The two easy ways to use Avios points to fly to Australia and New Zealand

I get a steady stream of emails asking about how to book Avios tickets to Australia or New Zealand.  Before the pandemic, my honest answer was ‘don’t bother – use cash’.

There were three reasons for this:

• Avios availability to Sydney, if using a 2-4-1 voucher, is exceptionally hard to get.  You need to route via Singapore which means you are competing with people who just want an Avios ticket to go there. Capacity on the route has shrunk massively since Virgin Atlantic withdrew and British Airways downsized to a Boeing 777 or even a 787 at times.  This means that it is rare to see more than the four guaranteed Club World seats. 

• The Avios required is disproportionately high.  Using British Airways, a Club World redemption costs 340,000 Avios (peak) or 290,000 Avios (off-peak) plus £775 in Reward Flight Saver fees. If you value an Avios at 1p as we usually do, a ticket for one person costs the equivalent of £4,175 (peak) or £3,675 (off-peak). It obviously looks better with the remote chance of using a BA American Express 2-4-1 companion voucher.

• Cash tickets to Australasia are disproportionately low.  Even post covid, Australia is PROPORTIONATELY cheaper than other long haul routes on a ‘pound per mile flown’ basis.  Pre-pandemic we saw (and wrote about) business class cash fares from the UK as low as £1,500 on Malaysia Airlines and as low as £1,400 to Auckland with Qatar Airways.  Those deals are unlikely to return, I admit, but pre-covid you could always find cash tickets ex-Europe for under £2,000.  When you factor in the charges on an Avios ticket, plus the huge amount of miles earned back for paying cash, plus the ability to pick and choose when you go, it is no surprise that redemptions look second best.

To be fair, there is currently a LOT of Avios availability between Singapore and Sydney. Here, via SeatSpy, are dates with two seats in Club World between now and June (outbound on the left, return on the right):

The problem is travelling between the UK and Singapore, especially on the return. Yesterday there was just ONE day in the next YEAR (12th May) with two Club World seats from Singapore to London.

Here’s the good news:

There are two easier ways to use Avios to Australia and New Zealand.

Option 1: Use Qatar Airways

Since Qatar Airways adopted Avios, the undoubted sweet spot in the redemption chart is 180,000 Avios for a return Business Class ticket between UK / Europe and Australia / New Zealand.

Not only is it massively cheaper than redeeming Avios on British Airways, but availability is better. Qatar Airways doesn’t just fly to Sydney either, it flies to:

• Adelaide
• Auckland
• Brisbane
• Canberra
• Melbourne
• Perth
• Sydney

Not only can you fly from London, but you can also fly from Birmingham, Manchester, Edinburgh, Dublin and many other European cities, via a plane change in Doha.

Frankly, even if you have a British Airways American Express 2-4-1 voucher, you should forget it and pay full price (180,000 Avios) per seat for a Qatar Airways redemption instead. It’s only marginally more expensive on Qatar Airways but the vastly superior product – and of course far better availability – easily compensates.

We wrote a detailed article on redeeming Avios on Qatar Airways flights to Australia and New Zealand which is here.

I need to flag one thing. If you search for business class seats from the UK to Australia or New Zealand on the Qatar Airways website, you will see a lot of seats at 360,000 Avios return, not 180,000. This is ‘extra’ availability which Qatar Airways chooses to offer on busier flights. The 180,000 Avios return seats are definitely there but require more hunting. If you book via ba.com these ‘extra’ seats do not appear.

Availability has further improved recently with partner Virgin Australia launching flights from Doha to four cities in Australia. Virgin Australia is leasing Qatar Airways aircraft and crew so, to all intents and purposes, you are on a Qatar Airways flight.

This article looks at how to book the new Virgin Australia flights between Doha and Australia with Avios.

Option 2: Using the multi-partner Avios reward chart via British Airways

There is a way to get an Avios reward flight to Australasia with far fewer availability issues and using far fewer Avios, whilst also seeing other destinations on the way.  The only snag is that you can’t use a British Airways American Express 2-4-1 voucher or a Barclays upgrade voucher.

95% of British Airways Avios collectors do not know that BA has a second redemption chart.

Some of you will never have seen this chart before (click to enlarge) or at least not before you started reading HfP:

You can see the original by clicking here to ba.com and scrolling down to click on ‘Partner Airlines’ and then ‘Avios costs for booking with two or more oneworld partner airlines’.

What is the Avios ‘multi-carrier reward chart’?

This is the reward chart that British Airways uses to price redemptions which include two or more oneworld partner airlines, excluding British Airways.

