How can I transfer from BA to Qatar, Finnair, Iberia, Aer Lingus or Vueling via ‘Combine My Avios’?

When Qatar Airways Privilege Club started using Avios as its rewards currency in 2022, it became the fifth loyalty programme to adopt Avios. The others are British Airways Executive Club, Iberia Plus, Vueling Club and Aer Lingus AerClub. Finnair is due to follow in March 2024.

Somewhat confusingly, the six different loyalty programmes don’t share an Avios ‘bank’. Instead, each individual account you have acts as a unique points bank. In theory, you could have a separate stash of Avios sitting with British Airways, Iberia, Finnair, Qatar Airways and Aer Lingus / Vueling.

Moving Avios between the various programmes can be complicated because there isn’t one single way of doing it. Moving Avios from the Executive Club to Qatar Airways Privilege Club is entirely different to moving Avios to AerClub. This guide should help.

Why should you want to move Avios between six different frequent flyer schemes?

As a Head for Points reader, you have a 90%+ chance of using British Airways Executive Club as your main Avios frequent flyer scheme. Why would you bother with the others?

The answers relate to both ‘earn’ and ‘burn’.

Each programme has its own unique partners. This is especially true with Qatar Airways, which has a huge list of partners (airline, hotel and car hire) for earning and spending Avios which are unique. The full list of ‘new’ partners Qatar Airways brings is here.

For example:

• if you want to earn or spend Avios on Virgin Australia, for example, you need to do it via a Qatar Airways Privilege Club account

• if you want to earn (but not spend) Avios from United Airlines flights, you can only do it via an Aer Lingus AerClub account

• if you want to earn or spend Avios on Scandinavian airline Braathens, you need to do it via a Finnair Plus account

There are plenty of other examples like this – here is an article showing all 35 airlines which you can earn Avios with, and which frequent flyer scheme you need to use to do so.

By connecting your Avios accounts, you are able to transfer Avios back and forth as many times as you like between the different programmes. Each transfer is free and instantaneous.

Note that you will only be able to transfer Avios to other accounts in your name using this method. This article looks at how you can transfer Avios to another person.

How to transfer your Avios to/from Qatar Airways Privilege Club

Before you can transfer your Avios to Qatar Airways or vice versa, you first need to link up your British Airways Executive Club and Qatar Airways Privilege Club accounts. If you don’t already have a Qatar Airways Privilege Club account, click here to open one.

(Make sure your personal details match on both accounts so you can link them smoothly. I am told by Qatar Airways that there must be a match of first name, surname and date of birth and I would suggest using the same email address too.)

Once you’ve opened a Privilege Club account, head to this page on the Qatar Airways website where you should see a prompt to connect your BA Executive Club account like this:

Once you’ve gone through the linking process you should be able to see your total Avios balance across both Privilege Club and Executive Club:

To initiate the transfer of Avios from Qatar Airways Privilege Club to British Airways Executive Club or vice versa, click the ‘Combine Avios’ button under ‘More to explore’. It will take you to this page:

You can move as many or as few Avios as you like. You don’t have to transfer Avios in round numbers as the amount you transfer is a text field rather than a drop-down of options.

To transfer Avios from Qatar Airways to British Airways, just click on the reversible arrows.

Avios transfers between British Airways Executive Club and Qatar Airways Privilege Club are instantaneous. Of course, you can always transfer them back if you change your mind.

Before you transfer Avios to Qatar Airways Privilege Club ….

There’s one thing to note. In theory, you can book Qatar Airways redemptions on ba.com for the same number of Avios and the same taxes as you’ll find on the Qatar Airways website. You don’t need to move your Avios to Qatar Airways Privilege Club, and there are some benefits (easier cancellation, easier changes) to booking via ba.com.

Due to IT quirks, however, you may find different availability between the two sites so it is worth checking both. Qatar Airways also releases ‘Flexi’ redemptions where those who are willing to pay 2x the standard Avios rate get access to a wider pool of reward seats.

Moving Avios into Qatar Airways Privilege Club is also the only way of upgrading a cash Qatar Airways ticket using Avios. This cannot be done via ba.com.

Want to transfer Avios from Iberia, Aer Lingus or Vueling to Qatar Airways Privilege Club?

At present, you can only link a British Airways Executive Club account to Qatar Airways Privilege Club.

If your Avios are with Iberia, Aer Lingus or Vueling, you would need to move them into a British Airways Executive Club account via the routes explained below and then transfer them from BA to Qatar Airways Privilege Club.

How to transfer your Avios to/from Finnair Plus

You can’t, yet.

Finnair Plus will adopt Avios as its reward currency in early March 2024. However, transfers to/from British Airways Executive Club will not be available until May or June 2024.

