Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

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

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

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.

  • Lev441 says:
    4 Mar4 March 08:13

    Same thing happened with the Virgin money virgin atlantic cards… held off initially applying and then got a 60,000 point SUB as I was a prior MBNA card holder…

  • Steve says:
    4 Mar4 March 08:16

    Thank you Barclaycard for providing a case study as to how to not launch a new product, how to piss off existing customers, i.e. those with the legacy Hilton card, whilst simultaneously potentially pissing off new customers, if there were to be a temporary enhanced sign up bonus that may not (still TBC) be applied retrospectively. Chapeau!

    • Spurs drive me mad says:
      4 Mar4 March 08:29

      I don’t know why everyone is surprised, how quickly you’ve all forgotten when Barclaycard slashed credit card limits to £250. Took me for ever to get someone competent to close my account and then 2 months later they sent me a new card!
      Everyone rushes to first out the trap, then surprised when system crashes then get even more annoyed when they think someone else might be getting something they didn’t.

      • Lady London says:
        4 Mar4 March 09:42

        🙂

      • CarpalTravel says:
        4 Mar4 March 10:10

        Remember though – as Spurs fans, our tolerance levels (and ability to be surprised) are way out of kilter of most others. 😉

        • Spurs drive me mad says:
          4 Mar4 March 10:22

          CarpalTravel … well we are certainly patient 😂

        • Jeff77 says:
          5 Mar5 March 09:33

          The billionaire on his yacht must be laughing at people paying some of the highest prices in Europe for middling football.

  • Olivia says:
    4 Mar4 March 08:29

    I’ve made the move over, switched as currently not earning anything, and only eligible for the smaller bonus.
    It seems the grass isn’t necessarily greener once the Avios card is active…
    Correctly showing balance on my Barclaycard Avios CC (yay), but in app there’s a “View your Avios” button which throws up an error message any time you try and click through it (nooo). Definitely another teething part of this whole launch.

  • Rui N. says:
    4 Mar4 March 08:32

    I demand my HfP annual fee back! 😀 (Good thing I ended up not applying for one this week!)

    • Spurs drive me mad says:
      4 Mar4 March 08:40

      Well when you do apply don’t forget to do it thru Rob’s link and your HFP dues will be paid!

  • Hugh says:
    4 Mar4 March 08:43

    My daughter applied on my recommendation and has had a rejection letter this morning saying she can’t apply again for 6 months. Should she wait 6 months, as this article suggests she might be able to try again later this month but maybe she shouldn’t as presumably this might impact her credit rating?

    • CarpalTravel says:
      4 Mar4 March 10:14

      The 6 months is a company policy thing, not credit rating enforced. As long as they waive it, she should be free to apply again. Her credit rating will likely be temporarily impacted though, which each application. If a Mortgage application or other equally important financial need is looming, then it will be best not to re-apply.

  • Sue says:
    4 Mar4 March 08:53

    Because I live in Jersey we are not allowed to even apply! I think that is so wrong, but don’t know what I can do. Anyone got any suggestions?

    • Andrew. says:
      4 Mar4 March 09:01

      Move to the UK?

    • Cranzle says:
      4 Mar4 March 09:12

      Why do you think that “it is so wrong”?

      • Bill says:
        4 Mar4 March 10:12

        Barclays are happy to accept mortgages from CI and IOM. Just not credit ard applications. Duplicitous

        • CarpalTravel says:
          4 Mar4 March 10:19

          Duplicitous? Hardly.

        • Chrisasaurus says:
          4 Mar4 March 19:57

          Jersey are happy to receive defence spending but not pay (fair and equitable) taxes, so…

      • Sue says:
        4 Mar4 March 16:46

        As Bill says below Barclays are happy to accept mortgages but they won’t accept credit card applications. We are part of the U.K. when it suits, and we aren’t when it suits too!

      • Sue says:
        4 Mar4 March 16:54

        We are in the U.K. so why shouldn’t we be able to apply for a U.K. based credit card?

    • Thegasman says:
      4 Mar4 March 09:22

      I’ll swap your 20% tax rate, mortgage interest relief & very generous childcare tax deductions for my 25k SUB in a heartbeat!

      • Andrew says:
        4 Mar4 March 09:41

        +1

      • Sue says:
        4 Mar4 March 16:52

        Sadly i don’t make use of either mortgage rates or childcare tax deductions and never have. However, I’d be happy to swap you paying £400k for a 3/4 bed house for £900k in Jersey!

    • @mkcol says:
      4 Mar4 March 10:09

      I hope you’re more aggrieved that you can’t apply for those US credit cards with their 100,000 point sign up bonuses.

  • KP says:
    4 Mar4 March 09:03

    I always wait for a while when new product launches to allow time for issues to iron out.

    Did the same with Barclays Premier. Did the same here. Both times it was the correct decision.

    I don’t like being the guinea pig with new product launches

    • soloflyer1977 says:
      4 Mar4 March 09:19

      Same here.
      Also, if I apply later this month and use Curve, I can “go back in time” to the new avios card.

    • Pete M says:
      4 Mar4 March 10:05

      Unless of course they close the new products down after too much demand and you miss out…

      • BuildBackBetter says:
        4 Mar4 March 13:47

        You are confusing offers with new products. Offers have a limited budget. New products typically come with new system requirements that companies don’t test fully.

  • Zoe says:
    4 Mar4 March 09:12

    Have people had issues getting accepted if self employed?

    • Andy says:
      4 Mar4 March 11:46

      I applied (self employed) and they need to run further checks apaprently

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

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Get 25,000 Avios with the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

GET A SIGN-UP BONUS OF 18,000 VIRGIN POINTS!

Latest Forum Posts

Get 80,000 bonus points (worth 80,000 Avios) and £400 of dining credit with The Platinum Card (Offer ends 27th May)

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get up to 10,000 bonus Hilton Honors points

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? GET THE ONLY FREE SMALL BUSINESS CREDIT CARD WHICH CAN EARN AVIOS

Get points worth 30,000 Avios with 'first year free' American Express Gold (ends 27th May)

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.

Got it!