Aer Lingus AerClub Avios Program: Everything You Need to Know

Aer Lingus, the national airline of Ireland, is headquartered in Dublin and operates the majority of its flights out of Dublin Airport, Ireland’s busiest airport. The frequent-flyer program of Aer Lingus is called AerClub and uses the rewards currency Avios, a currency it shares with British Airways Executive Club, Iberia Plus, Qatar Airways Privilege Club and a few other small airlines.

This means that Avios earned through Aer Lingus AerClub can be transferred to any of the previously mentioned frequent-flyer programs without paying a fee. Because of this, Avios are just about the most flexible airline rewards currency, which means that the AerClub program is definitely worth paying attention to.

Aer Lingus was founded in 1936 by the Irish government and remained entirely government-owned until 2006. In 2007, Aer Lingus left the Oneworld alliance. In 2015, the airline was completely bought out by International Airlines Group (IAG), which also owns British Airways, Iberia, Vueling and other small airlines. The fact that Aer Lingus isn’t a member of Oneworld means that it has a unique codeshare network including partners from other airline alliances (unlike British Airways and Iberia, which are partnered with mostly Oneworld members).

In particular, Aer Lingus allows members of its loyalty program to earn Avios on United Airlines-operated flights, which makes Aer Lingus AerClub even more interesting for U.S.-based travelers. Plus, Aer Lingus also uses a distance-based award chart to price its award flights (both on Aer Lingus metal and on partner-operated flights), which means that you should be able to find some sweet spots.

If you’re having trouble finding the award flight you want through Aer Lingus AerClub, you can always move your Avios over to one of the other three frequent-flyer programs that use this currency and gain access to their full list of airline partners. We’ll briefly cover how to move Avios between these programs in this article but, if you want to learn even more, we have a comprehensive article about moving and combining Avios.

Aer Lingus AerClub Overview

Aer Lingus has a fleet of more than 65 aircraft and operates more than 100 routes to destinations in the United Kingdom and Europe and more than 15 direct routes to North America. In 2022, Aer Lingus served more than 12 million passengers. While Aer Lingus certainly isn’t the largest airline, it does offer some great routes between North America and Europe, especially considering it just added a direct route to Seattle in 2022 and is set to add another direct route to Cleveland, Ohio, in 2023.

Plus, the fact that AerClub allows you to earn Avios, a rewards currency that can be used with several other frequent-flyer programs, makes this loyalty program noteworthy for travelers based in Europe as well as North America.

When it comes to earning Avios through AerClub, the most obvious way to do so is by booking Aer Lingus-operated flights. However, there are many ways to earn Avios through this program without ever stepping on a plane, including signing up for a co-branded credit card, shopping online, staying at hotels, renting cars and more.

When you’ve saved up a solid chunk of Avios, you can use them to book flights with Aer Lingus or certain airline partners, for upgrades on certain flights, hotel stays, car rentals and more. Plus, you can transfer your Avios from AerClub to one of the other three loyalty programs that use this currency to significantly expand your redemption options.

For most U.S.-based travelers, you’ll be using AerClub only every once and a while. However, if you travel with Aer Lingus fairly frequently, you’re definitely going to want to pay attention to its elite status program, which can help you rack up Avios much quicker as well as receive special treatment at the airport.

Aer Lingus AerClub Elite Status

The Aer Lingus AerClub elite status program has four tiers: Green, Silver, Platinum and Concierge. All AerClub members are automatically awarded Green status and have the ability to earn Avios through AerClub. However, to move up to the higher tiers and receive better elite status benefits, you’ll need to accumulate a certain number of Tier Credits, which can be earned only by booking flights that are operated and ticketed by Aer Lingus.

The number of Tier Credits you’ll earn on a flight depends on the fare class that you’re booked in. The following chart shows how many Tier Credits you’ll earn for a one-way flight within Europe on flights operated and ticketed by Aer Lingus, depending on your fare class.

The following chart shows how many Tier Credits you’ll earn for a one-way transatlantic flight operated and ticketed by Aer Lingus, depending on your fare class.

