Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Book good Qatar Airways business class flight deals from Scandinavia to Asia

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Qatar Airways is running another set of great offers from Sweden and Norway to Asia.  These are for flights ticketed before 2nd September.  You can travel at any point in the next year although I’d be surprised if there is much over Christmas and New Year.

Here are some sample prices from Stockholm:

Bangkok (16487 SEK, £1390)

Hong Kong (16430 SEK, £1385)

Manila (16567 SEK, £1397)

Phuket (17230 SEK, £1453)

The following destinations have good prices from Oslo (Stockholm is higher):

Singapore (16055 NOK, £1454)

Bali (17563 NOK, £1581)

Jakarta (14973 NOK, £1356)

If a particular Asian city is not listed above, it is worth looking at prices from both these departure points.

If you are trying to find these fares, you need to:

Book the outbound on a Sunday to Thursday

Book the inbound on a Monday to Friday

Remember that you earn Avios and British Airways tier points when you fly with Qatar Airways.  All of these trips earn you 560 tier points (four flights at 140 tier points each, with the change in Doha) which is virtually a British Airways Executive Club Silver card.

We have reviewed the Qatar Airways A380 business class seat here, the Boeing 787 business class here and the old-style Boeing 777 business class seat here.  The new Qsuite on most of the A350 fleet and some of the Boeing 777 fleet is covered here.

The Qatar Airways website has special pages covering the two main business class seats – the A380 / 787 / partial A350 version is here and Qsuite is explained here.

You can book on the Qatar Airways site here.

If you don’t have a credit card with 0% foreign exchange fees, your best option for paying is American Express Preferred Rewards Gold which offers triple points – 3 per £1 – when you book flight tickets in a foreign currency.  This is because the transaction triggers the ‘double points for airline spend’ and the ‘double points for foreign spend’ bonuses.

PS.  We recently wrote about some great Qatar Airways fares from Izmir in Turkey, with a caveat that this was clearly inconvenient for most people.  One reader dropped us a line to say that his parents live in Izmir and he was able to find flights to Bali in Business Class over Christmas for just over £1,000.  He was very happy – a family visit and an incredibly cheap Christmas break in one!

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.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

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

Qatar Airways and Privilege Club

Comments (159)

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

  • jarvester says:
    30 Aug30 August 09:21

    OT: just have been told by an AMEX rep that hotel status benefits will cease the minute you cancel your Platinum card. They used to keep running for a whole year after they were triggered, regardless of whether you kept the card, but she was adamant this has now changed. Was she correct? Anybody can shed some light? Thanks

    • Doug M says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:23

      Good to know if someone has recently cancelled? Real or just more misinformation scare tactics out of Brighton.

      • Waddle says:
        30 Aug30 August 09:32

        I downgraded to Green last week. My Marriott Bonvoy is still showing as Gold.

    • Rhys says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:39

      I cancelled my Plat a few months ago. I’m still Marriott Bonvoy Gold according to the Bonvoy website…..

    • Benilyn says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:40

      I cancelled my Amex plat about Feb-19, still holding all my hotel status.

    • Rob says:
      30 Aug30 August 11:19

      Almost certainly complete nonsense.

    • Pangolin says:
      30 Aug30 August 15:37

      I cancelled mine in July 2018 and I still have status in Radisson (Gold), Shangri-La (Jade) and Melia (Gold)!

      • jarvester says:
        31 Aug31 August 15:26

        ok cheers everyone. what about hotel programs that still show as “pending” on my plat dashboard? do I need to wait until the status goes live or good to cancel?

  • bsuije says:
    30 Aug30 August 09:27

    I feel like an old person saying this, but I remember them olden days where a good sale fare was around the £1k mark…

    • Jonathan says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:52

      Look at the pound against almost every other currency & you’ll see that these fares would have been around £1k pre May 2016!

      • John says:
        30 Aug30 August 11:18

        These fares are in Swedish kronor, which is currently 12 per £. Apart from during 2015, the SEK has generally been less than 12 for the past 10 years. SEK has done quite badly against the euro since 2012 (which the Swedish central bank wanted), so no, the fares are not that great in SEK terms either. I got several sub-13000 SEK fares in 2016 or earlier.

        NOK is more related to the oil price and I haven’t been paying attention to these fares so can’t really say.

    • TGLoyalty says:
      30 Aug30 August 21:33

      Yep. You can get fares from the uk for £1400-1600 In some sales so going to Scandinavia for these flights isn’t appealing.

      However if you want a mini break before your trip it could work.

    • Polly says:
      30 Aug30 August 23:52

      Or less!

  • John says:
    30 Aug30 August 09:32

    Although I don’t have the extra 3000 offered for supplementary, I noticed they have upped my refer a friend to 18000 on my gold business card !

    • Freddy says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:37

      I’ll have to take a look – thanks

    • Neil Donoghue says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:44

      I can confirm this – Now being offered 18,000 points for referring @ Rob

    • Young L says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:51

      It has always been 18000. Previous change only affected personal cards.

      • Neil Donoghue says:
        30 Aug30 August 09:52

        Incorrect! It has never been 18K for the Gold business. You must be confused with the personal plat card

        • Waddle says:
          30 Aug30 August 09:59

          It has always been 18k from the biz Plat. Good to see the biz Gold has been increased. Personal plat is 12k.

