‘The Travel Brief’, the weekly Head for Points travel trade newsletter
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Welcome to The Travel Brief, your weekly trade round-up of UK business travel and travel loyalty news as well as our latest reviews and features.
If you are not a subscriber, you can sign up here to receive this free newsletter in your inbox every Monday. Please forward it to any colleagues who you think may be interested.
The latest UK business travel news:
Our coverage of SAS’s move to SkyTeam will be on headforpoints.com from 5am today
Qantas resumes its non-stop flights to Heathrow, image above
Plaza Premium opens a new lounge in Heathrow Terminal 4
How ‘Discount Booster’ and new app-only deals let you save at Radisson hotels
JetBlue drops all winter season flights from Gatwick and delays restarts at Edinburgh and Dublin
Aer Lingus launches its first ‘Avios only’ flight
Is it time for Virgin Atlantic to launch a ‘Suite Guarantee’? Aircraft swaps are getting far too common
IHG’s Hotel Indigo opens in the mountains of Oman
The Randolph Oxford hotel is now bookable via Hilton
The HfP guide to Virgin Atlantic Clubhouses
How does Hilton’s ‘guaranteed connecting hotel rooms’ feature work?
Do you know you get a refund with British Airways and Virgin Atlantic if you cancel within 24 hours?
IHG adds a new Maldives resort to its Vignette Collection, image below
Stories we recommend from other sites:
Mark Lowes steps down as UK & Ireland Sales Manager for China Airlines (LinkedIn)
First look: London City Airport unveils upgraded departure lounge (Business Traveller)
easyJet pilots to join Virgin Atlantic on secondment for three years (Travel Weekly)
Ryanair approves Trip.com to sell flights (UK Aviation News)
Our latest reviews:
Our reviews section will return next week.
The latest UK travel loyalty news:
Get British Airways Bronze equivalent status for $49 by matching virtually any HOTEL status! You’ll get free BA seat selection for a year for starters (at 7 days before departure) for you and everyone on your booking ….
Cancellation fee on Club Europe Avios redemptions is now £12.50 each way, not 50p
How I turned my expiring Etihad Guest miles into cash with the Etihad Guest Reward Card
Where can you fly on British Airways from Terminal 3 for the Qantas and Cathay lounges?
How many Avios do I need to fly to ….? BA no longer publishes an Avios price list, but we do
REGISTER NOW: Earn 2,000 Bonvoy points per stay in Marriott’s new autumn promo. If you’ve got the Marriott Bonvoy American Express card, you’ll get 4,000 bonus points per stay.
Is it worth joining the Point A Hotels ‘A List’ programme?
STILL ON: Get 10,000 Avios with the FREE Barclaycard Avios Mastercard credit card!
Barclaycard has launched a special promotion if you sign up for the FREE Barclaycard Avios Mastercard credit card by 26th September.
The sign-up bonus is doubled – you will receive 10,000 Avios instead of the usual 5,000 Avios.
If you’ve not had any Barclaycard products for the last two years then you will definitely get the bonus if you spend £1,000 in three months. If you have/had other Barclaycards, the full rules about whether you qualify are in our article here.
This is the ideal credit card to use when American Express is not accepted. You will earn 1 Avios for every £1 spent.
It is also worth using as your primary credit card if you currently have the free British Airways American Express card but don’t spend £15,000 per year to trigger the Companion Voucher. You might as well use the free Barclaycard Avios credit card and just have one credit card for all your spending.
If you spend £20,000 per year on the card you will also earn an upgrade voucher, valid on any Avios redemption. Full details of how that works are in our article here.
You can apply for the free Barclaycard Avios credit card by clicking here.
The representative APR is 29.9% variable.
Head for Points receives a commission if you apply via our link – thank you.
Thank you for reading
Please drop me a note at rob@headforpoints.com with any feedback. See you next Monday.
Rob, Rhys and Katie @ Head for Points
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