Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Move quickly: lots of BA Club Suite Avios seats to Sydney in September / October / November

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As flagged by Liam in our forum, British Airways has opened up a lot of Club Suite business class availability between London and Sydney for later in the year.

In the hour since I posted this, a lot more outbound availability has turned up. The screenshot below is from 7pm on Thursday.

surprising amount of BA Club Suite to Sydney in September / October

This is based on TWO Club Suite seats being available between London Heathrow and Sydney. Outbound is on the left, return on the right.

Solo travellers will see a lot more availability.

If you have a British Airways American Express 2-4-1 voucher, you will find even more business class availability if you fly from Manchester, Newcastle, Belfast, Edinburgh, Glasgow or Inverness. To see this, you must tick the box on ba.com saying ‘I want to use my voucher’ and search for just two seats (or select two vouchers and search for four seats). Do not select more than two seats per voucher being used.

If you want to book the direct London flights, you should move quickly as these seats won’t last long.

If you can’t get seats that work, we ran this article earlier in the week on other ways to get to Australia and New Zealand with Avios.

(PS. BA moved Sydney to a Boeing 777 with Club Suite in October 2022. If you don’t see a Boeing 777 operating your flights then Club Suite is not guaranteed. The comments below suggest that there are some Boeing 787 services showing.)


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.

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.

Comments (40)

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

  • YC says:

    how live is seatspy?

    • Rob says:

      Refreshes 2-3 times per hour AFAIK via a direct BA feed.

  • SteveCroydon says:

    Unless you’re using a 241 or Barclays voucher, why would you book on BA? QR offer a better service/product, lower Avios and less cash – Simples!!
    Perhaps the greed-fed boom in travel and hotels has finally burnt itself out – good!!

    • NicktheGreek says:

      You wouldn’t, but for many couples or pairs that extra 100k avios isn’t super easy to come by. 250k avios is a stretch, but probably broadly achievable with concerted effort over 2 years. And makes the £250 annual feel to earn the companion voucher seem meaningful. 360k avios is straying into expert mode territory for most. Sydney is the further distance you can fly to in Australia so you’re getting bang for your buck there too..

    • Aston100 says:

      1. Qatar have blackout dates during many English school holidays.
      2. Some people find it more convenient to fly non-stop instead of changing planes in the middle of the night.

      • numpty says:

        Number 2. if flying to Asia, I hate the stopover in Doha (although I hate Dubai stopovers even more!), doesn’t matter how nice the cabin or the lounge is, a BA non stop from LHR to Asia let’s me get a decent sleep.

        However for going to Oz then a stopover is unavoidable, in which case I’d prefer QR (although the BA to SIN sector means I can use the Qantas lounge in SIN which has great food).

        • ChampagneSocialist says:

          Ditto. If I were by myself I would fly QR in a heartbeat, but if I’m booking for my elderly parents who are not frequent flyers there’s too much stress and risk involved with indirect flights. And anything involving my overactive kids I’d want them to be asleep for most of it!!

      • Qrfan says:

        Not really “non stop” flying ba to Sydney though, is it? You have to get off the plane.

    • bafan says:

      “Simples” is beyond irksome.

    • Hbommie says:

      The ‘boom’ continues as far as I can see. US hotels x3 pre pandemic levels.

  • ATAY1184 says:

    This article says Club Suite seats are available on LON to SYD
    I have Club booked BA0015 Lon Syd on 29 Aug and BA0016 Syd to Lon on 27 Sept. Manage my booking still shows as 787.
    Is there another flight on these dates? Or is there an aircraft change?
    Simplified question- how does Rob know that its Club Suite?

    • Rob says:

      Sydney went to Club Suite from October 2022, on a 777. BA made a big song and dance about it. Not sure if they are swapping them out due to their aircraft issues.

      • ATAY1184 says:

        Think they must have swapped aircraft. Colin Mackinnons post in this says 787 too

      • Alex Ho says:

        Summer timetable BA11/12 to SIN gets Club Suite on a B777-300ER. BA15/16 is on a B787-9.
        Winter timetable BA15/16 to SYD via SIN gets Club Suite on a B777-300ER. BA11/12 gets a B787-9.

    • Harry T says:

      My booking in Jan 2024 is showing as club suite.

      • Nick says:

        It’s seasonal isn’t it? 787 half the year, 777 the other.

  • KK says:

    1 777 1 787 cycle per day so get your picks right

  • Kay says:

    Booked earlier in the year to Lon-Syd in WT using free BA Amex 241, for 50k Avios and £300 for two.

    Have now rebooked with my Barclays voucher for CS, 160k and £750 for two.

    Will make the 22h more bearable!!

  • Louie says:

    Looks like we’ll still be having our involuntary weekend in Belfast then as we fly the week before the first of these releases!

    • BadOmens says:

      “An Involuntary Weekend in Belfast”

      Could make an intriguing movie title. Wonder if they could get Collin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson on board for it.

  • Sean C says:

    Totally screwed up and booked us on reward flights with a 241 to SIN instead of my parents and will probably have to cash up for their flights, and not get the miles/tier points for outselves! Also in CW not CS but still a lot better than paying cash, we were looking at almost 17K for 4 of us on BA or Singapore Airlines.

    Anyone know if there’s a change the 787-9 will be CS by April 2024?

    • Sean C says:

      Wow the flights were disappearing all over the place today. Eventually capitulated and managed to get us 4 seats together in May instead of our 1st choice dates in April which I missed out on by a matter of minutes.

  • gundam says:

    Hmmm. They must have just removed availability in the last hour. I was in the middle of booking something with loads of seats still available across December. Got timed out so started the booking again. Now zero availability.

    • Sean C says:

      Yeh, virtually no availability at all now outbound December through June. Sorry you missed out.

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

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