A quirk when you earn Avios flying with SriLankan Airlines

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As a member of the oneworld alliance, you can earn Avios and British Airways Executive Club tier points when you fly with SriLankan Airlines. You can also redeem Avios for their flights.

A reader pointed out a quirk which is worth knowing if you have any SriLankan flights booked. Iberia Plus is often more generous than British Airways Executive Club for some flights on SriLankan.

This is how it breaks down by sub-booking class:

SriLankan Airlines earning Avios

Economy Class (based on % of miles flown)

N – 25% on BA, 25% on Iberia

O – 25% on BA, 25% on Iberia

Q – 25% on BA, 25% on Iberia

R – 25% on BA, 50% on Iberia

S – 25% on BA, 50% on Iberia

L – 50% on BA, 50% on Iberia

V – 50% on BA, 50% on Iberia

W – 50% on BA, 70% on Iberia

M – 50% on BA, 70% on Iberia

E – 50% on BA, 70% on Iberia

K – 100% on BA, 70% on Iberia

Y – 100% on BA, 80% on Iberia

B – 100% on BA, 80% on Iberia

P – 100% on BA, 80% on Iberia

H – 100% on BA, 80% on Iberia

Business Class

I – 100% on BA, 100% on Iberia

C – 125% on BA, 125% on Iberia

D – 125% on BA, 125% on Iberia

J – 125% on BA, 150% on Iberia

As you can see, some booking classes are the same in both schemes, some are better in Iberia Plus and some are better in BAEC. If Iberia is better, and you don’t care about losing the British Airways tier points, you should credit your flights to an Iberia Plus account instead of a British Airways one.

You can move the Avios across to British Airways afterwards using ‘Combine My Avios’ so they won’t be orphaned in Iberia Plus.

You can learn more about BA’s earning rates on partner airlines on ba.com here. The Iberia Plus page showing the earning rates on SriLankan is here.

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, oneworld alliance partners

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

Charlieface says:

17 Mar17 March 10:17

Note if you decide to credit flights on the same booking to different programs, the best idea is not to enter your number, then retro-claim after the flight
Waddle says:

17 Mar17 March 13:46

Sunday OT: Amex online accounts
I received my Platinum yesterday and tried to activate it and add it to my Amex app. The app (and online) tells me I cannot add this card to my existing account which has my BAPP. I phoned up Brighton and the rep told me I had to wait for the first statement before I’m able to add it to an existing members account. Is this correct? Am I missing something? Do I have to make a separate account for each card or ‘family’ of cards?
- Craig says:
  
  17 Mar17 March 14:47
  
  I’ve had his problem a few times. I have a temp account that I use until I can add it to the main account which is usually possible after a few days.
- Tracy says:
  
  17 Mar17 March 14:59
  
  I have found I can’t add new cards on weekends but works ok Monday to Friday….
  - BJ says:
    
    17 Mar17 March 17:53
    
    +1, always suspect this was a weekend think. Anybody getting s card on weekend should wait until Monday to add to existing account.
    - Waddle says:
      
      17 Mar17 March 19:42
      
      Thanks both! I’ll try tomorrow.
Concerto says:

17 Mar17 March 14:39

The Ozone is expensive. You can’t get up there without prepayment of a sizeable sum of money (a few hundred HKD) to cover a couple of drinks at the bar
- Concerto says:
  
  17 Mar17 March 14:40
  
  Was responding to a post at the beginning asking about Hong Kong sky bars
Alex Sm says:

17 Mar17 March 15:17

Quite handy for reconciling negative Avios balance on Iberia
Craig says:

17 Mar17 March 16:46

OT: How long does it normally take for points from Virgin Wines to appear.
- Shoestring says:
  
  17 Mar17 March 19:50
  
  Unfortunately can be quite a long time, I’d say anything from a few weeks to a couple of months.
  
  Doesn’t hurt to stick in a claim.
Polly says:

17 Mar17 March 21:13

Rob,
Nice mention in The Sunday Times Travel today.. gave all our secrets away…cannot believe the journalist let 57k avios expire. He needs to read hfp….
Bs says:

17 Mar17 March 22:43

Ba sale worked well for me. Booked a flight to Belfast in J for £170, when I would have paid about £150 in Y.

Perhaps heretical to many on here I also used 10,000 Avios for £70 off. With the poorer availability and high charges on redemptions, and cheaper J cash tickets, I’ve stopped valuing Avios at more than 0.7 each now.
- Shoestring says:
  
  18 Mar18 March 08:06
  
  It’s not too heretical! Plenty of people get their Avios for free (so to speak) – therefore enjoying a nice discount is perfectly justifiable. And you’ll earn back some points/ TPs on the flight because you bought a cash ticket, which is more than can be said for Avios + Money (=nul points).
Tom says:

18 Mar18 March 09:09

Couple of questions from me today – help would be greatly appreciated.

1. How do amex refund your card fee if you cancel?
2. Got the offer to upgrade to plat from gold and spend 1k in 3 months to get 20k Membership rewards. I’m into my second year of gold (i’ve kept it around due to 3x points with spend on amex travel) will my annual fee i’ve paid for gold be rolled into plat and i’ll only be charged the difference?
3. Will i get a bonus for adding a supplementary card holder when i do upgrade to Plat? (I’ve currently got one for my gold card).

I’m planning to get the 20k and then cancel.
- Nick M says:
  
  18 Mar18 March 17:25
  
  1) Refund will show as statement credit, so ideally leave a balance there (or have another card to shift it to)
  2) Gold fee will be refunded pro-rata and then Platinum fee should* be charged
  3) Maybe – but you need to cancel the existing supp, and then re-add later… if the system pulls the supp through then you’ll automatically receive the extra card (and will be charged for any additional ones you request)