing purposes is 39.9% APR.

You can find full details on their website here.  Read on first, however, because there is a special higher sign up bonus for HfP readers.

What does the On Tap Club card offer?

The On Tap Club card is aimed at small businesses and sole traders.  Whilst you may not have heard of Capital on Tap, it already has 50,000 customers for its existing ‘no rewards’ payment card.  The Avios cards are their first move into the rewards market.

This is what the new On Tap Club Card offers your business:

20,000 Capital on Tap points (converts to 20,000 Avios) for signing up and spending £5,000 within 3 months

1 Capital on Tap point for every £1 you spend (converts to 1 Avios)

No foreign exchange fees when spending overseas

No ATM fees if withdrawing cash on the card

Up to 56 days interest free credit on purchases (minimum monthly repayment is the greater of 10% of balance or £250)

Up to 20 free supplementary cards for your staff

The card has an annual fee of £249.  This is obviously tax deductible as a business expense.

The maximum credit limit on offer is £50,000.

And an extra bonus for Head for Points readers!

If you use promo code headforpoints when signing up for the On Tap Club card, you will receive an additional 500 Capital on Tap points.  This is worth an additional 500 Avios.

The site will still show 20,000 Capital on Tap points as your bonus but the extra 500 will be added separately.  If there are any problems, let me know and I can quickly chase it up.

Who can apply?

The On Tap Club card is aimed at sole traders as well as small businesses.  The company appears to be flexible in who they accept:

if you are a UK limited company or limited partnership with turnover of £24,000+ then you should be eligible

if you are a VAT registered sole trader then you should be eligible. 

if you are a sole trader under the VAT threshold but above the £24,000 turnover threshold then applications are looked at on a case by case basis – if you have a functioning website and are clearly in business then I am told you should be eligible

Applicants must not have a CCJ against themselves or their business in the past 12 months.

Whilst it doesn’t make any day to day difference in how you use the card, On Tap Club is not a credit card.  It is structured as a prepaid Mastercard which is funded by Capital on Tap.  As far as I can see this doesn’t make any difference to your legal rights, as Section 75 protection does not apply to business credit cards.  In the event of any disputes over purchases, you request a Mastercard chargeback.

How do the two Capital on Tap cards compare?

Here is a quick summary of the two Capital on Tap products.  It is slightly confusing because they do not have the same points conversion rate.

The £99 per year Capital Club card offers:

10,000 Capital on Tap points for signing up and spending £5,000 within three months

1 Capital on Tap point per £1 spent

A 2:1 conversion rate into Avios so the sign-up bonus is worth 5,000 Avios and the on-going earning rate is 0.5 Avios per £1

15 free supplementary cards for your staff

No FX fees and no ATM fees 

500 bonus points (250 Avios) if you use code headforpoints when applying

The new £249 On Tap Club card offers:

20,000 Capital on Tap points for signing up and spending £5,000 within three months

1 Capital on Tap point per £1 spent

A 1:1 conversion rate into Avios so the sign-up bonus is worth 20,000 Avios and the on-going earning rate is 1 Avios per £1

20 free supplementary cards for your staff

No FX fees and no ATM fees 

500 bonus points (500 Avios) if you use code headforpoints when applying

Some sole traders, including myself, use a personal credit card for their business expenses.  A lot of self employed people – or their accountants – are not happy doing this, however, and it is clearly not sensible to give personal credit cards to your staff.  You need a dedicated business payment card in these circumstances.

Until now, if you wanted to earn rewards from a small business payment card you were reliant on American Express Gold Business or American Express Platinum Business.  These are good products but obviously have issues over Amex acceptance, especially with small suppliers.

The Capital on Tap Mastercards are small business cards that can be used everywhere that Mastercard is accepted.

You need to look at the maths based on what you spend, including how much you spend in foreign currencies (the card has no FX fees).  The £99 or £249 annual fee is a deductible expense so the net cost to you will be lower.  In Year 1 you are getting a sign-up bonus which converts into 5,000 Avios or 20,000 Avios respectively.

(Use the special headforpoints promo code and that increases to 5,250 Avios or 20,500 Avios respectively.)

Day to day you are collecting 0.5 Avios per £1 spent (£99 card) or 1 Avios per £1 spent (£249 card).  If you and your staff have a high level of business expenditure then this could work out very nicely for you.  Remember that you can have 15-20 free supplementary cards.

HMRC accepts Capital on Tap

Here is one good reason to get the card.  HMRC accepts Capital on Tap cards to make tax payments with no fees.  This is because HMRC treats it as a personal debit card.

This means that you can earn Avios on all of your PAYE, VAT, corporation tax and indeed personal tax payments.  At 1 Avios per £1 on the new On Tap Club card this is a valuable extra benefit.

But don’t forget ….

Capital on Tap points can be converted into cashback as well as Avios.  You can choose to take 1p of cash instead of 1 Avios.

If you don’t value Avios at more than 1p (and in most scenarios you can get more than 1p for them as this article shows) then take your Capital on Tap points as cashback instead.

Remember to use our Capital on Tap promo code when you apply

If the Capital on Tap Capital Club or On Tap Club cards sound interesting for your business, you can find out more and apply on their website here.

