Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Good Etihad business class sale to a Dubai bus stop (!) from €739 or £1,093

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

If you are planning a holiday in Dubai this Winter or next Spring, Etihad is running an aggressive sale at the moment.

I should say up front that there are also good deals available to parts of Asia. However, with covid restrictions still in place I thought it best to focus on the bargains available to …. erm …. a bus stop in Dubai.

OK, let me explain how this works.

It is normal practice for airlines to sell indirect flights for less than the cost of direct flights. Every HfP reader should know that, for example, London to Bangkok on a direct British Airways flight is likely to be more expensive than London to Bangkok via Frankfurt on Lufthansa. People will pay for convenience.

What we have here is simply the same philosophy at play. It’s just that, with Dubai and Abu Dhabi under an hour apart by road, there is no point in flying you between the two airports. Etihad puts on a bus instead!

What’s the deal?

Etihad is offering good deals from Madrid, Amsterdam, Brussels and London to a bus stop in Dubai.

The Dubai bus stop used by Etihad has been given the airport code XNB.

Availability is excellent.

Note that the fare may originally look a little higher than the headline numbers shown below but will reprice on the final screen. For Madrid, for example, the outbound flights show as €501 but later falls.

Madrid to Dubai in Etihad business class for €739 return:

(EDIT: Rome and Milan also seem to price at €739)

Etihad business class deals Madrid

London Heathrow to Dubai in Etihad business class for £1,093 return:

Etihad business class deal

Etihad is also flying from Dublin but I couldn’t find a fare under €1,300 return.

Do you actually need to take the bus?

Good question. Could you book these tickets to get a cheap trip to Abu Dhabi?

Let’s put it this way. Under no circumstances can you drop a leg of a flight and keep your ticket intact. If Etihad flew between Abu Dhabi and Dubai, and you didn’t turn up for the last leg to Dubai, your return flight would immediately be cancelled.

Similarly, if you failed to turn up at Dubai for the first leg of the flight home, your Abu Dhabi to London flight would be cancelled.

Will bad things happen if you don’t get on the bus? I’ve honestly got no idea, but for safety I’d take the ride – even if it means turning around in Dubai and getting a taxi straight back to Abu Dhabi.

What is Etihad like?

Here is my last published review of Etihad’s Business Class Studio. 

It is light years ahead of British Airways Club World, although Club Suite is a different story. You can’t guarantee getting Club Suite, of course.

What about my miles?

Etihad is not in an airline alliance. It does, however, have a lot of airline partners with whom you can redeem.

Your main options are:

  • credit to an American Airlines account (AA is an Etihad partner) which gets you access to oneworld redemptions including British Airways
  • credit to Air Europa – IAG is in the process of buying Air Europa and its frequent flyer scheme will swich to Avios when the takeover is complete. There is a risk that the deal does not happen if the airline collapses or the EU blocks it on competition grounds

Before booking, look at the details of the Dubai bus service on this page of the Etihad website.

The main Etihad booking page is here.

Thanks to Luxury Flight Club.

PS. If you are in the market for a longer-haul Etihad sale trip from London, here are the headline Etihad sale prices on offer until 10th October:

  • Bangkok £1,499
  • Phuket £1,899
  • Seoul £1,499
  • Seychelles £1,999
  • Singapore £1,599
  • Tokyo £1,999

It’s also worth checking prices from Amsterdam, Brussels and Madrid.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 65,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

How to earn Etihad Guest miles from UK credit cards

How to earn Etihad Guest miles from UK credit cards (April 2025)

Etihad Guest does not have a UK credit card.  However, you can earn Etihad Guest miles by converting Membership Rewards points earned from selected UK American Express cards.

Cards earning Membership Rewards points include:

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

Membership Rewards points convert at 1:1 into Etihad Guest miles which is an attractive rate.  The cards above all earn 1 Membership Rewards point per £1 spent on your card, which converts to 1 Etihad Guest mile.

The American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card earns double points (2 per £1) on all flights you charge to it, not just with Etihad but with any airline.

Category

Etihad and Etihad Guest

Comments (104)

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

  • Ravi says:
    6 Oct6 October 05:39

    The bus service is complimentary .I have booked multi city trip using the recent Amex offer .I booked the ticket as LHR-AUH -XNB for a Friday night and see the Dubai expo and take the flight back on Monday morning from AUH to LHR(Direct not starting at XNB) If i did book it as round trip it was expensive than the multi city after the Amex offer and the 10% off code for Amex booking (never expires) compared to multi city.

    Recently the prices dropped so called in Customer services to take the voucher and rebooked with the voucher and the balance was left as Etihad Money in the account which expires in two years time.

    • FCP says:
      6 Oct6 October 06:04

      Ravi, what is the Amex 10% off code?

      • Sandra says:
        6 Oct6 October 09:56

        Does this still work Ravi, unless I’m mistaken/misread, it says for flights up to June 2020?

      • Chris H says:
        6 Oct6 October 18:46

        Did not work for me. The prices were the same as on the main page, and even went through as far as putting in the payment details. The article said put in the first 4 digits of an Amex card. That also did not work.
        However, clicking on the promo code box and typing in AMXD0120 did work. £100 off the £2000 price was, I suspect, actually 10% off the flight element, and nothing of the taxes part. I was happy with £100 🙂

    • Ravi says:
      6 Oct6 October 06:41

      O/T :I called up Europcar to remove my account and delete the data about me .If i don’t do it this way my driving license number or DOB clashes in creating a new account.
      Opened up a new Europcar account as a USA resident (Amex platinum is my hire car benefit) and did upgrade my Europcar account to Privilege Elite for 45GBP on Ebay . I have applied code from flyer talk for the booking and I am paying 30GBP for intermediate car at AUH airport for 2 days.
      If I need to take the Etihad bus than I would have to move the car hire to Dxb.

