Why you shouldn’t bother earning Avios with e-Rewards

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If you are a member of British Airways Executive Club, avios.com, Virgin Flying Club or a few other programmes, you may find yourself receiving an e-mailed invitation to earn miles by joining e-Rewards.

I have been there and done that. And I can tell you, with all honestly, that you should delete the email and forget about it.

On the face of it, it seems a decent deal. You give e-Rewards some information – actually, a LOT of information – about yourself. They then email you with occasional market research surveys.

For each survey you complete, you earn points. When you reach certain point levels, you can redeem your points for miles. What could be wrong with that?

Well, as any seasoned e-Rewards member (or ex-member) can tell you, quite a lot can be wrong!

Just because you are sent a survey, it does not mean you are ‘qualified’ to complete it. Often you are thrown out after the first couple of questions, with no points earned.
Sometimes, you can go a L-O-N-G way into a survey before you are thrown out. You can waste over 15 minutes at times before they decide you are not the sort of person they want. In these circumstances, you receive a nominal drip of points which is a tiny fraction of what you would have got had you completed the last couple of questions.
Customer service is minimal, should you ever need to contact them.
The ‘time spent to Avios earned’ ratio is pathetic, however cheaply you value your time!
It will, without a doubt, take you longer than you think to reach the level where you can cash out.

The problem, of course, is that once you’ve done a couple of surveys you feel obliged to push on with them until you can empty your account! I would love to know what percentage of members cancel their membership after making their first redemption!!

The only possible reason to join is if they offer a good sign-up bonus. This may be, for example, 500 Avios after you complete your first survey.

In such case, join for only as long as it takes to complete that first survey. Then cancel! Do not, in any circumstances, be persuaded to carry on – I am sure you will regret it in the end. I did!

How to earn Avios points from UK credit cards

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

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

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

British Airways BA Amex American Express card

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways BA Premium Plus American Express Amex credit card

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points, such as:

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel benefits – for a 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, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios:

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company Read our full review

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus:

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios 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.

(Want to earn more Avios? Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)

Category

British Airways and Avios, Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

David says:

7 Nov7 November 08:05

I’ve not done e-Rewards, but if they are only telling you that you don’t qualify for what they want late in the process of each survey that is terrible.

If you want to be surveyed and earn from it, I’d sign up with YouGov. They do polling for both companies, but also the political parties and newspapers, media, etc

Usually get paid 50 points per survey, you can either convert these to competition entires, or save them up and get paid out at 50 pounds level. I save mine, and am getting to 50 pounds about every 9 months.

If you do want to signup, this is my refer-a-friend link:
https://yougov.co.uk/refer/QnHBy1eswTbYTUh3SMmgSQ/

When you recieve survey links by email, they tell you up front how much you will get for the survey, occasionally they say they need to ask you two questions first, but you know if you are getting money within a few seconds.
Howard B says:

7 Nov7 November 08:18

Have to say I disagree with the poster. I am not saying this is a great offer but after it is free. We have four in our household account and I have arranged the set so I get the emails from Erewards. There is a knack in completing the surveys. My success rate is about 85% and If I am knocked back it is a litle annoying to just get 50 of these points. However, in past year I have obtained around 25,000 points on all four accounts..
MR BRIDGE says:

7 Nov7 November 08:43

sorry raffles I disagree, although i also agree. As howard syas there is a knack, i too have about an 85% sucees rate, and sometimes i delibretaky screen out just to get the 25 /50 points in one or 2 clicks. I have earned 4000avios( an reddemed) in the last 36 days
Jamie says:

7 Nov7 November 09:24

I don’t agree either, strictly speaking you’re correct the time spent against the avois earnt would not stack up. However I tend to complete them while watching TV or at work when I need a break, I don’t manipulate my answers so my % of complete surveys is much lower than 85% but it’s a free way of boosting points if you are patient.
Kim says:

7 Nov7 November 09:47

Yes, I’d agree with the above commenters. I am probably screened out of about 50% but I’ve still managed to earn around 4000 Avios this year. And if you are not earning Avios any other way, it is a good way to keep a dormant account alive.
They have recently improved the rejection screen for non-Flash devices – so you can re-enter the survey you were booted out of if you are trying to do it on, say, an iPhone. It used to just exclude you completely from earning points. I did complain to them about it, so they do listen.

Two tips – firstly the points expire at the end of a ‘Membership Year’ and you lose 75% of anything in your account. It stinks, but if you play by their rules you can get decent value out of it.

Secondly, it is not very quick to remove surveys from your ‘available’ list, however it will occasionally offer you profile updates as well. Sometimes when these sit in your available list after completion you can complete them repeatedly and get multiple times the x points they offer (usually 10-25)
gnarly says:

7 Nov7 November 09:52

Raffles, you’re so wrong. e-rewards are the greatest way of getting free Avios. Remember that if you had an invite to the bmi programme, you may find that one of the other partners was Iberia. By using the Iberia e-rewards route you get a 50% bonus on BA Avios: 2000 e-rewards points yields 750 Avios vs. 500 BA Avios.
Get multiple accounts. Slightly adjust your profile. Be prepared for a few frustrating surveys, but have fun.

Note that I find the customer service to be quite good. Whenever I have a problem with the surveys they’ve given me full credit.

Remember to look to the other partners as well. If you need to top up your Delta, US Airways, Priority Club, HHonors, Choice accounts with a few extra miles, e-rewards is a sensible way to go.
This is especially useful with promotions like US Airways’s Grand Slam which awards bonus miles for transfers from as many partners as possible. E-rewards can make that happen.
cmcbugg says:

7 Nov7 November 10:22

It is painfully time consuming – but I do do it when I haven’t got much else to do (and I can’t say I strictly read everything!). Sometimes with a few big surveys you can make quite a few points relatively quickly. Also I have the orphaned bmi earning rate – which now goes to Iberia – so at 750 for 2000 it feels a little more worthwhile. I’ve never had a problem with the miles crediting so not issues with customer service myself.
Howard B says:

7 Nov7 November 11:26

Like the earlier poster….I do this watching TV etc….drives dear wife mad sometimes….but I got about 25,000 miles in last year from the four in our house….There is a knack in doing these surveys quick otherwise I would not do them.