Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Double tier points from the BA Holidays promotion are (finally) starting to post

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

One of the most attractive promotions currently running is the ‘double tier points’ offer from BA Holidays.

If you book a ‘flight and hotel’ or ‘flight and car’ package for 5+ nights via BA Holidays, for trips where the outbound flight takes place by 31st October 2022, you will receive double tier points on your flights.

This could be hugely attractive. For example, until 31st December 2022, you only need 450 Executive Club tier points for Silver status, which gets you lounge access. Even if you didn’t requalify, you’d get a soft landing for the next year, giving a year of Bronze and its seat selection benefit.

Double tier points from BA Holidays starting to post

You could get a Silver card from scratch in one trip. For example, booking Manchester to Corfu in Club Europe, you would get (40 + 80 + 80 + 40) x 2 = 480 tier points. You get a holiday and up to 25 months of BA lounge access and free seat selection, depending on the timing of your British Airways year end.

Your soft landing to Bronze would give a further 12 months of ‘free seat selection within seven days of departure’, meaning up to 37 months of benefits.

There is one snag. Whilst this offer has now been running for almost 18 months, British Airways has been unable to find a way of punctually posting the double tier points. A few people have reported receiving them, often after making a complaint, but they appear to be in the minority.

(To be honest, I think BA Holidays made a mistake by not making this an ‘opt in’ offer. This has substantially increased the administration required, and the majority of the people who are now receiving bonus tier points won’t even know they were ever due them.)

Over the last couple of weeks, however, I have received multiple emails from people who have finally received their points. Here is one I got over the weekend:

“Have just received 280 BA Tier points today that emanated from a CW flight booking LHR-JFK-BOS-LHR outbound 17 Dec 2021 inbound 4 Jan 2022!!! Unbelievable!”

So, there is progress of sorts here.

How many tier points would you need for BA status?

This offer is still running for another two months. If you wanted to push for status it seems that the odds of actually getting your double tier points to turn up have improved.

Remember that, until 31st December:

  • Bronze status in BA Executive Club requires 225 tier points (was 300)
  • Silver status in BA Executive Club requires 450 tier points (was 600)
  • Gold status in BA Executive Club requires 1,125 tier points (was 1,500)

That said, the posting is still random:

  • some people are getting them backdated to the date of their original flights, which is what the rules say will happen
  • some people are getting them posted with the current date, which has messed up their plans to earn status (although some other readers have found this convenient!)

If BA Holidays has now found a way of posting the double tier points, it should be less of an issue. Hopefully they will post promptly after your flight.

Full details of the ‘double tier points’ offer can be found on BA Holidays here. Remember that you need to book by 22nd October and take your outbound flight by 31st October.

PS. If you are still missing bonus tier points from this offer, you will find various emails you can use to complain in this dedicated thread in our forum. Sometimes they get a result, sometimes they don’t …..


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (October 2024)

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.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

50,000 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, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

10,000 points bonus – plus an extra 500 points for our readers 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

Up to 80,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

Get up to 40,000 points as a sign-up offer 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.

Comments (91)

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

  • Jonathan says:

    A little OT here,

    Does anyone know if Iberia Plus and AerClub have Avios calculators, telling you how many Avios you’ll earn for cash flights, they both give a general run down of what fare codes earn how many Avios, but I can’t seem to find an actual calculator that’ll tell you exactly how much you’ll earn per flight, like BAEC and QA Privilege Club does

    I think there’s a website that tells you which airline loyalty program has the highest earning rate for what route but I can’t remember it,

    Anyone with some help, thanks !

  • Wing it one world says:

    Just a note, the reduced tier points for bronze until 31dec2022 is 225/300 not 300/400. 😀

  • Rich says:

    Still nothing from my holiday March – despite contact by email and phone.

    I have an ominous line in my statement showing ‘Tier Points Adjustment 0 Tier Points’.

    I’m tempted to contact Amex an begin a chargeback, though no idea if they will agree

    • AJA says:

      When is your TP year end? If the holiday was in your old year you may find that the TP have been back dated and effectively added to your lifetime total and that the line you see is the adjustment in the current year.

  • Ishan says:

    I flew in March 2022 and received my double tier points in May 2022. However it took several emails and the final one made it clear the double tier points would tip me over to Gold before a series of long haul flights.

    May have helped that I complained about the food on my return from MIA in F. Not sure though.

  • GS says:

    I flew in early July (back mid July) and my bonus TPs were credited in mid August without me sending any chasers to BA. Sounds like I got rather lucky based on others’ experiences…

  • Nicky says:

    Slightly off topic but BA relevant: Will BA have their normal sales this year or do you think they will give it a miss because of cutting flights until at least March?

