Avios Advice: Three things to do when you’re getting started

Points collecting shouldn’t be so complex.

Looking back at when I started getting serious about Avios, I realize there are many things I wish I had done earlier. The reality is that I started at my own speed and did the things I felt comfortable doing. Collecting points can be overwhelming, so this guide simplifies my three key learnings.

Avios Advice #1: Get a credit card that earns points

I feel like we signed up for a points-earning credit card too late. This is my number one advice if you’re serious about collecting Avios. Not only will you earn points for every pound you spend on the card, but there are usually very healthy sign-up bonuses.

There are a few things to say about getting a credit card to earn points.

Firstly, never spend more on the card than you would normally spend. Please plan to pay it off each month and focus on your financial well-being. There’s no point in going into cash debt to build up Avios.

The next important point on credit cards is to consider the extra value versus the ongoing cost. Amex offers two BA cards, one of which is free. Both cards allow you – if you spend a certain amount each year – to earn a companion voucher, also known as the 2-4-1 voucher. This has significant value, as it effectively halves the number of Avios you need for flights.

There’s a lot of talk online about card-hopping: getting a credit card, earning the signup bonus then moving to another card. This is more prevalent in the US where the choice of cards is wider. The reality in the UK is that you’re looking at just two card companies for personal cards: Amex and Barclaycard. There are rules around the signup bonus that can trip you up. Jumping from one Amex card to another usually won’t work.

In my years of points collecting I’ve stuck with Amex, and when Barclaycard launched I added that card. Points collecting is effort, and I’d rather focus my energy on other ways of adding to my points pile than trying to move between cards. That being said, as I got closer to the renewal date on my Amex I’ve spoken to them about a renewal bonus. This is at their discretion, but I’ve managed to get 5,000 Avios just for remaining with them.

You can only use the companion voucher from the free BA Amex card for economy tickets. The paid-for card (BA Premium Plus Card) allows you to use it in any cabin. That is significant. Most people will want to use their points for Business or First class.

The card currently costs £300 a year, but (at the time of writing) it comes with a 30,000 signup bonus. £300 is a relatively large fee to pay each year. It’s worth considering the pros and cons of that card versus the cost. For us, it’s absolutely worth it.

Here are our personal cards, with some context around them.

BA American Express Premium Plus – I consider this the first card you should get (alternatively, there’s a free version). My wife and I have one each. The cards give us two companion vouchers each year plus a reasonable amount of Avios earned.

The cost has nearly doubled since we first got it, whilst the perks haven’t particularly increased.

Putting that aside, it’s a solid card, and you earn 1.5 Avios per £1 spent (Or 3 Avios per £1 spent with BA). Having an Amex card gives you offers ranging from getting bonus Avios to getting cashback from retailers. They are genuinely valuable, but I’d say that we only use two or three per year, and you have to keep an eye on the Amex app to see when new ones come in.

The biggest challenge with Amex is that it’s not accepted everywhere. It is much better than five years ago, but some retailers won’t take it. For offline retailers, I find it a little embarrassing when my card is “declined” when I go to pay.

I try to ask upfront if they accept Amex, but sometimes forget. For high-value transactions that don’t accept Amex, particularly when you’re renewing your insurance, I saw value in having another Avios earning card, so when Barclays launched a new one, I jumped on it.

Barclaycard Avios Plus – We have one of these cards to act as a backup when Amex isn’t accepted.

I pay £20/month for this card, but as I have a Barclays Premier Account (which costs £12/month), I get a refund of £5 each month. I earn 1.5 Avios for every £1 I spend. If I spend over £10k a year, I get a “Cabin Upgrade Voucher” or 7,000 Avios. As it’s my second card, I have never come close to hitting that spend. I already get an annual upgrade voucher through my Premier account.

In total, we spend £780 a year on credit cards: 2 x Amex at £300, and 1 x Barclaycard at £180. We probably get £60 – £80 back from Amex each year depending upon what cashback offers are on.

Is it worth it for us? The companion vouchers (x2 each year) save us around 150,000 points yearly. That would cost me – at full rate – £2,659. On top of that, we earn around 48,000 Avios each year. We get 0.5 extra points per £ on the paid-for card vs the free card, so that’s 16,000 extra points worth around £279. I feel like we come out on top with the Amex.

I put around £7k of spend through the Barclaycard, which gives me 10,500 Avios each year. This would cost me £195 to buy. The free card would have given us 1 Avios / £, so I’m losing money on the Barclaycard. However, it’s a valuable backup card, and if I ever decide to move away from Amex, it’s a viable option for earning points and an upgrade voucher.

Avios Advice #2: Use the BA Shopping website to earn thousands of Avios

I cannot stress enough how critical this is to earning Avios, as it’s effectively free.

In short, the Avios Shopping website allows you to earn Avios whilst buying from your favourite websites. It doesn’t cost you any more; it takes about 30 seconds of your time, but you can earn hundreds, or even thousands, of Avios each time.

