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How many flights is British Airways operating at the moment?

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If you are wondering what is happening at Heathrow at the moment, I managed to get hold of the British Airways traffic figures for last Sunday.

Across the whole day, BA operated:

british airways passenger figures
  • 43 passenger aircraft arrivals
  • 41 passenger aircraft departures
  • 15 cargo-only arrivals
  • 18 cargo-only departures

Long-haul departures were 33% full whilst short-haul departures were 76% full. This doesn’t account for no-shows so the actual number of people travelling will have been lower.

I have the total passenger numbers too but it may be too sensitive to publish. It is a low four-digit number in each direction.

How to earn Avios points from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

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

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways BA Amex American Express card

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways BA Premium Plus American Express Amex credit card

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

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

Nectar American Express

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

American Express Platinum card Amex

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel 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:

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company 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 card

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

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

(Want to earn more Avios?  Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)

Category

British Airways and Avios

Comments (61)

  • George says:
    12 Feb12 February 08:13

    Cornercard will have no way of knowing if you’re on furlough, unless they call your employer or write to them, which they’re not going to do. And even then… Anyway, it’s none of their business and a lot of people on furlough have a surplus of cash waiting to be spent anyway.

    • Rob says:
      12 Feb12 February 08:36

      It is very hard to get a credit card if you are self employed at the moment though. Even Capital On Tap won’t touch you now unless you have a Limited Company.

      • Lloyd says:
        12 Feb12 February 09:18

        Let’s hope that this changes by the summer, as wife and I are both self employed, we stand to lose over 100,000 points between us if we can’t spend them!

      • Richard G says:
        12 Feb12 February 12:38

        This is news to me. What’s going on there?

        I am amused by the concept that my business of 20 years is less stable than if I was some random employee that a company could get rid of on a whim.

      • Pangolin says:
        13 Feb13 February 15:26

        True. My Experian rating is the maximum 999 yet the only credit cards it says are available to me are the Amex ones I already have!

        PS I understand that these ratings and actual suitability for credit are not one and the same but the point stands. Self employed? Computer says NO!

  • Brighton Belle says:
    12 Feb12 February 08:38

    What other methods are there to put a few points onto the LH account to stop points expiring?

    • E says:
      12 Feb12 February 08:52

      Think points expire 3 years after you got them regardless of what else you add to the account? So even if you added points now from Amex (not possible but an example), the just added points would be safe for 3 years from now but the points you gained 3 years ago would still expire imminently. The only ‘protective’ measure is the credit card.

      • Chris P says:
        12 Feb12 February 09:04

        There’s always the alternative of buying something from the Miles & More catalogue so at least you get something, rather than lose them completely. Sadly, their wine doesn’t seem available to UK residents but I used a 25% off points deal on Black Friday and now have a great glass teapot courtesy of Lufthansa!

        • Neil says:
          12 Feb12 February 09:57

          Where do they ship from if you buy something from the catalogue? Just wondering if you’ll now get stung for import duty.

          • kitten says:
            13 Feb13 February 02:44

            They shipped some Bose or Anker kit – can’t remember which – to me from Germany. pre-31 December though

          • Chris P says:
            13 Feb13 February 11:39

            My teapot was shipped from Germany BUT it was November 2020.

        • Alex Sm says:
          14 Feb14 February 20:36

          Converting them to Amazon voucher is the last resort (or an option for small amount – helped me a lot after MBNA cards were abandoned a couple of years ago)

      • Rob says:
        12 Feb12 February 12:38

        Correct. The only other option is to get LH status, but as they don’t do matches that is not an option.

  • Paul says:
    12 Feb12 February 10:08

    60 flights yesterday with 50% being ferry flights (ie) Cargo only.

    ISB and Africa have almost 100% load factors and, in the midst of this awful pandemic, one has to wonder why?

    • chabuddy geezy says:
      12 Feb12 February 13:11

      International students are still coming to the UK despite lockdown and remote teaching.

  • SH says:
    12 Feb12 February 10:23

    I flew to ACC on Monday for work and the First Wing check in staff told me they’re expecting 3000 departing passengers.

  • Andy S says:
    12 Feb12 February 12:30

    You could get a train from Horley to Gatwick Airport for £2 (less if you have a railcard) to aviod the £5 drop off charge or a shuttle bus.

    • Martin Louis says:
      12 Feb12 February 18:28

      But it’s the hassle of getting out of the car with luggage, getting into the station, onto a train, off again. Fine for 1 able bodied person but if there’s 2 or more then the savings go.

  • 1ATL says:
    13 Feb13 February 02:24

    Drop off at the Hilton South Terminal and walk through might be a work around moving forward. How about the North Terminal hotels (Sofitel, Premier Inn, Hampton)?

  • Alex Sm says:
    14 Feb14 February 23:35

    It would make a brilliant McKinsey-style recruitment task to test people’s logic and general knowledge.

    So, if we assume for simplicity that all short-haul flights are A320 and long-haul are a mix of B772 and B789, it will give us 180 seats for each short-haul and average 240 seats for each long-haul.

    Let’s also assume that LH and SH were roughly 1 to 2, i.e. 14 LH departures and 27 SH departures.

    LH: 14*240=3,360 and 33% of which are ca 1,100

    SH: 27*180=4,860 and 76% of which are ca 3,700

    The total is nearly 4,800, which is not exactly in low 4-digit, rather the middle of the range. There might be a flaw in my calculations, but can’t figure out where exactly. Any ideas?

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