Qatar Airways has quietly scrapped the most annoying part of its My List policy for Privilege Club members. As of mid-September 2026, you no longer need to credit a flown flight or make an eligible co-branded credit card transaction before you can set up a list and redeem Avios for other people. All that's required now is that your account has been open for at least 30 days.
Quick recap for anyone who missed the saga: in June 2026, Qatar rolled out My List as an anti-fraud measure, capping the people you can redeem Avios for at four named Privilege Club members. Each person had to be an adult, accept an invitation, and stay on your list for at least six months. You could also only belong to one list at a time, and people already in a Family & Friends group couldn't be added. On top of that, creating a list originally required a qualifying activity — a flight credited to Qatar or an eligible credit card transaction — which felt like a forced engagement play rather than genuine fraud protection.
That qualifying-activity rule is what's now gone. In July, Qatar had already carved out an exception for Gold and Platinum members, letting them redeem freely for anyone without building a list at all. With the latest change, ordinary members can also create a My List without first handing Qatar a flight or a card swipe.
The core restrictions haven't gone anywhere, though. You're still limited to four adults on your list, each locked in for six months. Gold and Platinum members remain the only ones who can book for people outside their lists. In practice, most members end up with a 6-plus-4 structure: six non-member nominees under the existing Family & Friends programme, plus four Privilege Club members on My List — a maximum of ten pre-identified people you can ever book for.
Why did Qatar do this in the first place? Avios are extremely liquid currency, transferable between British Airways, Iberia, Aer Lingus, Finnair and Qatar. That's great for legitimate members and equally great for fraudsters, who can compromise an account, shift points across partners and book a last-minute ticket for a third party in minutes. The named-list system adds friction. It doesn't stop fraud, but it slows it down.
Still, the trade-off is real. The old freedom to redeem for anyone — a parent, a colleague, a friend in a jam — is gone for regular members. If you occasionally book awards for people outside a small fixed circle, Privilege Club is less useful than it was. Dropping the qualifying-activity requirement removes the pettiest part of the policy, but the six-month lock-ins and four-person cap mean this is a partial climb-down, not a full reversal. If you redeem Avios for family and friends, double-check who's on your list before you need a booking.