People who don’t buy points are already buying points without realising it

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

• Occasional Ranter says:

  22 Apr22 April 14:02

  I have bought over half a million Avios in the last year using Boost when credit card bonuses hit a household BAEC a/c. At <= 0.92p each, this makes perfect sense for my 2 uses:
  – BA biz short haul in Europe, where I'm getting about 3p of value based on published cash fares and about 1.5p of value based on what I'd actually be willing to pay;
  – BA or QR or CX biz long haul to OZ/NZ, where I'm getting about 2p of value based on published cash fares and where there have been very few cheap cash deals anyway, unless you want to undo the whole benefit of flying J by getting a positioning flight on Ryanair to some far flung European city with no interlining of bags…

  When QR start offering returns in QSuites to AKL again for sub £3k then I might stop buying so many Avios, but when is that actually going to happen ?

  Last trip to NZ, I had to delay the outbound journey at the last moment, couldn't use points for it as a result, cost me £4k one way with CX. It's brutal out there.

• Kevin says:

  22 Apr22 April 15:13

  Tesco Clubcard points do convert to Virgin on a 2x basis, and it works out at even more than that if you value a Virgin point at more than 1p.

  • Rob says:

    22 Apr22 April 17:00

    Sorry, yes, should have read 1p. Updated. Thanks.

• Bernard says:

  22 Apr22 April 17:35

  Not convinced that pre-buying an ‘asset class’ (in the loosest terms), that pays no interest or dividends, to buy a product subject to long term deflation, and where avios devalue every two years – either directly or by adding extra charges etc, is a financially astute move.
  Far better to invest in better returning assets or pay of the mortgage early.

  (Ok I get it, this is a points website, but let’s no get too clever about it. Avios are generally an exceedingly poor form of investment)

  • Occasional Ranter says:

    22 Apr22 April 19:41

    Would actually be an interesting article, comparing the value of 1 avios 10 years ago Vs today. Using typical award rates and typical cash fares for same destination.

    I know that with AA miles, J to Sydney was 60k miles 10 years ago, now it’s 85k miles. I think the earning rate on most OW partners is still the same ? Buying miles for cash used to cost about 1.6c a mile in the very frequent sales, now it’s about 2c, I think.

    But the cash fare on a decent airline, one stop, ex London on that route, is what, maybe 70% higher ?

    Availability of award seats is the bigger issue, I think.

    • meta says:

      22 Apr22 April 19:46

      If you are going to buy points, it should be for immediate to short-term consumption. Some people hoard millions of points, but that’s not a really good strategy. Earn and burn as fast as you can.

      • Rob says:

        22 Apr22 April 20:09

        This strategy only works until it doesn’t, until you need a room or a flight and you don’t have the balance.

        I’ve started keeping a minimum balance in my Hilton account, for eg. Less bothered about Marriott as Amex transfers are instant, but if a good Hilton event comes up I want to be able to grab it.

        Similarly, I like to keep enough Avios on hand so that if BA announces a new route tomorrow and every flight is open x 4 Club, I can jump in and hoover up seats for the family for prime school holiday dates.

        • meta says:

          22 Apr22 April 20:33

          In 15 years earn and burn strategy has always worked for me together with diversifying miles and points.

          1) I don’t need to fly BA.
          2) Avios transfers from HSBC and Amex are instant
          3) I don’t need to travel during prime school dates
          4) Using points on events is not really good use of points in my opinion.

        • Nick says:

          23 Apr23 April 00:01

          When I was earning for business travel, I assigned to values to each mileage currency: full value for what I could potentially use in the next 24 months given the amount of vacation time I had, and then a discounted value for the rest so I would be more inclined to burn the excess on slightly marginal redemptions to get ahead of the eventual and inevitable program devaluation

      • Occasional Ranter says:

        22 Apr22 April 20:10

        Well, yes, that’s a sound basic rule, but I’ll happily assume a little exposure risk given it’s paid off so well for me over the last 10 years.

        Also, holding a large points balance allows you to book a couple of alternative dates, which is very useful for trips to the other side of the world, where a family or work crisis might otherwise scupper the trip.

        • meta says:

          22 Apr22 April 20:37

          Just remember what happened to people who held large balances in Radisson Rewards…

    • Rob says:

      22 Apr22 April 19:50

      You need to decide how to factor in product upgrades though. When I started flying in Business BA had the ‘cradle seat’ which was effectively just a large normal seat (this isn’t SO long ago). Now you get a private suite with a closing door and a fully flat bed.

