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News: BA suspends S7 mileage partnership, double Virgin Points booking train tickets

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News in brief:

British Airways suspends S7 airline partnership

Whilst not announced at the time, British Airways suspended its partnership with Russian airline S7 on 10th March.

A statement on the S7 section of ba.com says:

“Effective 10 March 2022, British Airways has indefinitely suspended our oneworld frequent flyer programme with S7 Airlines. British Airlines Executive Club Members are no longer able to earn or redeem Avios on S7 flights.”

You have not been able to earn or redeem Avios, or earn British Airways Executive Club tier points, on S7 from that date, albeit that this is academic in the current circumstances.

S7 remains a member of the oneworld alliance, although it is not clear how long this will last – or indeed how long the airline itself will last without access to spare parts.

Earn double Virgin Points with Virgin Trains Ticketing

Last year Virgin Red launched a new way of letting you earn Virgin Points – its own exclusive train ticket booking platform, called Virgin Trains Ticketing.

I’ll just pause for a moment to allow you to think about the irony of Virgin Group setting up a train ticket booking platform after it lost both the Virgin Trains East Coast and Virgin Trains West Coast franchises …..

The new train booking website (we should probably call it a platform ….) is exclusive to Virgin Red and operates via the Virgin Red app. You can join Virgin Red here.

It is a very simple structure:

  • you earn 3 Virgin Points per £1 spent
  • there are no booking fees with e-tickets (there is a fee if you choose station collection)

E-tickets (technically m-tickets, since they can’t be added to Apple Wallet etc) sit inside the Virgin Red app, which saves you from having to download a separate app to hold your tickets.

As long as the rail company you are using does not have exclusive discounts for users of its own website, you will be getting the same price as you would pay elsewhere.

From time to time, LNER and Avanti West Coast run a cashback deal on American Express and certain other credit cards. When such an offer is running, these should be the most rewarding place to book rail travel irrespective of which train company you are travelling on.

For the next week, however, Virgin Trains Ticketing should be competitive.

Until 20th March, you will receive 6 Virgin Points per £1. I’d take 5% cashback over 6 Virgin Points, but if the best credit card cashback deal you have is 3%, or perhaps you don’t have one at all, it is a very competitive deal.

You will need to download the Virgin Red in order to book train tickets and earn points. You can register here.

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How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards

How to earn Virgin Points from UK credit cards (April 2025)

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

You can choose from two official Virgin Atlantic credit cards (apply here, the Reward+ card has a bonus of 18,000 Virgin Points and the free card has a bonus of 3,000 Virgin Points):

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

18,000 bonus points and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward Mastercard

3,000 bonus points, no fee and 1 point for every £1 you spend Read our full review

You can also earn Virgin Points from various American Express cards – and these have sign-up bonuses too.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold is FREE for a year and comes with 20,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 20,000 Virgin Points.

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.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express comes with 50,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert into 50,000 Virgin Points.

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.

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Small business owners should consider the two American Express Business cards. Points convert at 1:1 into Virgin Points.

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up 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 Virgin Points. 

Category

British Airways and Avios, Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

Comments (13)

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

  • Ancient says:
    15 Mar15 March 06:25

    It’s worth noting that Virgin charge a booking fee for booking train tickets, which train operators don’t.

    • Stu says:
      15 Mar15 March 07:19

      I haven’t seen a booking fee on my tickets using the Virgin Red app when the tickets can be fulfilled as emails/electronic tickets. Tickets that must be paper and hence physically collected may be where the charge arises.

      • JohnTh says:
        15 Mar15 March 07:42

        It depends on the actual train operator whether they do etickets but you don’t know until the last stage of checkout. EG Southern you pay a small fee (even though they have started doing etickets themselves.) I have asked VRed to look at this as is my local operator.

  • John says:
    15 Mar15 March 06:28

    The terminology used above is incorrect. In the context of rail ticketing, an e-ticket is independent of the ticketing medium, while an m-ticket is tied to an app/device.

    E-tickets come as Aztec codes, usually sent as PDF files. It is not necessary to use a dedicated app or anything like Apple Wallet. E-tickets can be displayed in your email app, or if you take a screenshot, your photo gallery app. If you have a printer, you can display them on paper. If you lose your device or it runs out of battery, you can access the ticket on another device.

    M-tickets are held within an app on a device. You cannot use a screenshot or print them, and usually must “activate” the ticket in the app before travelling. If you lose your device or are unable to charge it, you lose your ticket and need to buy a new one. For these reasons, m-tickets are inferior and are being phased out.

    • Callum says:
      15 Mar15 March 07:14

      Not to mention E-tickets have been around for 20 years longer than Apple Pay has existed (as the main way to issue airline tickets funnily enough), so compatibility with Apple Pay couldn’t possibly be a criteria for whether it’s an E-ticket or not!

      • Rui N. says:
        15 Mar15 March 08:40

        Wow, an Apple user thinking that things didn’t exist before Apple made it available several year laters. Never thought I’d seen that!

    • Stu says:
      15 Mar15 March 07:21

      Useful explanation!

      I came here just to say the tickets come as PDF which I can scan from the phone – no app required for the travel part (so if phone runs out of battery can use another device, just as you said).

  • janolabs says:
    15 Mar15 March 08:58

    Just wanted to say, the 10% back with LNER seems to be a widely available promotion as it doesn’t seem to have a cap of how many people can save it, and it’s available across all my (and supplementary) cards.

  • Andrew. says:
    15 Mar15 March 10:02

    Barclaycard, LNER 8% (no maximum). Virgin Money, LNER 8% (no maximum). MBNA, Avanti 3% (£30 Maximum). Halifax, Avanti 5% (£30 Maximum), LNER 5% (£30 Maximum). Amex, Avanti 10% (no Maximum), LNER 10% (no Maximum).

    All are valid once, except the Amex LNER offer which is valid every time. Barclaycard and Virgin Money offers tend to cycle every fortnight.

    PAW fans also have a 1% rebate at Trainline and Chiltern.

  • aseftel says:
    15 Mar15 March 10:27

    LNER is also 5% on Airtime.

  • RussellH says:
    15 Mar15 March 10:30

    I have 10% of at LNER on at leat two Amex cards, valid unil the middle of July.

    So, unless there is a special offer only available on another TOC’s website, this is a no brainer!

    Only slight problem – one of the cards is a gold Amex, which is coming up for cancellation before the £140 fee kicks in.

  • MilesOnPoint says:
    15 Mar15 March 13:43

    I currently hold S7 Airlines Gold status (Oneworld Sapphire) via a status match promotion they ran a couple of years ago, valid until February 2023.

    Time to look for another program as I think S7 Oneworld membership will be revoked soon and I no longer wish to interact with a Russian carrier for obvious reasons.

    Does anyone have experience matching to Royal Air Maroc via statusmatch.com website? Says they will match to Safar Gold but application fee of USD99 is non-refundable…

  • David says:
    15 Mar15 March 22:34

    “British AIRLINES Executive Club members…”

    Good to see someone at BA knows their terminology.

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

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