In October 2023, Aer Lingus will be adjusting its Tier Credits earnings rates for certain fare classes, specifically for Saver class flights within Europe, AerSpace flights within Europe and transatlantic flights in Smart class. You can find more information about these changes on the Aer Lingus website.

To qualify for an elite status tier, you’ll need to earn a certain number of Tier Credits in a membership year. The day that you first enrolled in Aer Lingus AerClub is considered the first day of your membership year and will be used as the basis for your membership year for the rest of the time that you participate in AerClub.

Once you earn an elite status tier, your status will be valid for the remainder of that membership year and the entire next membership year. Here’s how many Tier Credits you need to earn in a membership year to achieve each elite status tier:

• Green: 0
• Silver: 301
• Platinum: 601
• Concierge: 1,051

Of course, all four status tiers come with a different suite of benefits. Here is a breakdown of the different benefits you’ll receive at each status tier.

In terms of these benefits, the most valuable among them are probably the ability to earn bonus Avios on Aer Lingus flights, access to airport lounges, complimentary upgrades and the complimentary round-trip companion ticket that comes with Concierge elite status.

The Aer Lingus website also has some helpful charts that tell you exactly how many flights you’d need to take in each fare class to advance from one elite status tier to the next. So, if you’re set on earning AerClub elite status, those charts are definitely worth looking at.

As previously mentioned, Tier Credits toward AerClub elite status can be earned only by taking flights that are operated and ticketed by Aer Lingus. So, if you don’t fly on Aer Lingus metal often, then you probably don’t have much of a shot at earning AerClub elite status.

Earning Aer Lingus AerClub Avios

Of course, you can earn Avios by booking Aer Lingus-operated flights. However, you also can earn this currency by flying with Iberia, British Airways, Qatar Airways, Vueling and other airlines, making Avios one of the easiest rewards currencies to accumulate.

In addition to earning Avios on flights, you can earn Avios through AerClub by signing up for a co-branded Aer Lingus credit card, making purchases through the Aer Lingus online shopping portal, by making bookings with hotel and rental car companies and in several other ways. Let’s look more indepth at all of the different ways you can earn Avios with AerClub.

Flying with Aer Lingus

Figuring out how many Avios you’ll earn on an Aer Lingus flight is extremely easy due to the fact that earnings are based solely upon how much money you spend on your base fare. However, you won’t earn Avios on government taxes or any ancillary fees such as baggage or choosing your seat.

Aer Lingus even lists specific earnings rates depending on which currency you’re paying with:

• 3X Avios per 1 euro spent
• 4X Avios per 1 British pound spent
• 3X Avios per $1 spent
• 2X Avios per 1 Canadian dollar spent

When paying with any other currency (apart from the ones listed above), Avios will be awarded based on the euro value.

As mentioned in the previous section, elite status members with Silver, Platinum and Concierge status with AerClub will earn bonus Avios on Aer Lingus-operated flights. Here are the bonuses you’ll earn at each elite status tier:

• Silver: 25%
• Platinum: 50%
• Concierge: 75%

As you can see, calculating how many Avios you’d earn for a specific Aer Lingus flight is simple. All you have to do is multiply your base fare by the earnings rate for your currency and then apply any bonus earnings you receive for having elite status.

For example, if you were to purchase a flight that was operated and ticketed by Aer Lingus for $100, a Green status member would earn 300 Avios; a Silver status member would earn 375 Avios; a Platinum status member would earn 450 Avios; and a Concierge status member would earn 525 Avios.

Flying with Partner Airlines

Aer Lingus AerClub also allows you to earn bonus Avios for taking flights with partner airlines United Airlines and British Airways. Unfortunately, you can’t earn Avios with any of Aer Lingus’s other partner airlines.

If you want to receive Avios to your AerClub account for flying with United or British Airways, simply book flights with these airlines through the Aer Lingus website or provide your AerClub account number when booking the flight if you’re booking through either of these airlines’ websites.

When earning AerClub Avios on United or British Airways flights, your earnings will be based on distance flown and fare class. The percentage of the mileage that’s applied differs per fare class on each partner airline. Here’s a breakdown of how many Avios you’ll earn with British Airways.