      • Occasional Ranter says:

        22 Apr22 April 20:05

        Rob, that’s why we need someone who thinks about these things to write the article 😉

      • meta says:

        22 Apr22 April 20:35

        Yes, but due to poor BA maintenance can you actually guarantee that your seat or door will actually function? So you need to factor that in.

        • Will says:

          23 Apr23 April 00:55

          In reality, it’s very rare to have a broken seat or door.

        • Gordon says:

          23 Apr23 April 07:40

          As long as the maintenance is sufficient enough to stop an aircraft falling out of the sky, and I live to suffer a rare occurrence of a faulty seat, or door, I will be happy!

• Traumahawk007 says:

  22 Apr22 April 18:28

  I think too many get hung up on the Avios value. Nothing is free but it gives a massive opportunity for those to experience a higher level of flight comfort in business or first that they would normally be unaffordable. Yes it’s a PITA finding reward flights & BA should make it easier especially with BAPP 241 extra Biz seats.

  • Mark says:

    22 Apr22 April 19:49

    There is a convoluted way to see this. If you go to book on a specific day using the voucher and then click on ‘find availability on other dates’ it will show you availability using the voucher

    • Traumahawk007 says:

      23 Apr23 April 08:35

      @Mark I have had previous success finding and booking seats but can you elaborate please just in case I’m doing something wrong as recently
      what I have found is that I put my dates in with 241 and I’ll find availability for outbound but it says no availability for inbound even though the return date tabs below say availability. When I click on the find availability for other dates calendar it shows the date calendar and they are highlighted as if flights are there but what I have realised is that it is showing economy availability and by changing class it will show these economy seats for the return but then hide the original outbound as they’re the extra seats for the 241.
      It’s not easy

      • Mark says:

        23 Apr23 April 10:06

        Definitely not easy, and in terms of improvements to the IT experience having the option to apply your voucher when doing avios availability searches would be great. I don’t currently pay for seatspy but would probably take the plunge if they offered the ability to search for the additional club seats as a selling point.

        • Rob says:

          23 Apr23 April 10:15

          It’s physically impossible because the additional Club seats vary by starting point – you see more from Manchester, Edinburgh etc.

• Kevin says:

  22 Apr22 April 18:30

  I still don’t follow this! Tesco Clubcard points can be converted on a basis of 2x to both Hotels.com and to Virgin Atlantic points. Why is there a ‘loss’ in this comparison?

  • Rob says:

    22 Apr22 April 19:49

    It’s not a ‘loss’ – you’re giving up 2p of Hotels.com credit to get 2 Virgin Points, so you are ‘paying’ 1p per Virgin Point. They are not free.

• Kevin says:

  22 Apr22 April 20:20

  Sorry, Rob, and very respectfully, as I love your work, but the maths here just doesn’t add up.

  £1 spend in Tesco
  = 1 Tesco Clubcard point
  = 1p (if you get a voucher and redeem in-store), or if you convert:
  = 2p for Hotels.com, or
  = 2 Virgin Points (probably worth more than a penny each)

  In brief, as I see it, the Virgin and Hotels.com partnership with Tesco offer exactly the same deal.

  • Rob says:

    22 Apr22 April 21:12

    Yes, but if you treat the 2p at Hotels.com as being equivalent to cash (which it isn’t of course) then you are giving up 2p by taking 2 Virgin Points so they ‘cost’ you 1p each.

    • LittleNick says:

      23 Apr23 April 07:51

      For someone that doesn’t use hotels.com and generally goes direct, this doesn’t apply

• Kevin says:

  23 Apr23 April 01:37

  That is a very bizarre way of looking at things if you intend to use Tesco points fir Virgin redemptions, especially as reward fares, when you can get them, are much lower than cash fares. I have always understood your value of roughly a penny per Avios or Virgin Mile as being the value it brings to me when booking a reward flight.

  Here is an example: I recently flew BOM-LHR in economy on VS (fantastic service) using 10,000 Virgin points, plus £113. The points were all gathered from sign up bonus of linking Tesco/Virgin accounts, spend in Tesco, and at one point in the last few years, Tesco/Virgin were worth 3x. So. I accumulated those 10,000 points quite quickly. I’m not a credit card guy.

  Given one point valued at a penny, that equates to £213 for my flight. My points were (at least) doubled from the exchange Tesco Clubcard>Virgin. So I could halve what they ‘cost’ me, and I paid £163 for my 19 hour flight with full service. Take off the sign up bonus, and it’s even less than that.

• Kevin says:

  23 Apr23 April 01:38

  10hr flight*

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