If, for example, you flew from London to Amman on Royal Jordanian and then caught a Qatar Airways flight to Doha, it would be priced using the chart above.

The chart above is for Economy travel.  Multiply by two for Business Class and by three for First Class.

Take a moment to note what I just wrote.

Whilst a standard Avios redemption in Business Class on British Airways costs 3x an Economy redemption, using the multi-partner chart only costs 2x.  This makes the multi-partner chart very good value for Business or First Class Avios tickets.

How to use this chart to get to Australasia

If you use oneworld partner airlines to get to Australasia, you have a lot of options.

You have Finnair which flies to many key cities in Asia.  Cathay Pacific can get you to Hong Kong and then down to Australasia.  Japan Airlines can do the same via Tokyo.  Qatar Airways can do the same via Doha.  Malaysia Airlines can do the same via Kuala Lumpur.  And, of course, there is Qantas too.

Here is a real example booked by a Head for Points reader pre-covid:

Heathrow to Tokyo (Japan Airlines)  5,957 miles

3 day stopover

Tokyo to Brisbane (Qantas)  4,426 miles

Holiday

Cairns to Hong Kong (Cathay Pacific)  3,451 miles

3 day stopover

Hong Kong to Manchester (Cathay Pacific)  5,988 miles

Because this involves three non-BA oneworld airlines it prices off the multi-partner chart above.  As the reader travelled 19,822 miles, the total cost in Business Class was 200,000 Avios plus, at the time he booked, under £600 of taxes.

This is a far better deal than 340,000 Avios (peak day) plus £775 of taxes if you booked London to Sydney on British Airways in Club World – and you won’t be doing that anyway, because availability is virtually non-existent.

The itinerary above is actually a very simplistic way of using the multi-partner chart.  If it wasn’t for the fact that this itinerary is so close to the 20,000 mile threshold, you could have added in a number of domestic flights on Qantas or Japan Airlines.

What else can you do with the multi-partner reward chart?

Here is an example of a round-the-world routing using the multi-partner chart.

London – Delhi – Hong Kong – Tokyo – Los Angeles – New York – London is just under 20,000 miles.  This would be 200,000 Avios in Business Class for the whole trip.

It is worth noting that I have never seen a firm list of the rules for booking multi-partner reward tickets.  Most BA call centre agents will never have booked one.

• In theory you are limited to eight sectors with just one overland sector – although I have seen examples where multiple overland sectors were ticketed

• In theory you need to have every segment in the same class as just one in a higher class will reprice the entire itinerary.  However, some people have reportedly had agents charge based on the longest class flown, ie if 60% is economy and 40% First then they were charged economy!

• In theory you can book a segment in economy – and the rest of the itinerary in business – and upgrade that segment later for free if availability in business appears

• In theory there are no rules on backtracking although this may be down to badly trained agents.  One example I have seen was basically multiple holidays from London to somewhere, back to back, to get to eight sectors.  If the agent allows it you could book, say, London to Qatar and home, London to Hong Kong and home, London to Tokyo and home, London to Kuala Lumpur and home as one booking – as long as you are using at least two oneworld carriers – and save a huge number of Avios on booking four holidays separately.

In truth, no-one seems clear.  The ‘eight flights maximum’ rule does seem to be firm – but that still gives you a huge amount of flexibility to put together a great trip.

To book, you first need to find each flight individually on ba.com as a reward seat. Make a list of the date, flight number etc for each leg and then call British Airways to book.

Unfortunately there is no way of knowing what the taxes and charges will be until the booking is complete. Remember that starting outside the UK will save a lot in Air Passenger Duty, although you will of course have to get yourself to Dublin, Amsterdam etc.

Conclusion

Unless you are lucky, you are being optimistic if you think that you can easily snag Avios availability on the British Airways flights between London Heathrow and Sydney.

Even if you can, you will be paying a lot for it.

I hope this article has shown that using either Qatar Airways or the British Airways multi-partner redemption chart offers far better value for your Avios and much improved availability.

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How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (March 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:

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

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.

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

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.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 8th April 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Business Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to 120,000 points. You receive 80,000 points when you spend £12,000 within three months and a further 40,000 points if you spend on the card between Month 14 and Month 17. Points convert 1:1 into Avios and many other programmes. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 8th April 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Business Gold is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 60,000 points. You receive 40,000 points when you spend £6,000 within three months and a further 20,000 points if you spend on the card between Month 14 and Month 17. Points convert 1:1 into Avios and many other programmes. Click here to apply.

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