And here’s a breakdown of how many Avios you’ll earn with United.

If you book a multi-segment flight itinerary including one or more segments on Aer Lingus and one or more segments on British Airways or United, Avios earnings for each segment will be calculated separately.

For instance, let’s say you’re a Green member with AerClub and you book a trip in economy class from Dublin to Miami that consists of two segments. The first segment is an Aer Lingus-operated flight from Dublin to New York and the second segment is a United -operated flight from New York to Miami.

For the first Aer Lingus-operated segment from Dublin to New York, your Avios earnings would be based on the amount you would’ve paid for that portion of the trip if you had booked it by itself. So, if the base fare for that same flight from Dublin to New York alone would’ve cost you $300, then you’d multiply that by the earnings rate of 3 Avios per $1 and find that you’d earn 900 Avios for that segment.

For the second United-operated segment from New York to Miami, your Avios earnings would be based on the mileage of that segment and the fare class you’re in. The estimated mileage from New York to Miami is 1,093 miles, and the earnings rate for economy class on United is 75%. So, simply multiply 1,093 miles by 0.75 and you’ll find that your earnings will be 819 Avios for that segment.

So, you’d earn 900 Avios for the first segment and 819 Avios for the second segment, giving you a total of 1,719 Avios for the entire trip.

Spending with Aer Lingus Co-Branded Credit Cards

Aer Lingus currently offers two co-branded credit cards that make it easy to rack up Avios for making purchases in your everyday life: the Aer Lingus Visa Signature® Card and the Aer Credit Card. Unfortunately, since the Aer Credit Card is issued by Bank of Ireland, you won’t be able to get this card unless you’re an Irish citizen. For that reason, we’re only going to go over the Aer Lingus Visa Signature® Card (which is issued by Chase) in this article.

The Aer Lingus Visa Signature Card is issued by Chase and is very similar to both the British Airways Visa Signature® Card and the Iberia Visa Signature® Card. So, if you tend to fly with either Iberia or British Airways more often than Aer Lingus, you’re better off going with one of those cards over the Aer Lingus card.

The Aer Lingus Visa Signature Card has an annual fee of $95. However, you can easily offset it with the spending bonuses and benefits that this card offers. Aer Lingus Visa Signature cardholders earn:

• 3X Avios on Aer Lingus, Iberia and British Airways flight purchases
• 2X Avios on hotel accommodations booked directly with the hotel
• 1X Avios on everything else

On top of that, this card comes with some valuable benefits, including:

• Every calendar year you make purchases of $30,000 on your card, you’ll receive an economy companion ticket good for 12 months.
• You and any authorized users on your account are eligible for priority boarding on Aer Lingus flights between U.S. and Ireland.
• No foreign transaction fees
• Complimentary one-year subscription to DoorDash DashPass

While the Aer Lingus Visa Signature Card comes with some decent benefits and spending bonuses, there are definitely better cards out there that charge a $95 annual fee. For instance, the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card has a $95 annual fee and earns Chase Ultimate Rewards points, a much more flexible rewards currency than Avios. You also can transfer your Ultimate Rewards points to Avios at a 1:1 ratio.

Plus, since the Aer Lingus Visa Signature Card counts toward Chase’s 5/24 rule (which means that you can’t open more than five credit cards in a 24-month period to be approved for a new card from Chase), you may want to save those slots for other cards that offer better benefits and spending bonuses.

Transfer Partners

As previously mentioned, you can transfer Avios between any of the loyalty programs that use Avios as their currency (including British Airways Executive Club, Iberia Plus, Aer Lingus AerClub, Qatar Airways Privilege Club and other smaller programs) without having to pay any fees. More on that later.

You also can convert certain credit card points to Avios. Namely, you can convert American Express Membership Rewards points and Chase Ultimate Rewards points to Avios at a 1:1 ratio. These flexible rewards currencies can be used in many other ways, so you’ll want to weigh converting to Avios against your other options. However, in many cases, converting your Chase or Amex points to Avios through Aer Lingus AerClub can be a solid redemption.

Finally, certain hotel rewards programs allow you to convert their points to Avios. However, you’re almost always better off leaving these points in their native programs.