      Last year over Christmas I have paid 270 pounds for 24 days at DXB T3 but didn’t get the free upgrade which comes with being Elite.

  • John says:
    6 Oct6 October 05:41

    I hope all the cheap fare buckets don’t start and end at 0300

  • Dominic says:
    6 Oct6 October 05:48

    The busbis also run by a third party, so I would be very surprised if it caused an issue by not taking it.

    Also, worth mentioning, check the bus location on Etihad’s website. The old bus stop is no longer used, but still shows up as a valid location on Google.

  • Tom says:
    6 Oct6 October 06:03

    Are these coming up as ‘business classic’ fares? If so then they include a chauffeur driven car within the UAE – so no need to take the bus.

    I’ve also confirmed with Etihad in the past (very helpful via Twitter) that they don’t consider the bus a sector. Missing it does not invalidate your ticket. I did this when I stayed in Dubai then moved to Abu Dhabi early.

  • FCP says:
    6 Oct6 October 06:04

    Can you not swap the buss for the limo service being in Business class?

    • Andrew says:
      6 Oct6 October 06:11

      Not at these prices – it’s the fare class which doesn’t get you chauffeur drive.

  • Andrew says:
    6 Oct6 October 06:14

    Also worth noting that Abu Dhabi has different Covid arrival rules to Dubai, requiring testing on day 2 and 6 so I think that might impact on these fares even when your final destination is Dubai.

    • Dominic says:
      6 Oct6 October 06:36

      Only if you stay in AUH. Think it is day 4 and 8, also, now. If you leave AUH and return on day 9, you are not breaching the rules. The test on arrival is free, and took about 2 hours to get a result (and you can leave the airport etc during this time).

      • Dominic says:
        6 Oct6 October 06:39

        Oh, and if you do stay, tests are available in a few malls in Abu Dhabi (or even at your hotel), base price is £12. I believe Etihad organise tests at your hotel for biz pax, but not certain on that

    • meta says:
      6 Oct6 October 06:39

      You can travel straight to Dubai if you have been vaccinated after taking a test on arrival, no need for extra tests.

  • Jeff Greene says:
    6 Oct6 October 06:17

    “ even if it means turning around in Dubai and getting a taxi straight back to Abu Dhabi.”

    Good god. Here’s me thinking that holidays are meant to be enjoyable

    • ChrisC says:
      6 Oct6 October 08:05

      If you can save a shed load of money then some people will do this sort of thing.

      Not much difference to say flying to e.g. AMS, staying the night, then starting your real trip ticketed from AMS

      Not for everyone but for those of us that do it it can be very worthwhile.

    • Rob says:
      6 Oct6 October 09:03

      Don’t do this with the Mrs and two young kids. If you’re 25, single and fancy a cheap break and a bit of fun to stick on social media ….

      • paul says:
        6 Oct6 October 10:03

        Rob, depends on the Mrs!

        and I assume you are referring simply to this DXB fare when you say do it!

        But

        Ex EU (and Libya in the good old days) in general can save staggeringly serious sums of money. My wife was happy to do ex EU from when my two kids could walk! Consequently, lots of very comfortable Bali and Hawaii trips over the years with the bonus of shed loads of Tier points and Avios. Everyone was gold or silver. Despite still spending £6k-£10k on a trip (family of 4) that was less than the cost of ex LHR fares alone.

        From Libya in 2008 and 2010 as a family of 4, we flew to Sydney in F for under £3,600 including getting to Libya and the stay (The hospitality we received has never been matched)

        The avios then used to do trips to Europe, Egypt, Jordan and the odd weekend away in New York in F for the two of us.
        For a while Cairo was a real sweet spot for Hawaii fights, as the fare allowed unlimited free stopovers. So we stopped for months at home in London before heading, New York, Washington, Philadelphia or LA, and still getting 2 weeks on Big Island Beaches. Washington and New York are great places to take kids.

        The last great saving was Turkish ex Cairo to Bali in 2019. This was under £900 each and again unlimited stops. The miles from that are covering 2 business class 1-way flights from New York to London next year for $400.

        So it can really pay, when we started we did the immediate turnrounds at the outstation but we decided that it was best thing was to go the day before and make a day trip and see the European cities. Open top buses were great for this and Dublin, Luxemburg, Milan, Amsterdam, and Copenhagen were all seen. I’d have to say my kids now have the bug and hopefully will be able to travel in the future themselves to see the sites they have had taste of.

        • Christopher says:
          6 Oct6 October 10:20

          Did an ex IST DONE (I think it was called) RTW in 2005 that saved incredible amounts of money

      • Jeff Greene says:
        6 Oct6 October 11:10

        Struggling to see what’s fun about a bus journey followed by a taxi journey going back to where I came from.

        Not sure what benefit I’d get from posting about it on social media.

        Each to their own though.

  • MrIO says:
    6 Oct6 October 06:40

    Use the code AMXD0120 for extra discount.

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

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? GET THE ONLY FREE SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!