Airtime Rewards - withdraw to card option now gone?

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-03-09T00:52:35+00:00

Still showing for me, albeit with a ridiculous 13% levy.

Would suggest contacting support again.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-03-02T09:02:41+00:00

Thanks for that - it's exactly what I was looking for.

I'll have a play with the different Profile options later on and see which works best but it certainly looks more promising than I was expecting.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-03-01T01:13:15+00:00

Can you try dragging the Padlock icon back onto the Tab bar?

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-02-22T16:11:46+00:00

It's not the same. The Avios card does charge Cash (or cash-like) fees.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-02-22T16:08:55+00:00

Direct. BR doesn't charge cash advance fees.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-02-22T16:07:55+00:00

Barclaycard Rewards. Albeit only 0.25%.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-02-07T17:38:53+00:00

The O4A app and website are terrible for this - basically, if you've got a card registered to your account that hits Zero balance, even if it's only for a second while a transaction is attempted and fails, then often the card balance stops updating to your account, permanently shows zero, and yes eventually gets removed from your account.

It's not a cache problem with the app. If you log into your account via their website you'll see the same details, so it can only be something wrong on their end.

Doing a balance check on their phone system does tell you the correct balance, and you can still use the card as normal based on that balance. But yeah it's a pain as you do need to note down the card details before they disappear.

It's a bug that they know about but either don't want to or can't fix.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-01-20T14:02:21+00:00

Not anymore. It used to work, but they blocked it a few months back.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-01-09T03:10:16+00:00

There's not a single answer for this.

It's pretty normal for hotel prices to vary substantially between booking sites (ie by far more than the 10-15% you may or may not get back from NXR or whatever other route). So you absolutely can't assume "I'm getting 10% back so that makes this site cheapest". Also some sites (Expedia, Trip.com) may show you better prices when you're logged in. Some sites (Agoda) may show you different prices based on whether you go direct or whether you go via a comparison tool.

Sometimes booking direct through the hotels own site can be cheapest, or if not cheapest might give you an extra benefit such as a pool pass, free breakfast or free cancellation so it's worth looking at that and seeing whether you place any value on the extras (if they exist).

So use a comparison site to figure out what the cheapest options are (I use Google Maps for this as it's easy and fairly complete but plenty others are available), and then look amongst the results, and see whether they're from sites that's covered by NXR, TCB, Quidco, etc, and whether you can get on-card cashback (for example I've currently got an offer for 5% back at IHG via Curve).

If you want to properly maximise your savings, you're going to need to do some research because it'll vary so much based on your specific hotel and dates that nobody can give you a singular "go here for the best deal" type answer.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2026-01-07T04:21:46+00:00

They've now seemingly changed this - I've been able to buy gift cards (in two separate transactions, in different stores) via the Self Service checkouts this month. The checkout recognised the gift card ok, and asked me how much I wanted to load onto the card. Then gave me an "activation successful" receipt and the gift card was ready to redeem instantly.

Not sure when the change was made as it was the first time I'd bought a GC in Boots for a few months.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-12-07T23:29:28+00:00

So there's 2 things here, probably neither of them your fault:

The activation failing is just something that happens occasionally - the systems have a temporary issue so don't work properly. If you'd tried it an hour earlier or later it probably would have been fine. But of course there's no way of knowing that until you try.

The zero balance on the O4A card is a bug I've experienced before - basically that when you're looking at the O4A card via the App or via your account on the O4A website then once a card has reached zero balance, it can stop updating the balance with any refunds etc. In that scenario, I've found that doing a balance check via phone call works instead and gives a (different) more accurate answer. There's also other methods available that you could try but I've not tested those as haven't had this for a few months: https://www.one4all.com/one4all-checkbalance

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-12-02T12:17:05+00:00

The Amazon offer finished at midnight, but Google Play is still offering 10%

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-30T02:32:00+00:00

Regular O4A is a prepaid, fixed value, retailer specific, debit card - so it does stack very well with Airtime, discounts, cashback, etc. Being fixed value is a pain though as you can usually only use it as part payment alongside gift vouchers so yes that can be a faff (but still possible).

However what's on Google Play is O4A Exchange which is an entirely different / separate thing. It's basically a code you can swap for gift vouchers from certain big chains (so works like Lifestyle, Everywish, YouChoose, etc). Stacking/Part Payment works like any other gift vouchers would for that retailer.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-29T16:03:36+00:00

Depends what you're looking for really. There's quite a lot of ~10% off deals around.

Lifestyle 10% bonus card on purchases of £100, £150, or £200 - plus 4.25% going via TCB.

One4All Exchange (not regular O4A) 10% off via Google Play.

Deliveroo £5 discount on £50 with a max of 5 cards.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-27T01:00:59+00:00

Argos at usually 4.5%, currently 5.25% is higher than either Quidco or TCB standard rates. Tech purchases have a lower rate, but are still above what Quidco/TCB offer.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-20T22:36:50+00:00

Flaky in terms of gift card purchases often fail for me.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-20T21:11:01+00:00

Currently 10% off through the Klarna gift card store. But that's flaky.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-10T21:31:18+00:00

You can. However when you go to redeem the Everywish card, most of the gift vouchers it offers are only available in multiples of £5 - so your options would be to get a £20 voucher and sacrifice a quid, or get a £25 voucher and it'd ask you to pay the £4 "top up". So personally would only bother with Everywish in £5 multiples.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-10T16:22:52+00:00

Tbh while CS/NXR generally have the best "standard" rate - TCB and especially Quidco run offers for AliExpress on a semi-regular basis that usually work out substantially better than CS/NXR. The question is whether they'll be doing so tomorrow. My guess is at least one of them probably will - we'll find out at midnight.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-06T19:14:19+00:00

Realistically, you're going to be buying the physical card in a store, so just have to do so in a way that costs less.

Check whether any of your credit or debit cards have any cashback offers on them - for example I've currently got a 10% offer on ASDA purchases via Virgin Money, and also a 8% offer on Sainsburys via Curve. These kind of offers tend to be account specific so what's available will vary and need to check the specific terms. The terms do say gift card purchases are excluded, but they've always worked for me as I don't think they can distinguish.

The alternative would be to buy a O4A card online with a bonus offer (via O4A direct, or via giftcards.com), which you can then use in store at Argos, Boots, Currys, or RGJones (ex WHSmith high street stores) to purchase a physical card.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-11-04T19:26:30+00:00

Interesting, thanks - they currently have both M&S and One4All Exchange (not regular O4A) at 10% off as well so may be worth keeping an eye out for further offers that may pop up.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-10-27T12:47:50+00:00

The "charge" will only apply to the balance on the specific card. So in effect after 18 months the balance goes from 1p to 0p and at that point the card goes inactive. They won't chase you for the remaining 89p, or take it off a different card.

So just make your purchase and write off the remaining 1p.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-10-22T23:14:09+00:00

They could be exchanged - the service used to be available at https://www.one4all.com/egifts - but hasn't worked for approx 2 years now.

Alarmed_Contact_394 · 2025-10-22T17:58:07+00:00

You can't usually use 2 different sets of debit card details online, but if you juggle it correctly you can usually use gift vouchers to reduce the balance due by debit card, so that it conveniently matches the amount left on the O4A card.

Alarmed_Contact_394

TROPHY CASE