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Barclaycard has fixed its issues and an exclusive special offer is coming

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On Monday we ran three articles on the brand new, and very exciting, Barclaycard Avios Mastercard credit cards.

Things didn’t go well. As you will know if you tried to apply:

  • the application website was not functioning
  • when it was functioning, acceptance did not seem as high as we were hoping, so we are working with Barclays to optimise acceptance for HfP
HFP-Barclaycard-Avios-Plus-Card

Barclaycard has fixed its problems and a special offer is coming

Barclaycard is, of course, very unhappy that this has happened.

They have told us that we will see a special sign-up offer for a very limited period at a later point. This will hopefully encourage everyone who admitted defeat after facing problems this week to sign up.

In a statement yesterday, Barclaycard told us:

“We apologise to Head for Points readers for the technical difficulties experienced when we launched our Barclaycard Avios and Avios Plus credit cards. We can confirm that this has now been resolved. We will be coming back to you with an exclusive offer within the next few weeks.”  

If your application has been rejected, you may want to reapply in few weeks time, once we have worked with Barclaycard to improve acceptance for our readers.

If you want to try your luck now, perhaps because you have some spending coming up which you need to trigger the sign-up bonus, it’s best to check your eligibility first using their free tool – the information is reused in the application so it doesn’t take long, and there is no impact to your credit file.

You can check your eligibility and apply for the free Barclaycard Avios credit card (5,000 Avios bonus) here. You can check your eligibility and apply for the Barclaycard Avios Plus credit card (25,000 Avios bonus) here.

If you missed our content on Monday, the first of our three articles on the Barclaycard Avios Mastercards is here.

Bear with us. We’ll keep you in the loop. In the medium and long term, these two cards will be an excellent addition to the wallet or purse of all UK Avios collectors.

To learn more about the cards, read our Barclaycard Avios Mastercard credit card review here:

The representative APR is 29.9% variable.

…. and our Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard credit card review here:

The representative APR is 80.1% APR variable, including the annual fee.  The representative APR on purchases is 29.9% variable.

PS. If you are not a regular Head for Points visitor, why not sign up for our FREE weekly or daily newsletters? They are full of the latest Avios, airline, hotel and credit card points news and will help you travel better. To join our 65,000 free subscribers, click the button below or visit this page of the site to find out more. Thank you.

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (April 2025)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

In February 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

Barclaycard Avios Plus card

Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

Get 25,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £10,000 Read our full review

Barclaycard Avios card

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard

Get 5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £20,000 Read our full review

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

30,000 Avios and the famous annual 2-4-1 voucher Read our full review

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending £15,000 Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points. These points convert at 1:1 into Avios.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on the ‘free for a year’ American Express Preferred Rewards Gold card is increased from 20,000 Membership Rewards points to 30,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (30,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 27th May 2025, the sign-up bonus on American Express Platinum is increased from 50,000 Membership Rewards points to a huge 80,000 points. Points convert 1:1 into Avios (80,000 Avios!) and many other programmes. Some people may see even higher personalised offers. Click here to apply.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital on Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, and the standard card is FREE. Capital on Tap cards also have no FX fees.

Capital on Tap Visa

NO annual fee, NO FX fees and points worth 1 Avios per £1 Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

There is also a British Airways American Express card for small businesses:

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

There are also generous bonuses on the two American Express Business cards, with the points converting at 1:1 into Avios. These cards are open to sole traders as well as limited companies.

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

Category

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard

Comments (299)

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

  • Andrew J says:
    4 Mar4 March 06:37

    Will there be any enhanced bonus for those of us who have a Barclaycard already and were considering switching to Avios? Or should I just push the button now?

    • BJ says:
      4 Mar4 March 06:45

      Why not cancel and wait 6 months? You’re only talking 8000 Nectar points or £40 if you switch existing card now. Or are you now rethinking strategy in redeeming avios due to new voucher opportunity instead of shifting avios to Nectar and buying miles-earnibg flights?

      • Andrew J says:
        4 Mar4 March 06:53

        Nope, still very much still in favour of redeeming Avios for Nectar as in my opinion this offers the best value for money. My thoughts on Barclaycard switching is that I’d just rather not have the hassle of cancelling and reapplying when I can just press a single button in the app. But I asked the question to see if it was better to wait a few weeks.

        • BJ says:
          4 Mar4 March 07:19

          Ok, I’m still in two minds about my HH card, logic says cancel but I feel quite attached to it 🙂

          • NorthernLass says:
            4 Mar4 March 07:21

            I’m sticking with my HH card for the time being and hopefully OH can reapply for the new one when the new offer arrives. With the recent IHG and Bonvoy points shenanigans I’m migrating back to Hilton full time so the extra points from card spend and gold status is a no-brainer.

          • meta says:
            4 Mar4 March 08:14

            I’m also sticking with my HH. My partner doesn’t have it, but he is also not going for this new card. We have too many Avios and don’t want to expose us too much. Maybe in two years when the current stash is depleted. I also don’t like the fact that there is no upgrade to F.

          • RussellH says:
            4 Mar4 March 10:42

            To my mind hotel points are far more useful than avios. I have enough for a transatlantic flight in J, and that is about the only time these days that I am likely to want to fly anywhere. I have not been on a plane since June 2019.
            But hotel points continue to get earned and used. Frankly, I would have been far more excited if this new launch had been for a hotel scheme.
            I still have a legacy Marriott MCard too, and no intention to give that up either.

