I realise this may be discussed in passing elsewhere but I really can't find any substantive collation of the options for reasonably retaining BA Gold if one is based outside the UK/Europe. I'm fully prepared for the answer to come back as "it's not worth it"/"choose a programme more suited to your travel patterns" but I would like to check my working in public first before coming to that conclusion!

After last year's changes to BA(E)C and recently relocating to Hong Kong, I had resigned myself to not renewing Gold this year and being content with comfortably making Silver, or possibly switching to another OW FF programme if I could realistically attain OWE. However, the recent tweaks to BAC got me thinking: a) whether I could use any advantageously to get Gold for under £20k, and b) why the latest changes exacerbate the unfairness for BAC members not based in the UK or within reach of one of BA's favoured OW partners.

To summarise the hurdles which non-UK based BAC members have to overcome:

• No BA Amex available (even if I retained one, it needs a UK-registered BAC account and most spending would be in FX, attracting a 3% fee). BA-branded cards overseas (e.g. Dah Sing Bank BA Visa Platinum) are very weak by comparison and do not earn Tier Points.
  
• BA service is very thin in certain parts of the world such as Asia due to their myopic focus on the US. HKG is down to a single 787 with no First available. The prices are consistently more than CX's, and BA's is the inferior product.
  
• Flying non-favoured partner airlines is heavily penalised. CX earns 12.5% of distance in J, which on a 3-hour intra-Asia flight (~1,000mi) at ~£1,500 return yields roughly 250 TPs — meaning you'd need to spend something like £120,000 on CX J to reach Gold. In First on long-haul, three HKG-JFK returns (8,000mi each way) at 40% earnings can easily exceed the £20k needed when flying on BA. The point of an FFP is to encourage spend with a particular airline, which was previously enforced by requiring a certain number of sectors on BA metal. Yet BA has now dropped that requirement entirely, apparently content for members to never fly them at all, provided they use the right OW partners. For someone making one or two trips to London a year with significant regional Asia travel, Gold is simply unattainable. I'm very happy to direct spend to BA, but the reality is that when you live somewhere, a big portion of your travel will be regional, and that needs to be rewarding enough to make remaining in the programme meaningful.
  
• BA Holidays are useless when based overseas unless you're going to London. BA simply won't sell me a BAH package to where I actually want to go from HKG (e.g. SYD, TPE, TYO, SEL) because there are no BA flights from here. I'm unlikely to spend £20k on a package to London, and if I were spending that on accommodation I'd want the kind of Virtuoso/hotel status recognition that BAH (read: Expedia) cannot provide.
  

The recent changes which prompted me to reconsider sadly don't make a difference, given their strong preference for BA/AA/IB flights. Obviously, holding Gold currently means I pay nothing for bags or seat selection.

Not to be defeated, I've come up with the following possibilities for retaining Gold in theory:

• LON-HKG BAH and just live in the hotel. I currently bounce between hotels and serviced apartments anyway, so I could simply treat this as paying rent! Downsides: I'd have to return to the UK to start the holiday; it seems difficult or impossible to extend accommodation once booked and still have it credit; and there may be a maximum BAH length.
  
• OW RTW tickets inspired by this trip report, this should certainly be possible, though I haven't found fares in that range from a cursory search.
  
• Explore JL, AY and QR's networks more, taking advantage of their enhanced distance-based earnings rates in the hope of finding a good deal.
  

With the end of the TP year fast approaching I've accepted my fate as a Silver next year, so perhaps the purpose of this post is to brainstorm ways to overcome the hurdles for overseas members going forward. I'll likely give up on BAC after next year if I can't find any reasonable route to Gold. Coincidentally, I'm also about to start working for CX. OWE could be useful for CX lounges on staff travel (it is recognised), but given that much of my flying going forward won't earn TPs anyway, perhaps it's time to give up on this game entirely.