Get 500 FREE Avios for joining IHG Rewards Club – no stay required

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Avios (via Iberia Plus) and IHG Rewards Club have joined forces to offer you 500 Avios points for signing up – no stay required.

Full details are on the IHG website here.

IHG Rewards Club is the loyalty programme for Holiday Inn, InterContinental, Holiday Inn Express, Crowne Plaza, Hotel Indigo etc. A lot of Head for Points readers will already be IHG Rewards Club members – but perhaps there are members of your family, perhaps people with whom you share a British Airways Executive Club household account, who are not?

Now, before I go on, a quick confession. Back in July, IHG ran a similar offer with Virgin Atlantic’s Flying Club. The offer was very badly described by Virgin. On their website, it said you got 500 miles just for joining. On the IHG landing page, it also said you got 500 miles just for joining. In the small print – which I missed when I wrote about it – it said that you had to join up AND STAY to get the 500 miles.

There is no such doubt here. The small print, and indeed the large print, makes it clear that NO STAY IS REQUIRED. All you need to do is:

sign up for IHG Rewards Club via this page of their website

set up your profile so that you earn Iberia Plus Avios and not IHG Rewards Club points from your stays

and do it before 31st December

When do you get the Avios?

The wording is suitably vague:

“Avios will automatically be awarded by Airline partners on completion of Registration, and in any event before 15th February 2018”

…. but there is a good chance they arrive quickly.

Remember …. you need an Iberia Plus account

This offer ONLY works with Iberia Plus accounts. If you don’t have one, go over to the Iberia website and join.

Once the 500 Avios have arrived, you can use ‘Combine My Avios’ to move them from Iberia Plus to your avios.com or British Airways Executive Club account.

You cannot transfer Avios out of Iberia Plus until the Iberia account is 90 days old. If you join Iberia Plus as a new member today, and even if IHG posts your 500 Avios quickly, you won’t be able to move them across to BA until early January.

Get a fast track to IHG Gold status too

There is also a ‘fast track to Gold’ offer. If you complete three nights at IHG hotels in the 90 days following registration, you will be upgraded. Gold would usually require 10 nights.

This isn’t hugely beneficial, since you can get free Gold status by getting the free IHG Rewards Club credit card (representative APR 18.9%) – no spending required. There are not many benefits to being Gold, although you will get a few hundred bonus points and usually a free drink or snack on every stay.

You can sign up, or discover more details, on this page of the IHG website.

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: