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New British Airways business class lounge at New York JFK airport about to open

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There is good news for anyone heading to New York next week.  The fully refurbished British Airways Galleries Club lounge is about to open.

The lounge partly opened last week.  British Airways told me yesterday that the full space should be open at the ‘end of this week or early next week’.

British Airways Galleries Club lounge New York JFK

I have been promised a full set of photographs so keep an eye out on HfP.

The Galleries Club lounge can be accessed by anyone with a Club World ticket or who has a British Airways Silver card or oneworld equivalent.

I will be in New York in June and will do a full review then.  The image below is one of the mock-ups of how the new BA facilities will look.  There is a special BA website on the changes at JFK which you can read here.


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (October 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

Get 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

30,000 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

50,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large 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.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

10,000 points bonus – plus an extra 500 points for our readers Read our full review

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

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

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

Up to 80,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

Get up to 40,000 points as a sign-up offer 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.

Comments (166)

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

  • Tim says:

    O/T is anyone having issues registering to top up on the Tesco mobile website?

    I keep getting the same message of check your details are correct and you should only register your payment details on one account.

    My card has not been registered before and the details are correct.

    • BJ says:

      I think most have found it best just to ignore the website and the app. Call 282 to add your clubcard number, after receiving text to confirm this call 4444 to top up.

      • Liz says:

        2nd batch of 2k pts out of 5 have posted today! I followed your instructions!

        • BJ says:

          I’m going to wind up with sims 11 & 12 today so 115k avios for £480. Much more than I have been in the habit of paying for avios but with collection opportunities diminishing and cash fares creeping up I decided to take this opportunity. Now, if only we could get a Tesco conversion bonus 🙂

        • Liz says:

          Currently using up some of the data bought on our caravan travels. Feeling very high tech as I have tethered 2 devices to my phone for the first time! 😂

        • Grant says:

          Quite a haul, BJ. How many sims are you putting through per account? Presumably you’ve been sticking to x2 per card, but interested to know if more than x2 per account works ok.

        • Shoestring says:

          attaboy BJ, I don’t have that many Tesco a/cs so could feasibly have got it 4x & kind of regret missed opp, a la IB 90K I guess but you don’t need reminding about that!

        • BJ says:

          @Liz, it has always worked well for me, so much so I’ve never used a sim in my 4.5 year old LTE tablet.
          @Grant, all 4k points across 10 clubcard accounts. Today will be my first day chancing 4k+ on one account but at least two people have now reported that works.

        • Grant says:

          Thanks BJ – I’ve just found an old clubcard which is still attached to my account so I’ll try another 2 sims.

        • Nick_C says:

          Just to confirm it works on multiple cards per account. I’ve done 4 sim cards on four Club Cards in one account. All worked ok.

          Separate club card numbers for each debit card (2) credit card (1) and the original one that I got for shopping.

          I’ve stuck to one sim per clubcard though in case the second one triggers a manual check. It’s obviously not in the spirit of the deal as after two SIMS I’m clearly no longer a new customer.

        • BJ says:

          @Harry, I am trying to make the right calls this year after a number of bass ones last year, so far so good. Have 5 family clubcard accounts at my home and another 5 at my parents home. No longer required really but they were useful in the good old days.

        • BJ says:

          Thanks @Nick. When using the debit card where do we find the clubcard number? Is it just the 16 digit card number itself?

        • xcalx says:

          BJ I’m going to wind up with sims 11 & 12 today so 115k avios for £480. I am not understanding this. Have you put £40 on each sim.
          We have eight clubcard accounts with 1 sim registered on each and applied £20 voucher on each. I picked up another 8 sims and £20 vouchers yesterday . Am I correct in thinking I use the same 8 clubcard accounts again. £320 for £960 off an RCCL cruise, maybe

        • BJ says:

          @xcalx, no, sorry for the confusion. I was thinking of my own clubcard accounts. Ten sims across 5 accounts with 2 Sims per account with £20/SIM on each account, and plans to add a further 2 Sims with £20 each to one of those accounts today. That I have done the same with 5 accounts for my parents was lost in translation sorry.

