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You can now cancel British Airways Avios bookings online again …. after two years

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Good news! With the pandemic-era ‘Book With Confidence’ refund guarantee coming to an end last Friday, British Airways has brought back the ability to cancel Avios flights online.

The situation is now back to how it was pre-covid.

I had a booking which I had been putting off cancelling due to my lack of enthusiasm for ringing the call centre, so I was keen to give it a go.

How do you cancel an Avios booking online?

How do you cancel an Avios booking online?

The first step is to bring up your Avios booking on the British Airways website.

Scroll to the bottom and you see ‘Cancelling your booking’:

How do you cancel an Avios booking online?

Click through and you get the consent page which is, oddly, still in the format of the old BA website:

How do you cancel an Avios booking online?

You then get to your refund breakdown:

How do you cancel an Avios booking online?

In theory, the cancellation fee is £35 per person. In my case, because the taxes and fees on this one way European flight are under £35, they are capped at what I paid. I get no money back but I am not on the hook to pay more.

You are shown this policy in writing – it is not an IT quirk:

“Where the standard cancellation fee is greater than the amount due for a refund, it will be reduced to reflect this amount. You will not be charged any extra amount for this cancellation.”

I will, of course, get back the 39,000 Avios used.

Confirm the cancellation and you’re done. My Avios were refunded instantly.

As well as making life easier for those of us who need to cancel bookings, this welcome change will reduce the pressure on the British Airways call centres for people who do still need to ring.

PS. In our forum, there are two reports (click here) from people who have tried to cancel Club Europe bookings with £50 of taxes and charges and have been told that there is no cash coming back. This is wrong as £15 per person should be returned. Check the refund amount before you confirm the cancellation, and if you don’t agree with the cash element then cancel by phone instead.


How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 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

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

25,000 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

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable 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 10,500 Avios.

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

Huge 30,000 points bonus until 12th May 2024 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 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.

Comments (110)

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

  • Michael C says:

    I cancelled by phone on Fri and was told it was now online, but to ring back (for free) for other pending cancellations as my credit card has expired/changed, and they need the new info over the phone.

    • NorthernLass says:

      That’s odd, they are usually really strict about refunding to the original card, even if it’s closed or expired.

      • Michael C says:

        Haven’t checked to see if cash arrived! :o(…… !!!

        • Sean says:

          Recommend a check as they are very strict. BA recently refused my refund to a closed credit card, and even after they recognised it was ridiculous but “they’re the rules”, they insisted the money was returned to the old closed card. Cue second call to my credit card company to resolve. Bureaucrats at their finest.

  • James says:

    I just cancelled an airmiles booking that cost me £600 plus avios. Online i was offered ZERO cash refund. I called and the helpdesk charged me £35 per ticket, waived the £15 telephone fee as she acknowledged that they were having issues with the online service currently, mentioned that some people were being offered travel vouchers for cash bookings and so on. So I ended up getting £460 back vs £0 !!!

  • DenisO says:

    I have just cancelled on-line a one-way Avios booking for two people, which was made using a Barclaycard Cabin Upgrade voucher, paying Economy Avios rate for Business Class, and payment of £1 per person. The Avios and voucher were credited to my Exec Club account within minutes, with no cancellation charge.

  • Alan says:

    Hope they’ve got it working for flights with domestic connections, although given the state of BA IT for that normally I’m not holding out much hope. Wish they’d sort it so you could use future travel vouchers to pay taxes/fees on Avios bookings too…

  • Sheila Hodson says:

    I wonder if you can help with my problem with ba.com please. I am unable tp get onto their website via any of the normal addresses, also britishairways or the Executive club. This has been happening for at least two months and I was unable to check in for my last flight to Rome and it is very difficult when you are trying to redeem a Companion Voucher. The response is
    “Error 403 You don’t have enough permissions to proceed further”
    It is almost impossible to get through to BA and on one occasion when I did they didn’t know anythin or couldn’t help. Have you any experience of it please?
    Kind regards,
    Sheila Hodson, Member for about 20 years.

    • Rob says:

      Hi Sheila. I had another complaint this week exactly like this so it isn’t just you, but it’s not something I’ve seen myself and its not been flagged on our forums I think.

  • Jeremy says:

    Be careful, I didn’t see this when I cancelled an avios only booking this morning (europe reward flight saver for one person).
    Instead, I got a question asking which passenger I was, then a form to fill in with contact details and address. Once submitted, there was no calculation shown or any confirmation page!
    This was was it showed on the page after submitting:
    “Your request to cancel your flights has been sent”.
    And
    “What happens now?
    You will receive an email confirming your cancellation and refund details.
    We will review your request and calculate the refund amount payable.
    All flights in the booking will be cancelled, for all passengers.”

  • Joanna says:

    Hi,
    Need some advice please. My boss and his wife booked flights with avios from UK to Rio de Janeiro. Now the wife wants to fly home earlier but seems like I can only cancel both their tickets and not only hers. There is one avios ticket available for a earlier flight. Would it be possible to book a separate avios ticket earlier for her and just not to cancel the couples ticket? I heard that I can cancel hers once they started the journey but seems very risky as this is over Christmas and NYE. Any advice would be helpful!

    • Rob says:

      Is this a 241 or not?

      Assuming it isn’t a 241, this is what you do – you call BA and ask them to split the PNR (booking) into two. Once done, it is no problem to change the return date of the wife, assuming there are Avios seats showing.

      The only issue here is if one person has BA status, the 2nd person will lose free seat selection once the bookings are split.

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

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