What you missed on Head for Points last week

Welcome to the Head for Points weekly newsletter, full of the latest Avios, travel loyalty and travel credit card news, hints and tips.

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REMINDER: Exclusive HfP offers on the new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard coming soon

First up, I wanted to remind you that Head for Points will – at the end of March – be running an excusive sign-up offer on two new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard credit cards.

Don’t worry about missing out – we will send an extra email to our Weekly Newsletter subscribers on the day.

If you want to try your luck now, perhaps because you have some spending coming up which you need to trigger the sign-up bonus, you can apply for the free Barclaycard Avios credit card (5,000 Avios bonus) here. You can apply for the Barclaycard Avios Plus credit card (25,000 Avios bonus) here.

The first of our three introductory articles on the Barclaycard Avios Mastercards is here.

NEW DEAL: Get 40,000 Bonvoy points and Gold Elite status with the Marriott Bonvoy American Express

Marriott Bonvoy has launched a limited offer on the Marriott Bonvoy American Express card.

The sign up bonus is doubled to 40,000 Bonvoy points and, more interestingly, you will also receive Gold Elite status in Bonvoy until February 2024.

Let me be honest with you. Very few of our readers will qualify for the 40,000 points because it requires you to have had no personal American Express cards in the past 24 months. (Of course, your partner or a family member may qualify.)

Instead, look at it like this – you can effectively buy Marriott Gold Elite status to February 2024 for £75, which is the cost of the annual fee on the card. Everyone gets this benefit, even if they don’t qualify for the 40,000 points.

Full details are in this HfP article. You can apply here.

THREE WEEKS LEFT: Get 100,000 points with American Express Business Platinum

As a reminder, here are the – frankly a little bit crazy – limited time credit card sign-up bonuses on the two American Express small business payment cards.

American Express Business Platinum

Until 31st March, you will receive a crazy 100,000 American Express Membership Rewards points with American Express Business Platinum. Those would convert, for example, into 100,000 Avios or many other interesting things. Click for our full article or apply here.

American Express Business Gold

Until 31st March, you will receive 50,000 American Express Membership Rewards points with American Express Business Gold. Those would convert, for example, into 50,000 Avios. Business Gold is free for your first year too. Click for our full article or apply here.

OK, let’s move on to the normal miles, points and travel news:

The latest travel and aviation news:

I was in Helsinki last week to look at Finnair’s radical new ‘no recline’ Business Class seat (above). Here is my review, having flown it on the 3 hour hop from Heathrow. I was convinced.

I also had the chance to take a good look at Finnair’s first ever Premium Economy seat, reviewed here. Both of the new seats will be rolled out to 100% of the long-haul fleet by the end of 2023.

Malaysia is finally opening for tourism from 1st April. No quarantine will be required.

We published an excellent two-part guest article by consultant Oliver Ranson on ‘Why the disappearance of First Class is down to bad marketing, not lack of demand‘.

British Airways and Avios news:

In big news this week, British Airways is extending some American Express 2-4-1 vouchers to September 2023 – but ONLY if you took our advice and wrapped them in a Future Travel Voucher.

BA CityFlyer is adding new weekend routes from Edinburgh and Southampton for Summer 2022.

If you are targetted, you can pick up 1,250 Avios for a £30 + VAT spend on office supplies with Viking.

British Airways flights will be moving back to Terminal 3 at Manchester Airport later in March – but, of course, the BA lounge is permanently closed.

The offer for 18,000 Avios with a subscription to The Economist, paired with £45 of American Express cashback, has been extended.

You can earn bonus Avios with Avis car hire bookings if you don’t mind booking via the Aer Lingus website.

Hotel news:

Bored of Hilton hotels? From July you’ll be able to stay somewhere different – the Galapagos Islands. Image above.

We published our monthly round-up of the best hotel promotions for stays in March 2022.

We reviewed the brand new Courtyard London Heathrow Airport hotel, which is part of Marriott Bonvoy. It’s good value and, as it has just opened, in great shape.

Got a pile of Accor Live Limitless points? A lot of new London redemption ‘experiences’ have been added.

Radisson Hotels, including Park Inn, has launched a decent sale for stays in April and May. Stay two or more nights and you’ll get bonus points too.

Other interesting articles:

Here’s what Sinead learned when she flew Singapore Airlines in Premium Economy with a 10-month old baby (above). The lessons are useful for any airline.

Train operator GWR is joining the long list of companies which have pulled out of the Nectar loyalty scheme.

With the Marriott Bonvoy American Express having doubled its bonus, we show you how a couple can earn 201,666 Avios if they are new to American Express.

We have some exclusive images of the refurbished and extended Qatar Airways lounge at Heathrow Terminal 4.

We think that the best value hotel redemption in the Maldives is the Radisson Blu Resort Maldives, using transferred American Express points. Here’s why.

How do you get the mythical British Airways Premier card? We take a look.

Do you know that it is impossible to book flight tickets with Avios for an infant if you are booking via Iberia Plus? It’s not a website issue – it can’t be done at all.

Interesting threads from our forums this week:

• Can you book a BA Holidays ‘flight and car’ package to get double tier points but not pick up the car?
• Creation has finally realised that it had forgotten to add a 3% fee to ‘cash and cash equivalent’ card payments
• If you’re a Londoner, what do you think of the Birley sandwich chain?!

The full forum index is here.

See you next Saturday.