Avios Points - Best bang for buck?

[Rosscow]

Hi all,

Tips please! Swapped to an Avios card back in September and now have over 80,000 points.

I'm not expecting much, but what is the best way to get the most value? Ideally will be a short trip away with the wife somewhere - so flights I suppose.

Any tips greatly received!

Ta

[Arrivalist]

I use mine for wine and champagne

[Trustmeimadoctor]

80k isn't really enough without a 241 or companion voucher for anything worthwhile imho

I mean Aer Lingus man to mco economy is 65k + companion voucher and £600 ISH

Best use is long haul business or first flight with a voucher

[Tim330]

For short haul I found the Greek islands to be good value when travelling in school holidays. If you aren't restricted by school holidays not so helpful.

[jimothyc]

Assuming you got these via an Amex card, with that level of spend you should have qualified for a companion voucher.

40k is about enough for a business class short haul flight. So you could do 1 1/2 european city breaks for what you have.

[The Leaper]

I use my Avios points and a 2-4-1 voucher to book BA business class flights. I have found this the best use and value.

R

[mikey_b]

I need to spend some of mine really. Got a whisker under 327,000 at the moment, collected over many years. They started as BMI miles, got boosted with an Amex account, then all got transferred over to Avios when BMI went under, and are still being topped up with periodic work flights and general Amex spending every month.

[GTPork]

I recommend www.seatspy.com for finding the best options.

[48k]

Have a look at some of the YT videos by MyGreyGapYear. He has a lot of tips and tricks for flights including how to maximise use of Avios.

[pacenotes]

I use them for when flights are stupid prices.

School holidays or sports events. It's nice knowing I paid £25 to sit up front when the person beside me probably paid £750+

I did it for 3 rounds of the rugby world cup last year and same with the Olympics this year. J on my flight has been sold out for over 6 months now.

I did the long haul upgrade with points before, You still have to pay £300+ in tax to upgrade. If they have seats available it's about £600 to upgrade at the airport.

I'd rather pay for J upfront now to claim the tier points.

[GT03ROB]

pacenotes said:

I use them for when flights are stupid prices.

Agree last 2 times I’ve used them is when I’ve needed a flight the next day. This can be ruinously expensive but if you can find Avios availability, which you often can for next day, its works out good value.

I have around 1.2million. In the past I’ve used them for return tickets on Concorde to New York; 1st class returns to the Caribbean (when the equivalent flights were costing £7k each); upgrades business to 1st; business flights over Christmas from the Gulf & to the Caribbean when retail flights were bonkers prices.

use them well & they are great.