NEW: Earn Avios from car rentals with Hertz, Europcar and Sixt via Qatar Privilege Club
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A month ago, Qatar Airways officially adopted Avios as its frequent flyer currency. Qmiles are no more.
You can now link your British Airways Executive Club account with your Qatar Privilege Club account and move Avios back and forth at a 1:1 ratio. Our ‘how to’ guide to account linking is here.
If you think ‘so what?’ because you could already book Qatar Airways flights via British Airways Executive Club, you need to think again. A lot of new Avios earning options with partners are now available, as long as you open a Qatar Privilege Club account.
In this article I want to look at how earning Avios from car rentals is now far easier than it was.

For many years now, the whole of the IAG airline group (primarily British Airways, Iberia and Aer Lingus) has had an exclusive deal with Avis Budget.
This has generally worked well. There are some genuinely good additional benefits offered through this partnership, such as a free additional driver with Avis. You also earn Avios at a decent rate of 5 Avios per £1 spent.
Avis and Budget are often not an option, however, either due to price or to simply not having a depot or the availability you need at your destination.
This used to mean no Avios from your rental. This is no longer the case.
Qatar Privilege Club has a wide range of Avios-earning car rental partners
If Avis or Budget are not convenient, what you need to do is:
- book with one of the car rental companies discussed below
- credit the rental to your Qatar Privilege Club account
- move the Avios across to British Airways Executive Club
See here for details of the Qatar Airways car rental partners.

These are your options:
Avis
Yes, we know, Avis is a British Airways partner already. However, there is a little quirk. Avios earning via British Airways Executive Club is based on what you spend, at the rate of 5 Avios per £1.
With Qatar Airways you earn at a flat rate. For non-status members, this means 500 Avios per rental.
If you are spending under £100, and assuming that the BA and Qatar discount codes get you the same price from Avis, you might as well credit the rental to Privilege Club.
The Avis home page is here. The BA partnership site is here.
Budget
With Budget, there is an even bigger incentive to credit your rental to Qatar Privilege Club and not Executive Club.
With BA, you will only earn 2 Avios per £1 you spend. Credit your rental to Qatar Privilege Club and you will earn a flat 500 Avios.
Unless you are spending over £250, Qatar Privilege Club is the most lucrative option.
The Budget home page is here. The BA partnership site is here.
Europcar
Europcar was not previously an Avios partner, although you could earn Nectar points – at a terrible rate – and convert them. We wrote this article on how you could earn points and miles in other loyalty schemes with Europcar.
You can now earn Avios with Europcar via Qatar Privilege Club. You will earn 500 Avios on all rentals.
The Europcar website is here.
Hertz
Hertz is arguably ‘the big one’ in terms of opening up new ways of earning Avios from Qatar Privilege Club.
As a Privilege Club member you receive:
- Up to 10% off Hertz car rental rates
- 500 Avios for standard rentals
- 250 Avios for contract rentals
Historically, we recommended crediting Hertz rentals to Virgin Flying Club. If you collect both Avios and Virgin Points, the Virgin route is still more generous as you receive 1,000 points per rental.
The Hertz website is here.
Sixt
You can earn 500 Avios for every Sixt rental when you credit it to Qatar Privilege Club.
Sixt also has a partnership with Virgin Atlantic earning 500 Virgin Points per rental – see here.
The Sixt website is here.
Rentalcars.com
Finally, Qatar Privilege Club has an interesting deal with Rentalcars.com. This is a consolidator, allowing you to book cars from every major rental company in virtually all major markets.
You need to book via the special link on the Qatar Airways website (click on ‘Car Rentals’ and then ‘Rentalcars.com’) which takes you to a dedicated co-branded booking page. You will receive 3 Avios in Privilege Club for every $1 you spend.
Concusion
The Avis Budget partnership with Avios has been very successful because it was well designed to offer genuine benefits to members.
That said, Avis Budget is not always the answer to your car rental problems. The new Avios deal with Qatar Privilege Club means that you can now earn Avios from Europcar, Hertz and Sixt too.

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (May 2022)
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. You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard
25,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher for spending £10,000 Read our full review

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard
5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher for spending £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
25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable card perk – the 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 £12,000 Read our full review
You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points.
The Platinum Card has doubled its sign-up bonus to 60,000 Membership Rewards points, which convert to 60,000 Avios, if you apply by 1st June 2022.

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

The Platinum Card from American Express
60,000 points (SPECIAL OFFER) 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 10,000 Avios.

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa
10,500 points bonus – the most generous Avios Visa 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
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
40,000 points sign-up bonus and a long list of travel benefits 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.
(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.)
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