What is Bink? (And how can it win you 100,000 Avios this week?)

Our lead article today – click here – is a fantastic competition to win 100,000 Avios.

The competition is sponsored by Bink, which is a very impressive new loyalty app.  Bink has partnered with Avios to allow you to earn Avios points on your day to day High Street shopping – without needing to show your Avios card.  All you do is pay with a payment card you’ve registered in Bink and the Avios will be added to your account a few days later.

Bink is based on one simple premise – why should you need to show your loyalty card when shopping when you can already be identified from your payment card?

Wouldn’t it be fantastic if you earned Avios and other loyalty points automatically?  If the retailer recognised your payment card and automatically put the points or other rewards into your account?

All of this is possible with the Bink app.

How does the Bink / Avios partnership work?

Avios has embraced Bink as a key partner and is using it to work with High Street retailers who want to offer Avios points as an incentive.

If all goes to plan, you will soon be able to earn Avios points at various different High Street retailers.  You won’t have to show your Avios card when you purchase.  All you do is pay with the payment card you registered in Bink and the Avios will be added to your account a few days later.

The way it works is that Bink has partnered with the major payment card companies, including American Express, to get access to their transaction feeds.  You simply register your payment cards and Avios account (don’t worry – they use market leading encryption to ensure that your data is secure) in Bink.  Bink searches purchase data from its participating retailers to identify your transactions and then automatically adds Avios to your account.

PizzaExpress is the first Avios / Bink partner

PizzaExpress is the first High Street partner to sign up with Avios and Bink to seamlessly earn Avios points.

• You collect 3 Avios per £1 you spend on Friday and Saturday
• You collect 6 Avios per £1 you spend from Sunday to Thursday

All you need to do is:

• Download the Bink app
• Add your Avios card details
• Add your payment card details
• Link your Avios account using your last name
• That’s it

You do NOT need to show the Bink app when you pay.  You do NOT need to show your Avios card when you pay.

On one of her tougher HfP assignments, I sent Anika down to PizzaExpress to test Bink out (and got an expenses claim for my trouble).  Avios points successfully posted to her account a few days later:

More Avios retail partners coming soon ….

PizzaExpress is just the first of a number of High Street retailers coming to the Bink platform which will allow you to earn Avios points from your day to day shopping.  Further retailers will be unveiled over the coming months.

Even if you don’t eat at PizzaExpress, it is still worth downloading the app now.  Once you have downloaded Bink and added your payment cards, there is nothing else to do.  You will automatically start earning Avios from new partners as they launch.  You will also be entered into our competition.

Bink has far bigger plans too …..

The partnership with Avios is just the first element of Bink to roll out.

Going forward, they will be working with other major retailers to allow you to automatically collect loyalty points from their own in-house programmes without having to show your loyalty card.   You would simply pay with your Bink-registered payment card and Bink would tell the retailer to add the relevant points.

It will also prompt you to sign up for loyalty programmes if you shop at a participating retailer using your Bink-registered payment card.  There are probably retailers where you don’t bother signing up for their loyalty schemes because you can’t be bothered to deal with another card.

Bink will prompt you to sign up after visiting a participating store, it will award you points for the transaction you already made and will automatically credit you with your points going forward – with no effort on your part.

Bink is currently developing partnerships with Morrisons, Arcadia Group, PizzaExpress, Avios and River Island amongst others.

Bink is free to join and free to use

You will – at some point – end up signing up to Bink if you are a keen Avios collector.

However, signing up this week will give you a chance of winning 100,000 Avios points in our exclusive Head for Points competition, so why not do it now?

The app is free to download and free to use.  You can find it on the Apple Store here and on the Android Store here.  Full details of how to download the app and enter the competition can be found in my other article which you can read here.