The first time I flew bmi was last summer and the bmi Amex had been running for a while by that time. I tried to pay with my Amex and they apologised and says they don't accept it. I said "but don't bmi do their own Amex?", they said yes, but the systems don't support it.

Since then I had got status matched to gold and then went on to requalify for gold so I don't often buy on board, but a few months ago when I wanted some extra beers they said they didn't take Amex. I know the menu inside the magazine used to just show Visa and Mastercard.

Perhaps they've taken Amex all along but forgot to tell the crew