Bits: £15 Heathrow Express Saturdays, Etihad sale now on

News in brief:

Heathrow Express launches £15 Saturday tickets

Following the end of its £15 August promotion, Heathrow Express will continue to offer discounted tickets to passengers on a Saturday for the rest of the year.

A one-way ticket purchased on a Saturday will cost £15, a saving of £7.  A return ticket will be £25 – importantly, the return leg can be on any day of the week.

This price is available at the station as well as for pre-booked tickets.  You may find cheaper tickets available via their website if you are prepared to book well in advance – they can get as low as £5.50 each way at weekends when booked three months in advance.

Children under 15 continue to travel free so the net cost for a family of four, with two young children, will be £50 return if you travel outbound on a Saturday.

These tickets will not be available via the Avios site (heathrowexpress.com/avios) so you cannot combine this with the current ’20 Avios per £1 spent on Heathrow Express tickets’ offer.

Etihad sale now on

Etihad is currently running a sale from the UK.

To be honest, it is not hugely exciting, at least in Business Class.  Edinburgh to Singapore for £1758 is good, but charging £2800 for Sydney in Business is excessive (£1999 is my target fare for a good Sydney deal – Stockholm to Sydney on Qatar Airways goes for that).

£1800 in Business to Bangkok, which is currently massively oversupplied with seats, is also high.  £2300 to Dubai is also £800 – £1000 more expensive than I would expect for a ‘sale’.  £1685 from Edinburgh to Delhi is more interesting.

You need to book by 4th September for travel by 15th July 2018.  The list of UK sale fares is here.

My review of the Etihad A380 Business Class studio – which is probably the best business class product out there, except for the poor wine list – is here.

How to earn Etihad Guest miles from UK credit cards (December 2021)

Etihad Guest does not have a UK credit card.  However, you can earn Etihad Guest miles by converting Membership Rewards points earned from selected UK American Express cards.  These are:

• American Express Preferred Rewards Gold (review here, apply here) – sign-up bonus of 20,000 Membership Rewards points converts into 20,000 Etihad Guest miles. This card is FREE for your first year and also comes with two free airport lounge passes.

• The Platinum Card from American Express (review here, apply here) – sign-up bonus of 30,000 Membership Rewards points converts into 30,000 Etihad Guest miles.

• American Express Rewards credit card (review here, apply here) – sign-up bonus of 5,000 Membership Rewards points converts into 5,000 Etihad Guest miles. This card is FREE for life.

Membership Rewards points convert at 1:1 into Etihad Guest miles which is an attractive rate.  The cards above all earn 1 Membership Rewards point per £1 spent on your card, which converts to 1 Etihad Guest mile. The Gold card earns double points (2 per £1) on all flights you charge to it.

Etihad Guest is also a partner with the HSBC Premier Mastercard (0.5 miles per £1 spent) and HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard (1 mile per £1 spent).