For instance, you can convert Marriott Bonvoy points to Avios at a 3:1 ratio and Best Western Rewards points to Avios at a 5:1 ratio. Both of these redemptions would be low-value ways to use your hotel points. The only instance in which you might want to consider converting hotel points to Avios with AerClub is if you don’t plan on using your hotel points in the future.

Booking Hotels

In addition to transferring hotel points from certain hotel rewards programs, you can choose to earn Avios directly for hotel stays with certain hotel chains and booking engines. Here’s a breakdown of the hotel chains and booking engines that allow you to earn Avios for booking hotel stays:

In cases where you have to choose between earning hotel points or Avios for a hotel stay (such as with Marriott Bonvoy or MeliáRewards), you’re usually better off earning hotel points. However, if you’re using a booking engine (such as Avios Hotels or Booking.com), it’s a great idea to elect to earn Avios. Likewise with The Merrion Dublin, which is a single hotel that doesn’t have its own rewards program.

Car Rentals

Aer Lingus AerClub also has partnerships with car rental companies Avis and Budget that allow you to earn Avios on car rentals. To earn Avios with either company, you’ll need to book your car rental through cars.aerlingus.com and enter your AerClub account number when completing your transaction.

With Avis, you’ll earn 5X Avios per €1 spent. All AerClub members can add a free additional driver to every rental. With Budget, you’ll earn 5X Avios per €1 spent.

Transfer Money Internationally with Midpoint

Aer Lingus AerClub has a partnership with Midpoint, a peer-to-peer international currency matching and payments platform. When transferring money with Midpoint, you’ll earn 1 Avios for every €11 transferred. You’re probably not going to rack up a ton of Avios this way. However, if you regularly transfer money through Midpoint, it’s worth collecting some Avios while you’re doing so.

Booking Experiences with Viator

Viator is a travel agency that allows you to book interesting and unique experiences all around the world. This platform allows you to book everything from helicopter rides to museum tickets to wine tastings. Viator has a partnership with Aer Lingus AerClub that allows you to earn 4X Avios per €1 spent.

Shopping Online via AerClub eStore

Like many other airline loyalty programs, Aer Lingus AerClub has its own shopping portal called the AerClub eStore. Through this portal, you can earn Avios for making purchases with hundreds of well-known brands online. Earnings rates vary by merchant, but you can earn as many as 15X Avios per €1 with certain merchants on the AerClub eStore.

All you have to do is go to the AerClub eStore website and log in with your AerClub credentials. Then, you can browse through the wide variety of products and you’ll be rewarded with Avios every time you make a purchase.

Avios earned through the AerClub eStore will typically arrive in your Aer Lingus AerClub account within 35 days.

Avios For Thoughts

Avios For Thoughts is a free online survey community that allows you to earn Avios for completing surveys. You’ll earn 100 Avios just for signing up and completing a tutorial. You’ll also be rewarded with 500 Avios for completing your first survey. After that, you’ll earn between 20 and 350 Avios for each survey completed. While you probably won’t earn a ton of Avios through Avios For Thoughts, it’s not a bad way to get yourself a little bit closer to affording an award flight if you have some free time.

Buying Avios

Like most other frequent-flyer programs, AerClub gives you the option to purchase Avios with cash, but it’s usually not a good idea. You can buy a minimum of 2,000 Avios in a single transaction and a maximum of 200,000 Avios per calendar year.

The cost per Avios decreases when you purchase more Avios in a single transaction. For instance, if you purchased just 2,000 Avios, it would cost you $80, which means each Avios would’ve cost you about 4 cents. However, if you purchase 200,000 Avios (the maximum) at a time, it would cost you $5,523, which means each Avios would’ve cost you just over 2.7 cents.

Regardless of what quantity you purchase Avios in, it’s pretty much never a good idea. When you’re already paying a minimum of 2.7 cents apiece for Avios, it’s hard to get any value out of them.

How to Redeem Avios

Just as there are many ways to earn Avios, there are also many ways to redeem Avios. First and foremost, you can book flights on Aer Lingus-operated flights or flights operated by one of its partners. You can also redeem your Avios for things like hotel stays, car rentals and experiences.

