Is it easier to earn Avios than Virgin Points?

[Krispy]

Asking here as there’s more activity than the virgin forum.
Do you find that avios are generally easier to earn/available to earn in more places than virgin points? I ask as someone who has used both, collected and redeemed both. I find the companion voucher given by the virgin cards better (I know it’s limited to 75k) but better if you can redeem with saver upper class/premium seats, as the card itself can be free or £160 fee for the rewards+ card. The BAPP one is good, don’t get me wrong, and it’s only limited by how many avios you have yourself

For example
Virgin LHR-NYC (I know their most popular route): in PE – 35k virgin points return + £577
BA LHR-NYC: in PE – 85k avios + £300

In the above calculation, if you go with 1 point/avios = 1p. The virgin one is significantly cheaper (£927) vs BA at £1150.

However I find the virgin shops away platform has less shops etc available to earn points with compared to the BA Exec Club website. Capital on Tap also allows for transferring to avios. Am I missing anything here?

What are your thoughts?

[AJA]

For me it’s not so much whether one scheme is easier to earn points in but how much easier it is to spend the points. Virgin’s network and where they fly to doesn’t seem as extensive as BA, nor do I particularly want to fly where VS flies. Even though they are both part of wider alliances I find the vouchers which limit travel to the particular airline metal means that the BA scheme works better for me. I also find it easier to concentrate my spending and hence earning to one alliance. I am also not sure how great VS redemptions are with their dynamic pricing though I expect BA to go the same way. I probably won’t even retain Bronze status with BA but I have a large balance of Avios so will probably stick with BA.

[Krispy]

Yeah status has never been a consideration for me as I don’t do any business travel, it’s all personal travel. Therefore I don’t fly more than 4 return journeys a year, so earning/spending avios is worth more than actual status for myself. If I’m not redeeming points I just go with the cheapest airline. I do tend to prefer VA/BA because I can fly direct, which is worth more to me in terms of time rather than stopping in Qatar or Dubai and having a better flying experience.

I know what you mean. And you can use the BA companion voucher on multiple airlines, not just BA, also Aer Lingus and Iberia

[DJP31]

I think the BA shopping links are more extensive than those available via Virgin Red, but as others have mentioned it’s more about where do you want to go and who flys there. BA’s network is far wider than Virgin and for that reason my go to is BA.

However I also have the Virgin card as I’ve found with my spending pattern I can get the BA 2-4-1 and the Bcys upgrade voucher with room to spare. By having a Virgin card it’s another string to my bow and adds another voucher. I don’t have any status and it’ll be interesting to see if the 75k limit impacts me.