The Value of Transferring British Airways Avios to Partner Programs

I have said it once and I will say it again: Avios is one of the best points programs available to Canadians because its points act as a currency.

Rather than being relegated to redemptions within a single loyalty program, Avios can be transferred amongst the loyalty programs of multiple carriers and used to book award flights with those same carriers or any of their partner airlines. If you are curious about how to perform these transfers, check out my article on how to transfer Avios between partnered loyalty programs.

Therefore the question arises: why should you bother with transferring to other carriers if the British Airways Executive Club acts as the “main account” from which Canadians can manage and transfer their Avios? Why not just book the award flights the British Airways search engine spits out?

Today I’d like to address exactly why you should consider checking across the Avios platform – a deal may just be waiting for you.

Why Transfer Avios From the British Airways Executive Club

While the convenience of the British Airways Executive Club portal certainly can’t be knocked, it doesn’t necessarily always give you the best deal mileage on your Avios.

Let’s go over a few of the main reasons why you should consider transferring your Avios away from British Airways Executive Club. The elephant in the room is that any flight booked through British Airways is subject to BA’s fuel surcharges – which can be notoriously expensive.

While BA has eased up in recent years, with Economy fares generally being much cheaper than their Business alternatives, that doesn’t mean their fees are as low as booking through programs such as Aeroplan. Let’s take a quick look, and consider if this may make you wish to try your luck on some of the other airlines in the OneWorld portfolio:

The second reason you may wish to transfer is to avoid issues with IT glitches or bugs. Look, the Avios family of airlines don’t have perfect website infrastructure. However, some sites may work better for you than others. If this is the case, being able to use a website you can actually navigate is important.

Lastly, many of the carriers now part of the Avios ecosystem have specific flight partners that can only be booked through their specific website and loyalty program. If this is the case, you may be best off transferring points in and booking there instead of on the Executive Club.

Of course, it may not always be the best idea to go through the bother of transferring your points.

For example, the exact flight you want may only be available on British Airways’ website. Go ahead and book if this is the case (though double-check to save on surcharges, just in case).

You may also prefer to take advantage of British Airways’ wonderful Family Sharing program instead of splitting up your Avios. Once points leave your Executive Club account, they can no longer be combined with points earned by your family members in their accounts.

Finally, there is the ever-popular and aspirational Fiji Airways which is a unique partner to an even more unique location that can only be booked via British Airways’ portal. So keep that in mind if that stretch of the Pacific was your first choice for a vacation!

The Value of Transferring Avios to Qatar Airways Privilege Club

QSuites. I wrote it. You want to transfer to Qatar Airways Privilege Club so you can enjoy flying on one of, if not the single best business class hard products on the aviation market.

Finding availability on QSuites can, however, be a major pain in the rear end. As one of the most desirable aspirational redemptions, it’s very rarely found at its lowest price in award inventory.

However, if you transfer your points to Qatar Airways you can always fly QSuites… albeit at an elevated price. The “Flexi” function on their site means you can use double the Avios to always book in Business class.

Is this the best use of your points? Perhaps not. However, in an era where so much award availability is drying up, it can be one of the best ways to make sure you get the premium award flights on the route you want when you want to fly it. Not to mention, change and cancellation fees on Qatar Airways Privilege Club redemptions are completely reasonable, giving customers added flexibility when they make their booking.

Let’s take a look at this route on Qatar Airways QSuites and Qatar Airways First Class to Malé:

170,000 Avios per person is steep for this ticket, but the guaranteed availability can be vital for once-in-a-lifetime redemptions such as honeymoons or jubilee anniversaries. As Avios is relatively easy to earn for Canadians, Qatar is therefore a fantastic transfer partner.

What should also be noted is that Qatar has a slew of transfer partners available on their Privileges portal not available on the British Airways Executive Club: Bangkok Airways, JetBlue, LATAM, Middle East Airlines, Oman Air, RwandAir, S7 and Virgin Australia

I want to note with a caveat, however, that many of these partners do not release much premium award space to Qatar. These can be good options if you’re willing to fly Economy at a fixed price but don’t be expecting to get on Oman Air First Class without serious luck and finagling.

