Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Bits: 240 Avios with £24 of rioja, Concorde Room, 4000 Flying Blue miles with Europcar

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News in brief:

Get 240 Avios with six bottles of rioja

British Airways Wine Explorer, run by Laithwaites, is fairly well known.  The latest offer is The Christmas Collection, 12 mix and match bottles for £119 plus, for new customers, 1000 Avios.

Far fewer people know that Iberia has its own UK-delivery wine deal with vinoseleccion.

Here is their latest offer.  You receive a half-price case of six bottles of rioja for just £24 including free UK delivery.  You will also receive 240 Avios in Iberia Plus – which is a good way of ‘activating’ a new Iberia Plus account to allow transfers in and out via ‘Combine My Avios’.

In the Terminal 5 Concorde Room

The Concorde Room at London Heathrow Terminal 5 is the dedicated lounge for ticketed First Class passengers and British Airways Executive Club Gold Guest List members.

I am not a big fan of it, as I wrote when I last reviewed it three years ago.  The atmosphere doesn’t work for me, neither does the lack of self-serve food options.

If you are wondering what joys you are missing out on, if you have never made it past the hallowed door, take a look at the new furniture that has just been installed.  It appears that a local Wetherspoons or retirement home closed down and BA couldn’t resist a bargain.  Click to enlarge:

British Airways Concorde Room

Get up to 4,000 Flying Blue miles with Europcar

Flying Blue, the KLM / Air France scheme, has launched a very generous ‘quadruple miles’ offer with Europcar.

For bookings before 8th December, for rentals completed by 15th December, you will receive:

  • 800 miles for a one-day rental
  • 1,200 miles for a two-day rental
  • 1,600 miles for a three-day rental
  • 2,000 miles for a four-day rental
  • 3,200 miles for a 5-7 day rental
  • 4,000 miles for a 8+ day rental

4,000 Flying Blue miles could amount to a generous rebate on your rental cost.

Full details are on the Europcar website here.  Note that the offer is not valid for rentals in the US or Canada.


How to earn Flying Blue miles from UK credit cards

How to earn Flying Blue miles from UK credit cards (April 2025)

Air France and KLM do not have a UK Flying Blue credit card.  However, you can earn Flying Blue miles by converting Membership Rewards points earned from selected UK American Express cards.

These cards earn Membership Rewards points:

Membership Rewards points convert at 1:1 into Flying Blue miles which is an attractive rate.  The cards above all earn 1 Membership Rewards point per £1 spent on your card, which converts to 1 Flying Blue mile.

The American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card earns double points (2 per £1) on all flights you charge to it, not just with Air France and KLM but with any airline.

Comments (98)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Alex Sm says:

    “It appears that a local Wetherspoons or retirement home closed down and BA couldn’t resist a bargain.”

    Hahaha, or as they would say in Spain , jajaja 🙂

    This is the essence of BA recently, unfortunately – in all, from nearly-older-than-me B767s to pathetic food offerings of cheapest possible egg sandwiches on 4-hour flights

  • Stu_N says:

    OT – can’t get the Accor/ Air Berlin/ Iberia trick to work. I follow all the steps in the 6/8/14 article but at the end I am getting an email:

    subject “Your Rewards points have been recredited to your account.”

    body: “You have opted for your Rewards points to be automatically converted into air miles. Your points will be converted as soon as you reach the required points threshold.
    Your request is currently pending approval by our Partner Iberia.”

    Tried a couple of weeks ago and undid the auto-conversion option last week, just tried again and same response.

    Any ideas? I’ve previously moved points to Iberia so maybe it has remembered and this only works for new conversions. Alternatively any easy ways to earn 800 Accor points?

    • the real harry1 says:

      anybody who has it working is petrified of touching it – it will surely break

      I do remember having to fiddle with it for a while until it eventually got working (x2) – I guess they’ll take it away as an option in due course, anyway

    • Temp says:

      Same experience. It seems they’ve closed the loophole.

  • Alan says:

    OT Bits – 7 days now passed since VS to IHG transfer initiated, nothing showing up yet – fingers-crossed all still going to plan and counting towards Spire!

  • Sue says:

    OT – my partner has today a new replacement supplementary gold reward card from me ( he has a different postal address to me ) and he’s activating the card on line. If he registers the card to his existing BAPP online account – will it mean he won’t be eligible for new gold reward card bonus when he applies in his own name and at his own address? Is it better to create a new amex on line account for this particular card? Sorry – hope you can understand what I mean! Thanks!

  • Rich says:

    Concorde Room furniture – am in there now and expected to be aghast! I’m not, it’s an improvement in my opinion, especially out on the terrace. Furnishing choice is of course a matter of personal taste, but the photo in this article does not do the new style justice…. in my opinion.

  • Ian Cowan says:

    Anyone had their wine yet? Or a contact email/phone-call from Vinoseleccion as promised in their confirmation email? Their UK phone number (01908 code) brings up a foreign (presumably Spanish) ringtone then a recorded message, even during their advertised customer service hours. Hmm.

    • Marc says:

      Nothing here – ordered on 6th November and no contact after the intiial email, credit card has not been charged.

      I’ve sent an e-mail to them – will see if they get back…

      • the real harry1 says:

        nothing to worry about

        they’re getting more stock sent over to UK

        • Marc says:

          Yeah looks like it will get here fairly soon – got a reply from Vinoseleccion:

          Thank you for your message. I confirm that your order of Bene Placitum Reserva has been received correctly and it is being processed. Delivery date is approx. about 1 week as the wine is completely sold out in UK and had to be sent from Spain.

          I kindly inform you that until the order is not processed, Vinoseleccion will not make any charge.

          Our apologies for this inconvenience

  • John says:

    Received message this morning telling me delivery is today, ordered on Nov 8th! So I guess the new stock has arrived. This is the first contact I have had since I ordered.

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