Etihad offering STATUS tier miles if you transfer credit card or hotel points into Etihad Guest

Etihad Guest has launched a points transfer promotion with a difference.

It is common to see airlines offering a bonus if you transfer hotel or credit card points into their programme.  Etihad offers them on a regular basis.

This time, however, it is offering bonus STATUS miles for transfers!  Each redeemable mile you receive will be matched with one tier mile.

Don’t get too excited.  You cannot obtain Etihad Guest Platinum status simply by transferring over some American Express Membership Rewards or HSBC Premier credit card points.  There is a cap of 20,000 tier miles.

To put this into context, you need 25,000 status miles to earn Etihad Guest Silver status, or 20,000 miles to renew it.  Silver isn’t worth much either as you can see from the Etihad status benefits page here although you can access the Al Reem lounge in Abu Dhabi.

Etihad isn’t in a major airline alliance so, even if you did earn status with them, it isn’t worth much unless you are flying Etihad itself.

Regular or occasional Etihad flyers will clearly benefit from this offer.  For the rest of us, this offer isn’t anything to get excited about.  If you do occasionally transfer points to Etihad to make redemptions, it makes more sense to wait for the next standard transfer bonus when you could get 25%-30% more redeemable miles.

Full details of the offer are on this page of the Etihad site.  You have until 30th August to make your transfers and the bonus tier miles will arrive by 10th September.

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).