Using Aer Lingus AerClub to Access Availability Earlier

With summer travel to Europe at all-time highs, it can be very tempting to want to try Aer Lingus products. For those on the British Isles, a short jaunt to the Emerald Isle and then flying back to Toronto or Montreal on Aer Lingus can help you avoid the dreaded Air Passenger Duty for which the United Kingdom has become so infamous.

While availability isn’t the best for Aer Lingus’ Business cabins, there is plenty of Economy to be found, and at a mere 6 hours of flight time across the Atlantic, this is more than tolerable.  However, if you must try their premium offering direct service from Dublin, transferring to AerClub offers you the best chance of doing so.

This is because AerClub releases availability for new seats up to 363 days out, as opposed to British Airways 355. That little window of 8 days can make all the difference in finding award availability, as anyone who’s planned a sojourn to the exotic Maldives can attest.

One thing to be aware of is that if your AerClub was made and registered in North America, and your address is anywhere outside of Europe, your taxes and fees on any redemption flights will be charged in US Dollars. This is different from cash fares, which will be charged in the currency of your point of origin.

Why to Consider Transferring Avios to Iberia Plus

As I covered in my last article, the process of getting your Iberia Plus account can be a bit of a headache. However, if you persevere in setting it up then using Iberia Plus does open a few opportunities that are impossible via the Executive Club.

The first opportunity is to just get a better selection of flights available via Iberia. This is not something of primary concern to Canadians, as Iberia does not fly to Canada, but may be of relevance to those of our readers residing in the United States.
The second reason is a bit more niche: the option to customize your itinerary when flying on Iberia.

For example, here is a flight booked via the Executive Club that takes us from Sao Paulo, Brazil to Athens to take advantage of Brazilian fuel surcharge fees and thus not pay too much out of pocket for the privilege:

As we can observe, this charges us 84,500 Avios plus $181.30 CAD in taxes and fees.

On the other hand, if we use the Iberia Plus site, we can customize our itinerary by selecting the desired class of service for each leg:

By choosing to slum it in economy for the segment from Madrid to Athens, we can save $60 in taxes and fees and 6,000 Avios.

Is this always the ideal redemption? Perhaps not, but it does provide an incentive to at least double-check the Iberia Plus flight options and gives the customer more control over the itinerary they wish to fly.

Lastly, there are several partners once again only available to Iberia Plus members that can be booked by using Avios on that platform rather than the Executive Club: Avianca, Level, LATAM, Binter Canarias, and Vueling.

Do note that the latter two are regional ultra-low-cost carriers, so savings won’t be particularly grandiose. On the other hand, Avianca, Level, and LATAM are major regional carriers and are viable options for those willing to use Avios to fly economy as they don’t release much premium award space.

The Value That Moving Avios to Finnair Plus Offers

Finnair is probably one of the most obscure options on this entire list, not least because Finland is far in northern Europe. However, it offers an excellent way to come back from trips to East Asia by routing yourself through their main hub of Helsinki.

For example, here’s an example of a flight from Osaka to London Heathrow with a stopover in Helsinki, all in Business class, for only 80,500 Avios plus 26,080 yen (about $235 at the time of writing). The reason this is useful is because business class award availability to and from East Asia is at an all-time premium and dearth of availability.

As Heathrow is one of the biggest hub airports on Earth, it then presents excellent opportunities to make your way back to Canada, perhaps via Dublin to avoid the infamous Air Passenger Duty….

Conclusion

The Avios convertible points currency is one of the best available to Canadians regardless of whether it goes overlooked. At the same time, it can be a bit confusing to understand why you should consider shuffling it between a slurry of different airlines and their respective sites.

We hope that we have demonstrated today a few of the reasons why it can be a good idea to transfer Avios from the Executive Club and check further afield to get the perfect OneWorld flight redemption you always dreamed of.

Until next time, don’t pay more than you have to.