    • Rob says:
      4 Mar4 March 07:11

      I have raised it.

      • planeconcorde says:
        4 Mar4 March 07:45

        I am interested in having the new Avois card, but I also don’t want to lose my HH card.

        • DevonDiamond says:
          4 Mar4 March 07:58

          Zero change of me applying for it while I have the HH visa

          • Chrisasaurus says:
            4 Mar4 March 19:31

            Well then the incentive is for them to kill off the hh card…

        • AJA says:
          4 Mar4 March 08:21

          I’m the same as you. I would really like to have both the new Avios card and keep.the Hhonors one as well. Really don’t understand Barclays objection to holding more than one of their products at the same time.

          • David says:
            4 Mar4 March 08:36

            Agree

          • Ali M says:
            4 Mar4 March 10:05

            same – wont want to lose HH…
            think they have no objections with 2 cards but just wont give bonus. hopefully enhanced bonus is for all customers

          • Simonbr says:
            4 Mar4 March 12:24

            +1. Barclaycard needs to allow applications for this card to include the welcome bonus for holders of the HH card, otherwise a lot of people will stick with HH and collecting their Avios with Amex.

          • Tracy says:
            4 Mar4 March 16:28

            Same, keeping HH and would only apply for the avois card if I get the same bonus as new customers…..

      • Andrew J says:
        4 Mar4 March 07:46

        Great, thanks – the current deal is a measly.

  • Roberto says:
    4 Mar4 March 06:51

    And if you can Rob could you get an update of when everyone will have the option to swap existing products over to a new card. I and others here read your comment about “Thursday” but that’s been and gone, many existing barclaycard users are still not getting this option..
    Thanks.

    • AJA says:
      4 Mar4 March 07:17

      +1 re this comment.
      Plus is it confirmed that holders of the Hhonors card can switch to the Avios cards for the lower SUB (and will that be an enhanced SUB as well?) or are we excluded?

      • BJ says:
        4 Mar4 March 07:23

        The HH card is no longer on the market so I wish Barclaycard would relax their rules and let us apply for another card with SUB and still keep HH.

  • L says:
    4 Mar4 March 06:59

    Yes I applies yesterday and got accepted.. wish I had waited cause now wondering what the offer will be..can HFP push for something for its readers that already got accepted lol

    • Rob says:
      4 Mar4 March 07:11

      Don’t lol. We are doing.

      • CarpalTravel says:
        4 Mar4 March 07:24

        Thank you. 👏

      • James says:
        4 Mar4 March 07:51

        Great to hear that Rob! Excellent that you’re understanding about this.

        • Pete M says:
          4 Mar4 March 08:09

          Thanks Rob, that’d be appreciated. It took a few attempts yesterday, but finally got accepted. The problem for me was their address system – you basically have to trick it to accept flat numbers, without which it auto-rejects…!

          • Kevin says:
            4 Mar4 March 16:06

            Hey Pete, how did you manage to trick the system into accepting flat numbers? Facing similar problems here!

          • PeteM says:
            4 Mar4 March 16:18

            Click to say you don’t have a postcode, Kevin – it then opens up more fields to fill in! Really stupid way to go about it, if you ask me!

  • TerryTierPoints says:
    4 Mar4 March 07:14

    A kick in the teeth for those of us who persisted with multiple attempts and spent time contacting Barclaycard.

    • slliw says:
      4 Mar4 March 10:12

      That’s the whole point, the offer is for those who did not persist and gave up. The new offer is to win those people back to give Barclays another try

  • DenisO says:
    4 Mar4 March 07:18

    Rob,
    Do balance transfers count as spend at 1.5 Avios per £, to trigger 25,000 Avios bonus, and to trigger Upgrade Voucher for £10k spend ?

    • Macmac says:
      4 Mar4 March 07:20

      They don’t count towards avios, unsure if it counts towards the upgrade voucher but I doubt it.

  • Macmac says:
    4 Mar4 March 07:19

    Excellent credit score and not over committed on credit but been declined…. Any way to appeal?
    Barclaycard seem to be declining lots of people with high credit scores according to the comments. A bit disappointed as seems a excellent card

    • Rob says:
      4 Mar4 March 07:21

      You should, as the article says, reapply later in the month when the special bonus is running. You may well get a different result.

      • aseftel says:
        4 Mar4 March 07:30

        Have you checked this with Barclaycard? Every acquisition decision tree I’ve ever seen has had ‘decline if already declined/applied within past X days’ as a rule.

      • Marc says:
        4 Mar4 March 17:12

        I’ve been declined, first time since student days, I’m presuming it’ll have a negative effect on my credit score? Try again in couple say and chance another rejection, really? What if it happens again, doom looms…

  • dst87 says:
    4 Mar4 March 07:21

    Ah that’s a shame. Great you’ve been able to negotiate something, but shame since I managed to apply and be accepted a couple days ago.

    Ah well. That’s life, I suppose.

  • Graham Walsh says:
    4 Mar4 March 07:25

    Hadn’t applied yet as still reading through the articles and comments 🙂 I don’t usually wait, but glad I did this time 🙂

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

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