If you want to transfer Avios to/from Iberia Plus, Qatar Airways Privilege Club, Aer Lingus AerClub, or Vueling Club into Finnair Plus, you will need to move them to a British Airways Executive Club account first.

The only reason you would need to move Avios directly into Finnair Plus, instead of booking the same flights via ba.com, would be to upgrade a cash Finnair flight or book with an exclusive Finnair Plus airline or hotel partner.

How to transfer Avios to/from Iberia Plus

The process for transferring Avios to Iberia Plus is similar, although there are a few more rules you need to be mindful of.

You can cannot move Avios into or out of an Iberia Plus account unless:

• the Iberia Plus account is 90 days old and
• the Iberia Plus has ‘earned’ at least 1 Avios

The easiest way to have the account ‘earn’ an Avios is to transfer 1,000 American Express Membership Rewards points.  You could also credit a British Airways or oneworld flight to the account, credit an Avis or Budget car rental or transfer some hotel points.

If this applies to you, you need to wait until your Iberia Plus account meets both of the criteria above before carrying on with the transfer process. For this reason, we recommend opening an Iberia Plus account now, even if you don’t need it yet. You’ll thank us later.

Once you’ve got an Iberia Plus account that is over 90 days old and has earned at least one Avios you head to the Iberia ‘Combine My Avios’ page here.

Click on the button at the bottom and you’ll be taken to this page:

Simply select which programme you’d like to transfer Avios to and log in with the details from that programme. (‘Avios Partners’ is for transfers to Aer Lingus and Vueling.)

You can select how many Avios to transfer, and in which direction (ie BA to Iberia or Iberia to BA):

That’s it. The Avios should transfer immediately.

If this process doesn’t work, it may be that there is a mismatch with your personal details on both accounts. Make sure that your date of birth, first name, second name and email address are identical.

If you want to transfer Avios to/from Qatar Airways Privilege Club to Iberia Plus, you need to transfer them to a British Airways Executive Club account as an intermediary step. It cannot be done in a single transfer.

How to transfer Avios to Aer Lingus AerClub or Vueling Club

Due to the size of the airlines and their redemption opportunities you’re less likely to need to transfer Avios to Aer Lingus AerClub or Vueling Club, but we’ve included them for completeness.

Here are a few reasons why you may need an Aer Lingus or Vueling account:

• you are booking a cash flight on Aer Lingus or Vueling and want to part-pay the flight using Avios (you can pay 100% of the cost using Avios, including taxes and charges – your flight can be genuinely ‘free’)

• you are flying a heavily discounted Aer Lingus flight, which is likely to earn zero Avios if credited to British Airways Executive Club but will earn in Aer Lingus AerClub

• you are flying on Vueling, which only earns Avios when credited to Vueling Club

• you want to book a short haul Avios redemption from the UK to Ireland – the taxes will be cheaper if you book via aerlingus.com (there is no difference on long haul Aer Lingus redemptions)

Here’s an important point to note: Aer Lingus AerClub accounts are the same as Vueling Club accounts. Only the branding is different – both have account numbers starting 3081xxxxxxxxxxx. You can log in with either at aerlingus.com or vueling.com and it will pull up your Avios balance. There is no reason why you would need a separate AerClub and Vueling Club account.

If you don’t already have an Aer Lingus AerClub account, open one here. Alternatively, you can open a Vueling Club account here. Make sure to use the same date of birth, name, address and email address as your other Avios accounts.

For odd reasons, ‘Combine My Avios’ for Aer Lingus and Vueling is operated from this page of the British Airways website. You can also send/receive Avios from Iberia and Qatar Airways from here.

The screenshots look the same as for Iberia Plus transfers above. Select ‘Avios Partners’ if you want Aer Lingus or Vueling.

Conclusion

Moving your Avios between the five different frequent flyer schemes which use it is – by far – not as simple as it could be.

On the upside, because each programme has a high degree of independence, it is able to cut its own partnership deals and have its own flight redemption structure. This allows the switched-on flyer to benefit from the sweet spots that each programme offers.

(This article is part of our ‘BA Q&A’ series which explains how British Airways Executive Club works.  You can see all of our ‘BA Q&A’ articles here. )

(Head for Points is the UK’s biggest frequent flyer website with 2.5 million monthly page views.  Want to learn more about earning and spending Avios?  Click here to read our latest news stories and click here to join the mailing list for our weekly or daily email newsletters.)

---

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:

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

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.

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 12th May 2024, the Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa card is offering a bonus of 30,000 points, convertible into 30,000 Avios. You must have a Limited Company to apply. Click here to learn more and click here to apply.

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.

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.

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.