Back in February Qatar Airways announced they will be adopting Avios in place of Qmiles as the loyalty currency in their Privilege Club program. That time has come and as of March 22 the switch has been made. Qatar Airways Privilege Club members now earn and burn Avios and any Qmiles in accounts up to this date have been converted 1:1 to Avios.
Avios is the currency of all the IAG airline’s frequent flyer programs, namely British Airways Executive Club, Iberia Plus, Aer Lingus Aer Club and Vueling Club. Seeing that Qatar Airways is a 25% owner of IAG the switch to Avios makes sense. Even though all the airlines run their own frequent flyer programs the commonality of Avios provides members the option to transfer them between programs. The most popular has been between British Airways and Iberia since the latter tends to charge much less on award ticket fees and taxes but I have a feeling the addition of Qatar Airways Privilege, in which you can already transfer Avios from British Airways to will become a very popular option as well.
If you currently have accounts with British Airways Executive Club and Qatar Airways Privilege Club you can link accounts with a very simple process. I assume if you don’t have one or the other it is easy enough to just join the program and then follow these steps to link your accounts so that you can transfer Avios between them. If you haven’t joined Qatar Airways Privilege Club you should do so with their current offer that awards 2,500 Qmiles Avios for joining by March 31 with promo code FLYQR3 and then 5,000 more if you take a flight with them. Click here to join
? RWRDS Recommendation: Be sure to always check our Qatar Airways Privilege Club Bonus Avios page for bonus offers on flights, hotels, car rentals and more before you book any travel or as in this case before you join the program as we have the above offer and another join offer listed there. Check out the bonus Avios page here.
Linking Privilege Club & Executive Club Accounts
To begin with you can go the new Avios page on Qatar Airways website where you can click the Link my accounts button
On the next page you’ll see the following:
When you click on Link account with British Airways Executive Club you’ll be taken to BA’s site to login and once you have done that your accounts will be linked and you’ll be presented with the following:
And that’s all it takes to link your accounts!
Combining Avios between accounts
Once that is done navigate to your Privilege Club account dashboard and you’ll see an option that says ‘Combine Avios’
Click on ‘Combine Avios’ and you’ll be brought to the page where you can move Avios between your Qatar Airways and British Airways accounts:
As I am currently sitting on no Avios in either of my accounts I couldn’t go any further however it is on this page where you would set the amount you want to transfer and you can move the Avios over instantly.
Earning Avios in Canada outside of travel
As you can now transfer Avios 1:1 from your British Airways Executive
Club account to Qatar Airways Privilege Club you effectively have a new
airline transfer partner for credit cards in Canada that allow to
convert points to British Airways. Namely American Express Membership
Rewards cards, RBC Avion cards and HSBC Premium Mastercards all allow
you to convert to British Airways and then you can simply transfer 1:1
to your Qatar Airways Privilege Club account to book those amazing
Qsuite and other awards.
Here are all the consumer cards in Canada that you can earn Avios with:
American Express Cobalt Card (C$1 = 1 to 5 Avios – via British Airways)
American Express Gold Rewards Card(C$1 = 1 to 2 Avios – via British Airways)
American Express Green Card (C$1 = 1 Avios – via British Airways)
Diners
Club Club Rewards Mastercard (C$1 = 0.80 Avios – via British Airways)
HSBC World Elite Mastercard (C$1 = 1.2 to 2.4 Avios – via British Airways)
HSBC Premier or Jade World Elite Mastercard (C$1 = 1.2 to 2.4 Avios – via British Airways)
Marriott Bonvoy™ American Express®* Card (C$1 = 0.67 to 2.08 Avios)
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Best Western Rewards Mastercard (C$1=
0.20 to 1 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC British Airways Visa Infinite Card (C$1
= 1 to 2 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC Avion Visa Infinite Privilege (C$1 = 1.25 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC Avion Visa Infinite Card (C$1 = 1 to 1.25 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC Visa Platinum Avion Card (C$1 = 1 Avios – via British Airways)
The Platinum Card from American Express (C$1 = 1 to 3 Avios- via British Airways)
British Airways Executive Club matches Privilege Club
To match Qatar Airways redemption requirements British Airways has lowered the Avios requirement for redeeming for Qatar Airways Qsuite awards including the taxes and fees. This means you can redeem 70,000 Avios one way for flights from North America to Doha.
This is good for the direct flights to Doha however since British Airways prices flights by segment if connect beyond Doha you are better off moving your BA Avios over to Qatar Airways. For example Montreal-Doha-Madlives is only 85,000 Avios with Qatar Airways but 105,000 Avios via British Airways.
With this new 1:1 transfer from British Airways Executive Club to Qatar Airways Privilege Club you effectively have a new airline transfer partner for credit cards in Canada that allow to convert points to British Airways. Namely American Express Membership Rewards cards, RBC Avion cards and HSBC Premium Mastercards all allow you to convert to British Airways and then you can simply transfer 1:1 to your Qatar Airways Privilege Club account to book those amazing Qsuite and other awards.
Here are all the consumer cards in Canada that you can earn Avios with:
American Express Cobalt Card (C$1 = 1 to 5 Avios – via British Airways)
American Express Gold Rewards Card(C$1 = 1 to 2 Avios – via British Airways)
American Express Green Card (C$1 = 1 Avios – via British Airways)
Diners
Club Club Rewards Mastercard (C$1 = 0.80 Avios – via British Airways)
HSBC World Elite Mastercard (C$1 = 1.2 to 2.4 Avios – via British Airways)
HSBC Premier or Jade World Elite Mastercard (C$1 = 1.2 to 2.4 Avios – via British Airways)
Marriott Bonvoy™ American Express®* Card (C$1 = 0.67 to 2.08 Avios)
mbna
Best Western Rewards Mastercard (C$1=
0.20 to 1 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC British Airways Visa Infinite Card (C$1
= 1 to 2 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC Avion Visa Infinite Privilege (C$1 = 1.25 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC Avion Visa Infinite Card (C$1 = 1 to 1.25 Avios – via British Airways)
RBC Visa Platinum Avion Card (C$1 = 1 Avios – via British Airways)
The Platinum Card from American Express (C$1 = 1 to 3 Avios – via British Airways)
Wrapping it up
Qatar Airways has changed the currency in their Privilege Club frequent flyer program from Qmiles to Avios and by doing so have now become an amazingly viable option for Canadian points and miles collectors. Now that you can transfer Avios 1:1 to Qatar Airways from British Airways it has opened up greater access to Qatar’s amazing premium class products out of Montreal and the U.S. with excellent redemption value and lower fees and taxes. There will be times you’ll want to redeem via British Airways and at other times via Qatar Airways and they make it easy for either with the easy transfer between the two.