liam0114

Morning,
I've been considering switching from my BA premium amex card to the gold card.

I understand that the 2-4-1 voucher is an incredible perk however I'm not sure that I really get the most out of it. I dont generate enough avios (~30K pa) to make business class redemptions. I feel that using it to fly long haul economy is not really saving me much. Therefore by switching to the gold card i can still convert my points to Avois but I like the flexibility that I can also convert them to other loyalty schemes which I might take advantage of more often or if i want to fly to a part of the world not service by BA.
Any thoughts on this ??

Cheers

sjrk1

I was in a similar position to you when I had my BAPP card. I got the 241 voucher but at the time I was unable to have long haul holidays due to a variety of reasons and didn't earn enough avios to redeem into long haul business even if I was able to. I ended up using it taking myself and a friend to Greece in Club Europe for a couple of weeks which wasn't necessarily a bad use but not great.

I cancelled the BA card and took out the gold card and have found that generating a more meaningful stash of points was easier with the gold card a meaningful without really trying** - though having your favourite pubs take amex helps greatly! I also value the flexibility of choosing who to the move the AMEX rewards to and not just BA/Avios.
However in saying that, I use the Avios e-store as a way of boosting my Avios balance when using shopping with the likes of Booking.com/Argos/John Lewis(and many others) as well as linking my Tesco Clubcard/Shell fuel card to my Avios account. Earned another decent amount without much hassle.**

You should be able to get the welcome bonus of 20000 points or 22000(?) with a referral. Also, give family member(s) a supplementary card and a card referrals to friends to boost your points balance.
There is a free companion credit card to the gold card that is a handy way of generating points if you want to to split a payment over a couple of months (but no longer than 4-6, the APR is huge!), I think the offer for taking it out was 3000 points for Ł500 spend. There are other MR earning credit cards that have better APR but no bonus if you have the gold card (and no gold card bonus if you take out the rewards credit card first).

In short I would cancel the BA card and get the gold card. If you have a long haul trip coming up, you can always take out the BA card again for the 241 voucher

**Health warning: I realise I probably got lucky with being able to earn that amount easily! But nothing ventured, nothing gained and all that

liam0114

Hi
Thanks for the help, I think it pretty much confirms that I should cancel the BA one and get the Gold card instead. Esp as we would like to explore the world in places where emirates fly etc..

Cheers
Liam

Rich4423

I recently cancelled my personal Amex BA card and plan to soon cancel my business Amex BA card due to diminishing benefits. The BA Business Card now demands a Ł60k spend for just 30k bonus miles, without offering any vouchers. Despite accumulating 5 vouchers on the personal card, I was unable to use any in premium cabins due to poor availability. An attempt to switch to the Platinum card was unsuccessful due to a high credit limit on my existing BA cards. Amex’s lack of assistance led to the cancellation of the personal card. As I no longer fly with BA, I’m looking forward to the Emirates card release and plan to sign up for the Virgin Atlantic Card.

marcopizzaiuolo

Not commenting on the BA Business Amex, but the vouchers issued via BAPP have actually become easier to use as these opens up extra availability for rewards seats and in fact I have managed to use it on return flights in FIRST for the last two years. Obviously personal circumstances and desired destinations will impact on perceived usability of the benefits.

Rich4423

Maybe you are flying to Islamabad because there is rarely any seats in business or first Also the BA Amex Business stop issuing vouchers that actually gave access to premium cabins.

marcopizzaiuolo

Again, I was not commenting on the Business one as you also mentioned BAPP not being worth it in your response, I commented on that. With regards to FIRST availability, for the last two years since the BAPP voucher changed, I have seen plenty of availability to many North America Destination (including ATL, ORD, HOU, PHL, IAD, JFK, BOS but if booked with the 355-1 trick often discussed here, even easily to LAX and SFO), Central & South America (MEX really plenty but also SCL), Asia (PKX, PVG - here you do need some planning) etc...

Rich4423

That’s the issue, I just can’t book that far ahead. Thanks for the tips.