However, not all redemption options offer the same value. So, it’s important to calculate the value per Avios you’re getting from each redemption by comparing the price in Avios to the cash price. Let’s take a look at all of the different ways that you can redeem Avios through AerClub and the respective values that each redemption option offers.

Flying with Aer Lingus

Like each of the other loyalty programs that use Avios, Aer Lingus uses a distance-based award chart to price its own award flights. This means that there are definitely a few sweet spots to be taking advantage of, particularly on short-haul flights during off-peak times.

Aer Lingus separates its award flights into several zones, and the price per zone varies by whether it’s peak or off-peak time. Aer Lingus has calendars for 2023 and 2024 with peak and off-peak dates on their website.

Here’s the award chart for Aer Lingus-operated flights.

To make matters even easier for you, Aer Lingus also publishes an award chart that can tell you exactly what zone each of their flights are in.

When it comes to searching for sweet spots, you’re probably going to have more luck searching for flights in Zone 1, Zone 2 and Zone 3.

For instance, we searched for a flight from Dublin to Gran Canaria, Spain (which would be a Zone 3 flight), on an off-peak date in economy class. If you were to purchase this flight in cash, it would cost you about €215, which is about $233 at the current conversion rate.

However, if you were to purchase an award flight with the same origin, destination, fare class and date, it would cost you 8,500 Avios. Thus, this redemption would give you a value of about 2.7 cents per Avios ($233 x 100 cents / 8,500 Avios). That’s a much higher value than you’ll get with most other redemption options.

We also searched for a flight from Dublin to Athens, Greece (which would also be a Zone 3 flight), on a peak date in economy class. If you were to purchase this flight in cash, it would cost you about €329, which is about $357 at the current conversion rate.

The exact same flight would cost you 10,000 Avios. Thus, this redemption would give you a value of about 3.5 cents per Avios ($357 x 100 cents / 10,000 Avios). That’s a great value.

As you can see, if you want to find out the value of a certain award flight, you just need to multiply the cash price by 100 cents and divide it by the number of Avios you would need to find the same flight (which you can find by referring to the award charts above or on the Aer Lingus website).

It’s also worth noting that you can use your Avios to pay for seats and bags as well as the base fare of the flight.

Flying with Partner Airlines

Although Aer Lingus has a multitude of partnerships with airlines all around the world, you can’t book partner award flights through AerClub.

However, you can spend the Avios that you’ve earned through AerClub on award flights with British Airways, Iberia and Vueling by logging in to Avios.com with your AerClub credentials. Award flights with these airlines are priced using the same distance-based award chart as Aer Lingus-operated award flights.

As previously mentioned, you can use the Combine Avios feature on Avios.com to move your Avios from Aer Lingus into one of the other frequent-flyer programs that uses this currency. And because you can’t book partner award flights through AerClub, doing so is highly advisable in this case.

For instance, instead of keeping your Avios in AerClub and being limited to award flights from Aer Lingus alone, you could move them to a British Airways Executive Club account and gain access to award flights from British Airways’s full list of partner airlines, which includes Alaska Airlines, American Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines and JetBlue.

Upgrades

Aer Lingus allows you to use your Avios for upgrades from economy class to business on certain Aer Lingus flights. You can’t use Avios to purchase upgrades on partner flights through AerClub. If you want to upgrade your ticket, you need to send an email to aerclubupgrade@aerlingus.com with your current ticket. They will check the availability of an upgrade on your itinerary and issue you a new ticket if one is available.

When it comes to the price of the upgrade, it depends on the time of year that you’re traveling and your origin and destination. Luckily, the following charts make it easy to find out how much your upgrade would cost.

As you can see, you can book an upgrade to business class only on flights between Europe and North America. That’s because Aer Lingus offers business-class tickets only on transatlantic flights. Aer Lingus only offers economy-class tickets on flights within Europe, and upgrades to business class aren’t available.