    • Rob says:

      That depends on how much business you think BA gets from the 20% or so of the population who don’t care about utility bills and are still rolling in pandemic savings.

      • yonasl says:

        Well, if anything that should force BA’s hand to do some sales.

        While we hear a lot about the cost of living crisis I do not think people have fully gasped the increase on their utility bills that is coming (after all most are not reading the news or they would have picked a fixed 1 yr tariff long ago). In November people will start getting the new bills and being shocked!

        So I suppose many will cut in discretionary spending like eating out, expensive trips or services they don’t really need. BA and all others will have to fight for their custom somehow.

        • Tariq says:

          Yes, likely that many will cut back because of the scaremongering.

          In reality, I don’t think the lead time to higher bills will be this short. I calculated our likely spend yesterday based on the new price cap rates, and despite the usage price rates doubling, my annual usage is far below the ‘average’ that the scaremongering is predicated on.

          Even worse, my energy provider seems to be saying that they’ll calculate spend and increase DDs when they feel like it, so if that’s replicated across the industry, many people will underpay well into early next year and end up in energy debt…

          • Will says:

            I’m not sure I’d call energy bills scaremongering.

            Have a look at wholesale gas prices in the U.K. if they persist we’ll be paying at least £1/kWh for electric and 30p/kWh for gas before winter is over.

            This price cap largely shields is from the real price.

            And even if the government steps in and subsidises energy, to what end?

            We’re rapidly approaching the point (I’d argue beyond but clearly “the market” still seems to be willing to loan the U.K. money) where the government simply cannot take on ever more debt and print more money without destroying both the currency and future economy.

          • Londonsteve says:

            Agree with Will. If things carry on like this it’ll actually be cheaper to run diesel generators on red diesel to generate power than to buy from the energy suppliers who are dependent on gas to generate a significant chunk of the supply. £1 per Kwh is far in excess of where it becomes cheaper to drive my 20 year old automatic diesel luxury car than to recharge the electric car we also have.

          • Gordon says:

            @Londonsteve. That may have been an option a few years ago, I contract to various recycling companies in the south east and all their diggers and shovels have to run on white diesel now at the full price…. Only farmers in the agricultural industry are permitted to use Red diesel now. This came into effect on the 1st April 2022. (And no it’s not an April fools joke)….

        • Gordon says:

          @Yonas, I agree, There will be a good percentage of people cancelling flights/Holidays when the hikes take effect.With customers cutting back on their Netflix accounts (Estimated at £1M plus, Last count)That’s before before the energy tariff hikes.So they will definitely be cutting back on a Flight/Holiday….

          • Mike Hunt says:

            Plus when the new mortgage rates begin to bite – when combined with massive hike in utility bills I feel air ports / air lines will be much less busy in Easter 2023 !

          • Gordon says:

            @Rob, @IanM post looks a bit odd now the expletive has been removed 😂

          • Gordon says:

            And lonely….

        • JDB says:

          Utility bills are the least of people’s worries as mortgage rates go up, the cost of everything goes up as well and savings are eroded by inflation, although in theory debts/mortgages are also eroded.

          • ianM says:

            +1 totally agree, what a muppet

          • Will says:

            While you are certainly correct at present about savings/debt erosion by inflation, that’s only true if you have people willing to lend money at least than the inflation rate.

            I’m not sure who is actually willing to lend money (at risk) right now at such low rates.

            World has lost its assessment of risk imho.

            There’s more than a marginal risk of a total collapse of the economy (the likes of which we’ve never seen before) at which point loaning money last year against houses at under 1.5% looks insane.

          • Will says:

            *less than the inflation rate

  • The Lord says:

    Where is the picture from Rob? Looks like Santorini but any idea on the hotel?

    • Rob says:

      No idea, BA Holidays sent it to us once!

    • iSub says:

      A quick reverse image search reveals it to be the San Antonio Santorini Luxury Hotel in Caldera

    • iSub says:

      The pic is called “Solitary man sitting on the edge of an infinity pool looking out over the scenic Mediterranean view of the Santorini caldera, Greece” in case you want the less cropped original

  • Lady London says:

    Surely if someone earned in December and didn’t get credited till August they have lost the ability to benefit from any upgraded status for most of their card year, possibly all of it, and should be entitled to take the upgrade in the following year instead?

    • Londonsteve says:

      LL, a jolly good point! Someone might have lost 25% or more of the time they would have otherwise enjoyed status benefits had the double tier points posted promptly after having returned from the holiday.

    • Andrew says:

      I’d be incurring additional costs left right and centre to make you whole and billing it back to BA!

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

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.