          • Neil Donoghue says:
            30 Aug30 August 10:01

            Amex becoming generous overnight….Very odd….I wonder if the Gold Business annual fee will go up to £200 tomorrow! HA

  • Benilyn says:
    30 Aug30 August 09:40

    OT: Possible to open the biz amex card w/o actually having a biz?

    • Neil Donoghue says:
      30 Aug30 August 09:45

      Nope! They carry out various checks and require bank account statements

      • Freddy says:
        30 Aug30 August 09:57

        They didn’t ask me for bank statements but may have looked me up online or checked my other amex cards for business spend.

    • Rob says:
      30 Aug30 August 11:18

      No. Well, not quite true. If you can peruade a bank to open a bank account for you in a business name then Amex is likely to give you a card.

  • JShank says:
    30 Aug30 August 09:53

    Re HSBC – I had the conversion bonus appear on my screen previously but when I logged in today it had gone. Suspect we may have missed out on the extra 25%. Hope not though!

  • Waddle says:
    30 Aug30 August 09:57

    OT: Supp bonus
    I still haven’t received the 3000 MR points bonus for adding a supplementary on my Gold card (I even did it via page that shows what you’d earn for every card). Will a call to Brighton resolve this easily? Thanks

    • Nick_C says:
      30 Aug30 August 17:09

      Same issue. I’ve only had the sup for a week, but expected the bonus to post when the card was activated. Was planning to wait a couple of weeks before chasing.

      How long have you been waiting?

  • Marco Meldrew says:
    30 Aug30 August 10:02

    O/T
    I recently took out an Amex Platinum card and have qualified for sign up bonus, etc.

    If I now wish to cancel, but retain the Membership Rewards points, do I go to a free charge card?

    Is there any minimum qualification period I need to keep the Platinum card to keep the bonuses?

    Do I just call up Amex customer services to do this?

    Many thanks.

    • Rob says:
      30 Aug30 August 11:13

      Best bet is to switch to the Amex Rewards Credit Card which is free for life and keeps your points alive. You can then cancel Platinum as soon you’ve registered the ARCC card for the fee refund.

      • TGLoyalty says:
        30 Aug30 August 16:34

        or switch to gold and keep it for 12 months for free. spend the £15k then close it once the 10k bonus has posted

        • Optimus Prime says:
          30 Aug30 August 16:44

          Is it still free when switching from Platinum to Gold? I thought they charged you the annual free straight away.

          • Andrew says:
            30 Aug30 August 20:27

            There’s currently a special offer – I did this last week: they’ll downgrade you to the Preferred Rewards Gold *CHARGE*card (note not credit card) as a special deal for plat cardholders and will let you have the first year fee-free.

          • TGLoyalty says:
            30 Aug30 August 21:35

            Well what I was actually thinking was get a referral from a friend (or yourself) and apply for a gold credit card which isn’t a downgrade.

  • NICK says:
    30 Aug30 August 11:25

    from yesterday’s monese article:
    What is this particular way?

    The Original David says:
    A Monese account, which seems to be a bit like Revolut but not as good in several ways.
    Reply
    Nick_C says:
    29 August 2019 at 16:03
    But better than Revolut in one particular way!

    • The Original David says:
      30 Aug30 August 12:10

      I assume it’s about the manufactured spend potential from funding your Monese account through Post Office/PayPoint, but there’s plenty of MS potential with Revolut as well, so not sure what the distinguishing feature is…

      • SultanofCroydon says:
        30 Aug30 August 12:48

        Can someone delete these comments?
        This is not kind of information that any UK-based points collector with common sense would post to an open platform…

        • Ian M says:
          30 Aug30 August 14:05

          Yeah slow hand clap for the people posting this stuff.

          • The Original David says:
            30 Aug30 August 14:14

            It’s on the Monese website!! Do you really think Monese doesn’t know about it…?

          • Callum says:
            30 Aug30 August 21:17

            I always find this funny, as you’re effectively saying “it’s fine that someone told me this information, but we need to make sure other people don’t find out”.

            I get the fact that the more people who know about it, the more likely it is to be stopped, but it seems incredibly selfish.

      • Anon says:
        30 Aug30 August 23:05

        Amex put me under a financial review and all I will say is that they didn’t take kindly to all the monese top ups at the post office

        • Harry T says:
          30 Aug30 August 23:34

          But how much did you top up at the Post Office, and how often? And was that your main spend on the card?

    • Jay H says:
      30 Aug30 August 12:16

      Rumour has it you can use your Amex to top up Monese at the PO 😉

      • Jonny says:
        30 Aug30 August 12:27

        Are there any limits on this?

      • NICK says:
        30 Aug30 August 13:13

        But what about the fees?

        from the Monese website:
        On our Starter plan, Post Office top-ups cost 2% of the sum with £2 minimum per transaction and the funds will arrive in your account on the next day. PayPoint top-ups costs 3.5% with £3 minimum but funds are instantly available.

      • Alex says:
        30 Aug30 August 14:47

        how? I thought it was cash top-up only

        • Jay H says:
          30 Aug30 August 16:20

          Nope! Well not in my local… I just stick my amex in when they ask for payment

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