Hotel Stays

Aer Lingus gives you the option to book hotels through AerClub using Avios. You can choose to pay for your hotel stay entirely with Avios or you can use Avios to make a partial payment and cover the rest with cash. To do so, you can navigate to the “Spending Avios” page on the Aer Lingus website and then click the “Hotels & Leisure” tab. Scroll down and click the “Book Hotels” button. This will bring you to the Aer Lingus hotel booking portal.

Once you’re there, you’ll need to enter your destination, your desired dates and the number of guests. Press the “Search Hotels” button, and you’ll be presented with a list of hotels that fit your search parameters.

Unfortunately, booking hotels with Avios through AerClub doesn’t provide much value per Avios. For instance, we found a hotel stay at The Manhattan at Times Square Hotel for 13,275 Avios.

As you can see, the cash rate for the same hotel stay would have been $103.57, which gives you a value of about 0.7 cent per Avios. If you compare that to the value that you can get from booking flights with Avios, you’ll see that booking hotels is usually not the best option.

Car Rentals and Experiences

According to the Aer Lingus website, you also can use Avios to book car rentals and experiences. Unfortunately, they currently don’t have an online portal for booking either of these things.

If you want to book a car rental or an experience with Avios, you’ll need to call the Avios customer service line for your region. Here are the different numbers for the different regions:

• U.K. and Europe sites: 03444-49-333-49
• Ireland site: +353-1-562-1043
• U.S. and Canada sites: +1-855-585-8264

When you call, an agent will help you look for car rentals or experiences in your desired location and then help you book your car rental or experience with Avios.

Combine Avios

One of the greatest advantages of the Avios currency is that you can move Avios between accounts with the four different frequent-flyer programs. For instance, you can move your Avios from Aer Lingus AerClub to Iberia Plus. This gives you access to the entire list of airline partners for Aer Lingus, British Airways, Iberia and Qatar Airways.

And, in the case of Aer Lingus AerClub specifically, you’re probably going to want to take advantage of this feature. Since AerClub allows you to purchase award flights operated and ticketed by Aer Lingus only, you’re probably going to want to move your Avios to another program (such as British Airways Executive Club) that allows you to book partner award flights.

All four airlines that use Avios have their own unique list of partners. So, transferring your Avios from one loyalty program to another might give you access to new partner award flights.

For instance, if you transfer your Avios from British Airways Executive Club to Iberia Plus, you’ll gain access to award flights from LATAM (which aren’t available through Executive Club), a large airline that operates tons of routes between North America and Central and South America.

Another advantage of the Avios currency is that, if you have balances of Avios in separate accounts, you can combine them all into one account. For instance, if you have 100,000 Avios in your Aer Lingus AerClub account and 100,000 Avios in your British Airways Executive Club account, you can combine them both into one account for a total of 200,000.

If you want to move Avios between Iberia, British Airways and Aer Lingus, the easiest way to do so is by signing into Avios.com with your Aer Lingus AerClub credentials. If you want to move Avios to or from your Qatar Airways Privilege Club account, you’ll need to use British Airways as an intermediary, which can get a bit complicated.

If you want to learn more about how to move or combine Avios, check out this article.

The Bottom Line

Out of the different programs that earn Avios, Aer Lingus AerClub is probably the least enticing because this program doesn’t allow you to book partner award flights.While you can use your AerClub Avios to book flights with Iberia, British Airways and Vueling through Avios.com, you’d be much better off transferring your Avios to another program where you can book a multitude of partner awards from both Oneworld and non-alliance partners.

Where AerClub does shine, though, is in the fact that it allows you to collect Avios for taking flights on United Airlines, which you can’t do with any of the other Avios-based programs. So, if Avios is your preferred airline rewards currency, it’s definitely worth opening up an AerClub account to earn Avios on United flights.

However, when it comes time to redeem those Avios, you’re better off doing so with Iberia Plus, British Airways Executive Club or Qatar Airways Privilege Club, all of which allow you to book partner award flights.

If you do choose to redeem your Avios through AerClub, you’ll usually get the most value by redeeming for flights rather than car rentals, hotel stays or experiences. Since Aer Lingus uses a distance-based award chart, you’ll typically find the highest-value redemptions on short-haul flights around Europe in Zones 1, 2 and 3.