Can I Spend Avios On Shopping?

This pandemic has changed many people’s outlook on life and what they prioritise. If you are sitting on a stack of Avios with no intentions of flying in the near future, you might be looking for another option to redeem them for. Luckily with Nectar’s new partnership with British Airways you can spend Avios on shopping… and you will get a decent return!

Where can I spend Avios on shopping?

Nectar spend partners can be viewed on their website here – https://www.nectar.com/card/spend – there are currently 13 partners. Predominately 500 points are worth £2.50 off your shopping (with a few exceptions.) You can redeem at stores such as Sainsbury’s, eBay, or Argos. With these 3 shops, you can pretty much cover most items you can imagine buying! Outside of this, you have brands such as Vue, Caffe Nero & Eurostar where you can also redeem your points.

To put this into an Avios context for you every 312.5 Avios you convert to Nectar would get you 500 Nectar points

What value will I get If I spend Avios On Shopping?

The exchange rate between Avios is 250:400. So that means every 250 Avios points you transfer will get 400 Nectar points worth £2. An easier way to see it is probably for every £2.50 worth of flights you could have got you are getting £2 worth of shopping, which is 0.8p a point. Good value? As external redemptions go, yes, does it make sense for you? That’s up to you to decide!

If you are looking to transfer between the two schemes take a look at our article here – https://pointsuncovered.com/avios/how-to-link-your-avios-nectar-accounts/

Conclusion

Obviously by converting your Avios points to Nectar points for shopping you won’t get the same value you would on good flight redemptions. We value an Avios at 1p so 0.8p is pretty good value for an external redemption. Are you tempted to spend Avios of shopping? Or are you keeping them for your next getaway?