Remember to add promo code headforpoints to receive the extra 500 points as a sign-up bonus.

Disclaimer: Head for Points is a journalistic website. Nothing here should be construed as financial advice, and it is your own responsibility to ensure that any product is right for your circumstances. Recommendations are based primarily on the ability to earn miles and points. The site discusses products offered by lenders but is not a lender itself. Robert Burgess, trading as Head for Points, is regulated and authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority to act as an independent credit broker.


best travel rewards credit cards

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – February 2025 update

If you are looking to apply for a new credit card, here are our top recommendations based on the current 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

Get 5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £20,000 Read our full review

You can see our full directory of all UK cards which earn airline or hotel points here. Here are the best of the other deals currently available.

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

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

30,000 Avios and the famous annual 2-4-1 voucher Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

50,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Earning miles and points from small business cards

If you are a sole trader or run a small company, you may also want to check out these offers:

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up 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

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 1 Avios per £1 Read our full review

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

For a non-American Express option, we also recommend the Barclaycard Select Cashback card for sole traders and small businesses. It is FREE and you receive 1% cashback when you spend at least £2,000 per month.

Barclaycard Select Cashback Business Credit Card

Get 1% cashback when you spend at least £2,000 per month* Read our full review

Comments (87)

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

  • Mr Entitled says:

    It’s better to get something than nothing on business spend but I agree on the avios front. Any plans for the rewards to be extended to other suppliers?

    Amex acceptance is too low and curve is no longer an option. There is very definitely a gap in the market here for Capital on Tap.

  • BryCel says:

    They are making this so messy! £199 for the same card with no extra points, £249 with 20000 points. Both cards are similar.

  • ashic says:

    This is interesting. I signed up at the end of March for Rewards Club. I got charged £199, and have a 1:1 conversion rate. I can’t recall what the sign up bonus is though, so will have to wait till I clock £5K on the card. It does say “Rewards Club”, so I’m guessing it’s the same as the £249 card mentioned here, only that they’ve upped the fee.

    • Mike Bickle says:

      That’s what I have £199 for 20500 bonus. No bonus though. It was changed same day of the original article from, I think, £99 for 10500. Now it looks like it’s changed again.

      • Mike Bickle says:

        Should have said no bonus yet

      • Joseph Heenan says:

        I got the same £199 card after the previous article – as far as I can see the only difference is they’ve put the price up by £50. I got an email confirming the bonus too (the same email where they offered you the option to switch to the £99 card due to the confusion).

        • Rob says:

          Correct. This was a short term trial which we were asked not to cover, but they decided quickly that the economics did not work.

        • Joseph Heenan says:

          Rob: interesting

          Is the profit on a corporate card so low that £50 is make or break? Or is it more that they don’t want to make a loss on the bonus or want to discourage some lower spending customers from applying? Or that they figure that £250 is competitive enough?

          • Rob says:

            From my meetings with them, they are focused on slow and steady growth. It is surprisingly small business – the Barclaycard in-house gym will be bigger than their office. First time I went around the CEO made my coffee. They deliberately do not want people applying just for the bonus. When you are accepted they are obliged to have extra capital available in case you spend up to your credit limit on Day 1. If 100 readers apply today and get a £20k limit, that is another £2m potential exposure to be managed in a day. Peanuts for Amex, but not for smaller players.

        • Joseph Heenan says:

          Thanks for that insight Rob – it’s great to hear a bit more about these companies! I didn’t realise they were that small – it seems they’re punching well about their weight class, their offer compares very favourably to many of the other fintechs who end up charging similar (or much higher) amounts for corporate cards that don’t have any rewards attached.

          Very happy with capital on tap so far, just hope that at least get a feed into Xero sorted out soon.

  • Joseph Heenan says:

    Re: HMRC & VAT – we usually pay this via d/debit – would I need to cancel the direct debit or do HMRC automatically reduce it if you make a card payment?

    • Mr Dee says:

      Well I paid online once and then hmrc took the full direct debit so I assume no

    • ken says:

      What are the Fees for using a business credit card to pay VAT, PAYE etc ?

      Was between 1.8% and 2.8% depending on which card in 2018

  • Joseph Heenan says:

    That’s my understanding, yes. Using the Avios for personal use seems to be the more beneficial option if you can make use of them at more than 0.6p or so per Avios.

  • Scott says:

    Is their website down at the moment? Keep getting “an unexpected error has occurred” when I click to reply. Have tried different web browsers too.

  • Rob says:

    You are right but I didn’t want to wade into areas where I am not qualified to comment.

    • Mr Dee says:

      well no that would make no sense not giving people the whole options of the card

  • Mr Dee says:

    The 1% cash back is tempting but the £250 is hefty without added benefits as it would mean I will need to spend a fair amount to make the annual fee pay off, well at least 10k compared to say a free card.

    • czechoslovakia says:

      Depends on how you look at it really. This month i put £5k of foreign travel spend through. Thats £150 of Amex FX fees saved, plus £50/5000k avios. Thats the £199 trial fee returned already. Not forgetting the £200/20k avios bonus on top. £4k of HMRC this month also is another £40/4000k avios.

      • Mr Dee says:

        Yes it does depend on what other cards you have available to use.

        I think with the bonus its worth a try to see how it goes for a year

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

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