Here are some quick and punchy details prepared by the redoubtable
Raffles on earning BA Miles with Tesco.
Collecting BA Miles with Tesco
Tesco is the UK’s largest supermarket chain. It operates a loyalty card scheme called Tesco Clubcard which awards 1 point for every £1 spent. Points can be spent in-store or with partners, including BA. 1 point coverts to 2.4 BA Miles.
As with the BA AmEx, you can only convert points to Executive Club accounts that are UK domiciled. Bear this in mind if you are considering moving your account to Europe to benefit from the lower Tier Point thresholds. One way to work around this is to keep your Clubcard vouchers (they do not expire for 2 years) and convert them at some point in the future when you move your account back to the UK.
How do I join Clubcard?
Pick up a free card at any Tesco, and then register it online or by posting back the form attached to the card. Alternatively, apply for the Tesco Credit Card. This doubles as a Clubcard and, in addition, earns you 1 point for every £4 (equal to 0.6 BA Miles per £1) you spend on the card anywhere, not just at Tesco. This is nowhere near as good as the BA Premium Plus AmEx (1.5 BA Miles per £1) but it can be used at places that refuse AmEx e.g. council tax bills, John Lewis. It can also be useful if you normally use your BA AmEx but want to delay the issuance of your next '2 for 1' redemption voucher.
Until April 2005, the Tesco Credit Card was twice as generous, awarding 1 point for every £2 spent. You may see references to this old level on FT, as existing cardholders still receive this rate.
Can I have multiple Clubcards?
Yes. However, Tesco does appear to be getting cleverer at spotting multiple mailings to the same address, and you may find that you can only qualify for a promotion on one of your accounts. To avoid duplicated mailings, ring the Clubcard Helpline and have the accounts merged. You will then only get one statement with one points total. However, if you receive multiple statements then you will also receive multiple bonus points coupons, of course!
Do other businesses award Clubcard points?
Tesco has a range of partners that award Clubcard points – see tesco.com for the current list. These include Avis, Powergen and Marriott. It is worth noting that you get more BA Miles by crediting your Marriott hotel stays to Tesco (and then to BA) then you do by crediting them directly to BA – see Post 1 of the ‘Tesco and BA’ thread for full details, which is usually in the first couple of pages of current threads on FT! The current thread is:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=512869
and although
Raffles usually does a yearly restart, the new thread will usually be linked to from the last post of the old thread, if you find the above link is out of date.
How can I earn bonus points?
There are occasional bonus offers in-store, although these are less popular than they were as they have occasionally led to mass bulk-buying by FTers! These deals are flagged on FT and other Tesco sites such as loyalty-points.co.uk (you need to log-in to this site before you can see the Tesco codes thread). These offers often allow you to rack up BA Miles for less than 1p each, compared to 1.7p when buying them from BA. Recent offers included Palmier biscuits, Laurent Perrier champagne, pre-paid mobile phones, frozen beef in gravy and instant coffee!
These offers are usually available whether you shop in-store or on-line at the grocery site. Note that some stores may restrict you to six identical items in any single purchase. Points offers are usually not advertised in Metro or Local stores but they should register at the check-out – do a trial purchase and see what happens.
With the loss of in-store promotions, you are now far more likely to earn extra points from using special bonus codes for your online shopping. These usually give you an extra 200 / 500 / 1000 points when spending £x in specific areas of the Tesco website. These promotions are listed in Post 1 of the current ‘Tesco and BA’ thread. Post 1 also explains how to join the various Tesco clubs (lots of opportunities to receive bonus points coupons!) and how to recycle old mobile phones and inkjet cartridges for points.
How do I convert points to BA Miles?
You can check your points balance at any time by going to tesco.com and clicking 'My Account'.
Once every quarter, you will receive a statement with vouchers for points earned (minimum 250). Quarters run from Aug-Oct, Nov-Jan, Feb-Apr and May-July and you will receive your statement 2-3 weeks later. Each statement comes with a number of bonus points coupons to use in-store.
You can ask Tesco to send your points electronically to BA, or you can convert your vouchers online. See Post 1 of ‘Tesco and BA’ for details. You will still receive a statement in the post showing the miles earned.
What is Premium Clubcard?
This scheme, now abolished, let customers who spent over £780 per quarter convert at 800 BA Miles per 250 points. FTers who were Premium Clubcard holders can still convert at this rate, so will see the occasional mention of it.
For the latest information of the Tesco / BA partnership, look at the ‘Tesco and BA’ thread.
Other Partners
BA has a lot of other Hotel, Car Rental and other Partners. Some of the more notable ones are Avis (who offer a pretty good AWD for BA Gold members and nice miles earning opportunities), and Travelex.
This link lists BA’s hotel partners:
http://www.britishairways.com/travel...l/public/en_gb
This link lists BA’s car rental partners:
http://www.britishairways.com/travel...e/public/en_gb
This link lists BA’s other partners:
http://www.britishairways.com/travel...e/public/en_gb