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British Airways launches an interline agreement with Canada’s Porter Airlines

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British Airways has teamed up with Porter Airlines to offer improved access to smaller cities in Canada.

This is in addition to, and not a replacement for, the current deal with WestJet.

Porter is Canada’s third-largest scheduled carrier and is based at Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport.

British Airways Porter Airlines interline

The agreement covers:

  • onward connections from British Airways services to Toronto and Montreal to cities such as Edmonton, St John’s and Quebec City
  • onward connections from British Airways services to Newark, Washington and Boston to Ottawa

The benefits of an interline agreement are that:

  • you can book your entire trip on one ticket (BA flights with connections to Porter are now bookable on ba.com)
  • you are protected if one leg of the flight is delayed
  • you will have your baggage through-checked, and
  • you will usually have the baggage allowance for the long-haul flight carried over to your connection

Unfortunately, as a pure interline agreement, you will NOT earn Avios or tier points on Porter connections and you cannot redeem Avios on Porter Airlines. The most useful home for any miles you earn on Porter is probably Alaska Airlines (details here) which is a oneworld alliance member and so allows redemptions on British Airways.


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.

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.

Comments (17)

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

  • Alex G says:

    But all of this will only apply to cash tickets. You cannot add a connecting flight to a redemption. And BA will not interline your baggage if your two flights are on separate tickets.

    • LittleNick says:

      This I find one of the main downsides of redemptions, no option to pay for some amount to include the extra leg on the same ticket

      • Throwawayname says:

        That still beats my recent redemption on Gol using AF miles where I had to pay €50 to check in a piece of luggage onto a 90 minute flight.

  • BJ says:

    What’s up with the ‘Airways’ today?

  • Jonty says:

    Coming tomorrow…British Airways and American Airlines enter partial name sharing deal

  • Tim says:

    Shouldn’t the article title read “British AIRWAYS…”?

  • Qrfan says:

    Ottawa rather than ottowa.

  • Martin says:

    It’s been quite a long time since I’ve flown with Porter, but I still have fond memories of a Toronto to New York flight with them where the lovely flight attendant (born in Glasgow but living in Canada for decades), on hearing our Scottish accents, made sure we were not thirsty for the flight. I think she even dropped off another beer for me after the seatbelt sign had gone on.

    Their original ethos was to make flying a little bit glamorous and fun like it used to be, and they definitely felt like the antithesis of Air Canada at the time.

  • Dylan says:

    Porter is by far the best economy cabin I’ve flown. Like Martin said, it’s the anti-AC.

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

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