Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

News: new BA Amex / BA offer, new Qatar Airways promotion

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

News in brief:

Bonus Avios offer for holders of the free BA Amex card

If you have the free British Airways American Express credit card, you may be targetted for a ‘bonus Avios’ offer.

This may, or may not, show under the ‘Offers’ tab in the Amex app or on your online statement page. You need to save the offer to your card to register.

You will receive 1,000 bonus Avios if you spend £200 with British Airways by 10th May. You need to book via ba.com, according to the rules, but I imagine call centre payments would work OK too, as would BA Holidays payments.

The rules state that flights must depart a UK airport but I would question whether that actually matters. It may be that any non-Sterling spend is excluded.

Because the bonus Avios will come from American Express and not BA, you will also earn the bonus for paying the taxes and charges on Avios redemption bookings, or even booking partner airlines via the BA website.

The offer is restricted to the first 40,000 people to register.

Save 20% on Qatar Airways flights in May and June

Save 20% on Qatar Airways flights in May and June

Qatar Airways is running a special sale for the next few days, exclusively for Qatar Airways Privilege Club members.

(If you’re not a member of Qatar Airways Privilege Club you can sign up for free here. This HfP article shows you how to link your BA Executive Club and Privilege Club accounts so you can transfer Avios back and forth.)

Until 19th April, logged-in members will see special discounts – up to 20% off the base fare – on a range of destination including the Maldives, Seychelles and Zanzibar. A full list of destinations is in the T&C on the landing page here.

You must be booking for travel in May or June.

You must use code MEM22 when searching for flights.

The discount applies to both Economy and Business class bookings.

Your Qatar Airways Privilege Club number will be used in your booking, but you can easily – if you wish – swap it over to a British Airways Executive Club number later, or at check-in. You will earn Avios either way but you may want the BA tier points.

You can find out more on this page of the Qatar Airways website.

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 Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2025)

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

Get 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

30,000 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.

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.

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

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large 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, and the standard card is FREE. Capital on Tap cards also have no FX fees.

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 1 Avios per £1 Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business

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

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 Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

Category

British Airways and Avios, IHG One Rewards, Qatar Airways and Privilege Club

Comments (44)

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

  • John says:
    8 Apr8 April 08:33

    I saw the BA offer yesterday but I didn’t save it and now it’s gone.

    • Gordon says:
      8 Apr8 April 08:48

      Like a lot of other offers it would only be available to the first certain percentage of customers….

      • Rhys says:
        8 Apr8 April 09:06

        The first 40,000 customers, as per the article!

      • John says:
        8 Apr8 April 11:53

        Correct, just pointing out that everyone saying they didn’t get the offer may just have missed it

    • Nick says:
      8 Apr8 April 13:46

      Just added it to my BAPP account.

    • Andrew says:
      8 Apr8 April 15:28

      I saved it on the 29th March.

  • Nick says:
    8 Apr8 April 09:32

    Amex know your flight details and should – if they’ve set it up correctly – only be paying out for UK departures. Similarly for online vs offline sales.

    It will also work through an OTA if it’s a published fare and they’re passing through your card details, but not if it’s a net fare where the agent is taking your payment. Oh and shhh, don’t tell anyone about that bit.

  • Philondon says:
    8 Apr8 April 10:03

    No BA offer on my Amex.

  • Simon Nicholas says:
    8 Apr8 April 10:51

    I’m struggling to get the Qatar booking process to genuinely discount my fare using the MEM22 code. I want to fly MAN>DOC>JNB retn leaving 30th June, returning 18th July (it doesn’t say in the T&Cs whether both legs need to be before end of June) and I have logged in and it claims that it has applied MEM22 discount.

    However the fare quoted remains at £2976 – which is exactly the same fare as I’m quoted by Qatar (direct) via Skycanner without logging in and applying the code!

    Am I doing something wrong, or is this just a bit of a scam, and there isn’t a genuine discount at all?

    • SteveCroydon says:
      8 Apr8 April 11:22

      I’m shocked that Qatar’s code MEM22 doesn’t work. A bit like last week’s FLYQR3 code, which they pulled without notice (no 2,500 bonus Avios for signing-up)!!!
      I guess they’ve sold half a dozen tickets with MEM22 and now decided to pull the offer, just like FLYQR3.

      • Simon Nicholas says:
        8 Apr8 April 11:30

        Call me a cynic, but I prefer a spot of transparency when making a purchase – especially one which costs a few grand.

        Whatever I’m buying, I like to see the headline price and then the discount being applied. In this case the Qatar website claims that the MEM22 discount has already been applied to the fares displayed. However, if you remove the MEM22 discount code it offers you exactly the same fares!

        Unsurprisingly I am not impressed.

      • Babyg says:
        8 Apr8 April 16:15

        the pulled FLYQR3 because people gamed it by creating new accounts and linking them

    • Wallaj4 says:
      8 Apr8 April 16:23

      I have been following a few Qatar flights the last couple of weeks and ready to make a booking . This code could have made the difference, but like others have said the prices of the flights I am following have not changed at all , but the screen clearly states ‘code applied ‘.
      Shame as the oneworld fares are much higher than star alliance airlines currently

  • BJ says:
    8 Apr8 April 11:02

    Are others seeing the bonus points on the drop down box to choose the number of IHG points they want to purchase? In the past it would always show as ‘15,000 + 15,000 bonus’ etc but this time there is no indication of the bonus. I don’t want to proceed with purchase unless I can screenshot somrthing indicating the bonus.

    • Rob says:
      8 Apr8 April 11:44

      The bonus was showing last night. I was under the impression that this deal was open to all but perhaps not. Do not buy if you don’t see it offered.

    • John says:
      8 Apr8 April 11:54

      Yes I see the bonus so looks like you aren’t included this time or you haven’t signed in properly?

    • Andy says:
      8 Apr8 April 12:37

      The bonus is only active for me over 30000 points purchase

    • BJ says:
      8 Apr8 April 12:49

      Thanks to all three of you. I had a closer look, and scrolling down further this time found, like Andy, the bonus does not kick in until I buy at least 30k. I guess this is the ptice to pay for previously just buying small amounts to top up account to rounder numbers.

  • DJA says:
    8 Apr8 April 14:03

    Anyone been through LGW north recently, and made use of the Plaza premium lounge? If so, how busy has it been?

    • Rob says:
      8 Apr8 April 14:26

      I know someone who was turned away last week. It is still in DragonPass despite quitting Priority Pass.

    • blue_wolf says:
      8 Apr8 April 15:41

      Every time I’ve been in the past couple of months it’s been quiet – that’s in the early morning though (before 9am), can’t speak for the rest of the day.

    • Ikaz says:
      8 Apr8 April 16:17

      About 15 pax Wednesday 14:00-16:00, not the quietest crowd though, really noisy. Good lounge though, no issues accessing with Amex plat

  • Paul says:
    8 Apr8 April 21:31

    IHG bonus is a good offer. I had two nights booked in Cairo for 308$.

    When I checked, both nights available for 21,000 each.

    To buy 41,000 points with the offer was 247$

    A nice little saving!!

  • Charlie says:
    10 Apr10 April 19:20

    What do you mean by “ You will earn Avios either way but you may want the BA tier points.” Can you earn tier points when not flying BA ? I was under the impression that you couldn’t (still learning 🙂)

    • Rob says:
      10 Apr10 April 20:21

      You earn BA tier points on all 14 oneworld alliance airlines, but Aer Lingus is not part of the alliance.

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!