        • xcalx says:

          @ BJ Thanks. I have now put the other 8 x £20 vouchers onto new sims using the 8 clubcard accounts. Was able to use the saver vouchers from last year.

      • Nick_C says:

        Just text “Clubcard” to 28578 and then reply to the SMS

      • Nick_C says:

        @BJ – ClubCard number is printed on the back of the debit card. Bottom left. Starts 634004…

      • the_real_a says:

        IF you are allowed to keep them… People should read up on the history of these offers and then take a view if the risk is worth it.

  • ChrisC says:

    For clarity the photo with the oval light fitting in the ceiling is of the food court area – as per the BA website – rather than the lounge.

    But it’s good this is all finally finished after starting in January last year. It’ll have a 5 year or so lifespan before BA moves to T8 and T7 gets demolished.

  • Anna says:

    I’m flying back from JFK in CW at the beginning of June so will look forward to visiting the lounge, thanks for the heads up!

    • BJ says:

      OT @Anna, not sure if you caught it but Simon added a comment late last night that selreferral going in the BA basic-BAPP direction worked for him.

  • BJ says:

    Isn’t the Laithwaites offer cummulative? If si it could be triggered with two introductory offers and something else costing at least 2p.

  • Cat says:

    Ah, Tesco Wine – once I used a 1500 bonus avios offer to order 6 bottles of Château Phélan Ségur. Despite the order being just for 6 bottles, Tesco Wine somehow managed to process the order twice, charged me twice and sent me 12 bottles, and over 3000 avios. When I phoned them to point out their mistake, they offered to refund me 50% of the cost of the second case, rather than collect.

    That was a serendipitous bargain!

    I miss Tesco Wine!

    • Anna says:

      +1 – no-one else stocks my favourite Jacktone Ranch merlot; I am now down to my last case which is being drunk extremely sparingly!

      • Cat says:

        We have the last bottle of Phelan Segur waiting for a special occasion!

  • xcalx says:

    IB have extended MAD-SJU from summer only to Yearly.

  • Delbert says:

    Would appreciate some advice, please.

    Flying to Bangkok via Zurich this weekend and wondering how it works with duty-free at LHR T2.

    Will my boarding pass from LHR to ZRH pick up as an international flight (rather than European) when I purchase duty-free at LHR.

    Many thanks in advance.

    • BJ says:

      Years since I’ve done it but they used to put it in a marked and sealed duty free bag that you could carry through to your final destination. No idea if that’s changed.

    • Anna says:

      As long as you’re travelling straight through to Bangkok (i.e. no stopover in Zurich), it should be fine. I have done this when travelling long haul from MAN via LHR. If you will have to go through security again at Zurich, however, you will very likely need to have any bottles in the correct sealed bags, which Duty Free staff don’t supply automatically. I would also suggest checking the policy at Zurich to make sure the Swiss authorities allow sealed items to be carried in hand luggage.

      I have previously circumvented restrictions by putting duty free alcohol bought before a connecting flight into a carry-on case then checking it in prior to the last flight.

    • BJ says:

      I should add, take care not to exceed your Thai allowance otherwise you could find yourself in big trouble. If there is more than one of you then each absolutely must carry their own allowance only to avoid problems.

    • Delbert says:

      Thanks BJ and Anna.

      Yes, straight through to BKK with no stopover. I’ll go for it, get sealed bag(s) at LHR and split allowance between my wife and I prior to arriving in BKK to circumvent any allowance issues at Swampy. We travel twice a year to BKK.

  • Mark says:

    Was in the jfk lounge last night. Food was fantastic. I got a sneak peek in the new lounge, alas I wasn’t aloud to take any pictures, but it’s very smart and very much like the mock up pictures.

    They’re just waiting for the various authorities to stamp their aproval on it and it will be open.

    Gutted I missed the full opening by a few days.

    • Anna says:

      Really looking forward to this – I’ve got my first F in May for my birthday, travelling back in J so both legs should be quite a treat!

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

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