Using the Avios Shopping website is simple:

1. Visit the Avios Shopping website. Sign in to your BA Executive Club account.
2. Search for a shop that you’d like to purchase from.
3. Click on the link that takes you to that shop.
4. Buy as normal through that retailer.

There are thousands of retailers listed, including popular ones like Asos, Currys, Sainsbury’s, Argos, Boots and eBay. What you can earn differs by retailer, but at the time of writing, you could earn 6 Avios per £1 spent at Asos or 5 Avios per £1 spent at Boots.

If you’re spending money with online retailers and not using Avios Shopping, then you’re missing out on thousands of Avios.

There are a few things to note about Avios Shopping. Firstly, you must complete the transaction on the retailer’s website, not the app. Secondly, there are sometimes different earning rates depending on whether you’re a new or existing customer. Looking at my example list of retailers above, Asos, eBay and Sainsbury’s offer different rates for returning customers.

Finally, there are no guarantees that you’ll earn your points. The way the Avios Shopping site works is that when you click on a retailer’s website, it’s up to that business to tag your transaction as coming from BA. Sometimes, things get in the way. For example, you might end up saving your basket and coming back later. This can sometimes mean your Avios get declined if you visit the retailer’s website via a Google Search or a third-party website. Sometimes, using a voucher code or a gift card will block it.

I’ve been using the Avios Shopping site for years. I’d estimate that 90% of my transactions went through fine, and I earned Avios from them. Some businesses are well-known for failing a lot – for example, Hilton is terrible. It was so awful that they had completely removed themselves from the Avios Shopping site.

I’ve earned almost a hundred thousand Avios over the last couple of years by using Avios Shopping. All without spending any more money. You have to be focused, but the effort vs reward is heavily tilted in my favour. My best advice is to really focus on the high-earning opportunities: insurance and hotels. We have home insurance, car insurance and pet insurance renewing each year, and that could give us 10k Avios each time.

Hotels, at 10 Avios per £1, are a gold mine. We put £3k – £4k of hotels through the Avios Hotels website each year. That’s a combination of cheap, one-night stays, and our longer holiday stays. I won’t use Avios Hotels if there’s a significant price difference vs booking direct, or via another aggregator, but most of the time the pricing is the same, or just marginally different.

The Shopping website isn’t just for your regular retailers -you can earn Avios when you buy insurance, TV packages, mobile phones and a lot more.

Of course, there’s Avios to be earned through hotels and travel. You can earn up to 12 Avios per £1 on hotel brands and up to 8 points/£1 on airport parking (including the official Heathrow and Manchester Airport car parks). My favourite e-sim provider airalo will give you 15/£1.

The Avios Hotels website

Avios has its own hotel booking website. Expedia powers it, so you get the same wide choice of hotels albeit with a somewhat dated user interface. It’s worth persevering because you earn 10 Avios per £1 spent on any hotel booking.

The pricing is typically the same as most other hotel aggregators, and I have a 100% award rate for bookings through this site. It operates differently from the main shopping website. That relies on cookies and tracking code in your browser and then an order being tracked back to you, whereas the Avios Hotels website does not: all transactions are tattooed with your Avios details.

Avios Advice #3: Build a destination list and be flexible

Earning Avios is one thing, but spending it can be challenging. If there’s no Avios availability on the flights you want to take, then there’s not much you can do about it.

My advice is to build out a list of places that you want to visit, and to tackle them in the order that they become available. The most challenging points redemption is the one where you need to go a particular city on a particular set of dates. The easier ones are where you can be really flexible on dates and potentially the destination.

I’ll give you an example of flexibility: in 2024, we wanted to tick the Maldives off our bucket list, but there was no availability in the month we wanted to travel. Instead, we used points to fly to Adu Dhabi, spent four nights enjoying that city, flew to Doha (and experienced the stunning First Class Lounge) then connected on to the Maldives. Flying back, we stayed four nights in Doha. Whilst that made the trip longer, and with more flights, it gave us two more places to explore and it made the trip even better.

Adding in stopovers, or departing from one city and flying back from another may feel like it’s adding complexity to the trip. The reality is, is does. It also adds extends your trip, with more places and things to do. If you’re travelling with kids having more flights might not work. For couples it’s just a way to see more of the World.

Some destinations are just more straightforward than others. If there’s more than one flight per day, that will make it easier (New York, Boston, Washington, and Singapore come to mind). It will be more challenging if it’s a “hot” destination (The Maldives, Singapore). If the destination is served by larger planes, then it could mean more availability (e.g. the A380, A350).

Some destinations are just very challenging. Australia (via Singapore) is a tough one.

A good way to stay on top of availability is to use a third-party tool to monitor Avios seat availability. They will cost you money on a monthly basis, but you can pop in all your target destinations and a rough idea of dates and they will alert you when the seats become available.