British Airways Sends Me A “Birthday Bonus”

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I’ve been a British Airways Executive Club member for over a decade now and, although I’ve heard of the “Birthday Bonus”, I’ve never actually been a recipient of it….until now. I’ve no idea what’s triggered this sudden outpouring of generosity from BA but it certainly can’t be anything I’ve written in this blog!

The British Airways Birthday Bonus

The birthday bonuses that British Airways use vary from person to person and the terms and conditions appear to vary from year to year.

In the past I’ve heard of British Airways Executive Club members receiving offers of bonus points for all kinds of trips including:

• Euro Traveller roundtrip
• Club Europe roundtrip
• World Traveller/World Traveller Plus roundtrip
• Club World/First Class roundtrip

Some people have received offers for all of the above while others just a subset.

Interestingly, in the past, the birthday bonuses weren’t limited to cash bookings – Avios and Avios + cash bookings were included too…but that no longer appears to be the case.

My British Airways Birthday Bonus

I’ve got a birthday coming up in December and this is the offer BA has come up with:

British Airways would like to wish you an early happy birthday with an Avios bonus, to make your celebrations extra special.

We’ve got two Avios gifts for you to choose from – simply take your pick from the gifts below, register online and make a booking by 30 September 2016 and travel in December.

Your Avios open up a world of possibilities. With our new off peak prices, you don’t need to have a huge Avios balance before you can start enjoying the rewards and your birthday bonus Avios could help you fly away again at a later date.

On the one hand it’s very generous of BA to offer me free Avios just because I’m getting older while, on the other hand, the T&Cs make things a little rushed, not that easy and not as generous in the past:

• I have 2 weeks to find flights
• My outbound flight has to be in December.
• The promotion isn’t applicable to one-way flights
• I must originate in the US (where my BAEC membership is registered)
• Flights must be both marketed and operated by British Airways
• The offer is not valid on Avios or Avios + cash fares

This close to the end of the year I normally have all my flight plans well and truly wrapped up but, by pure luck, I am looking to book a transatlantic flight for December…so this may come in useful.

Ideally I would fly between 1 and 11 December to make the most of the Triple Avios promotion that British Airways is currently running but, as that’s almost certainly out of the question, I’ll have to see if it’s worth trying to squeeze something in.

Bottom Line

I value Avios at 1.0 cent each so the birthday bonus is worth between $150 and $250 to me…which isn’t bad but which also isn’t enough to have me change my plans or make some new ones.

If British Airways happens to have some competitive fares to where I’d like to fly then clearly this bonus will weigh in BA’s favor….but I’m always very cautious of allowing promotions to sway my decision making.

There are a few things working against British Airways here:

• I don’t need any more elite qualifying miles so I’ve no added incentive to fly on a OneWorld airline
• I’m not a great fan of Club World
• I already have a $200 Amex promotion I can use for flights with Delta so that will probably make BA’s pricing less competitive

I’m not ruling out a flight with BA but, as grateful I am for my birthday bonus, it’s at best 50:50 whether I’ll be making the most of it or not.