mmxbreaks

Oh the year of refunds.
And, apparently for BA AMEX, it counts against your current year's Companion Voucher goal earnings (the £20,000 threshold) - even if the debit was made in the previous year's accounting.
My example:
- Spent of £1,500 in October 2020.
- AMEX year end in December 2020.
- Cancellation and refund (of £1,500 October sum) received February 2021 - i.e. within new BA AMEX card year.
- That £1,500 is minused from current year's £20,000 Companion Voucher goal.

I see this as a fundamental systems error. AMEX says it's credit versus debit and cannot be corrected.

Have raised a complaint, but has any one else experienced this and had any good/bad luck in escalating? As I'm expecting there will be several additional refunds - some much larger - I suspect I'll be in "negative" earnings towards a Companion Voucher this year otherwise. :-o

Freddorick

This seems correct, otherwise you could just order stuff for 10/20k, receive the voucher, and then return everything you ordered.

Merlin5

The spend annually to get the companion voucher is £10,000 not £20,000. I do appreciate what you're saying but I can also see if from AMEX point of view and to me its fair.

LBA_flyer

I think it is £20,000.00 for the Blue BA amex card

mmxbreaks

You could do that anyway. If the voucher is spent, it's unlikely to be recoverable (depends how keen they'd get to nullify a booking I s'pose).

Not that this was ever my intention. In 2020 accounts I earned the voucher two or three times over. For 2021 that won't happen - no hotels, no flights, many refunds.

NandoDave

The bonus target is against your annual net spend. The maths you have outlined is absolutely correct.

Here is a detailed explanation of how it works:
https://www.headforpoints.com/2020/0...ndles-refunds/

dougzz

What Amex do is reasonable, sadly it catches those that keep the card long term versus those that churn. There are many cases of people buying refundable items with the sole intention of triggering the voucher, which is seemingly never cancelled once issued. Of course these people often cancel the card and have the refund paid to bank or another card, so never see the need to reach the higher target the following year.

if you value the voucher wouldn't you benefit from the paid card, if you did spend 2x or 3x the £20K in year 2020 the extra Avios alone would justify the fee, never mind the increased usefulness of a 2 year voucher.

Globaliser

This is absolutely correct on Amex's part. I have once deliberately used it in my favour, for the purposes of delaying the issue of a voucher for as long as possible.

mmxbreaks

It's a credit card thing, I suppose. It's not deemed as a 'refund', rather credit/debit.
As much as it makes sense, it's still frustrating. :]

mmxbreaks

I typically upgrade it to Black just before it's about to happen on Blue. Then downgrade at an appropriate time when I know spend will be lower overall and I'm less worried about the 0.5x multiplier.

This year I'll be awaiting BA's 50% Avios promotion to come back instead...!

dougzz

Fair enough that's an approach taken by quite a few I'd guess. Seems a bit shameless* to do this but complain about the way refunds count negatively against spend. If you're happy with the admin of changing things around why you wouldn't just cancel the card, then reapply in a 3 months or something and get a new spend target. Any further refunds go against the old card, and you can ask for the balances to be transferred to the new one without Avios loss or the 20K/10K target being increased.

*I have just got a new BAPP after a 2 year gap to trigger the welcome bonus. I don't have any issue with gaming Amex, just seems a little unfair to call them out on the way they quite reasonably handle refunds.

cheshirepete

A few months ago Apple offered me a credit to return my iPhone 11 back to get the iPhone 12. I was on their Upgrade programme, so the Phone was paid for monthly via my Bank Account via DD over 20 interest free payments. I made a BIG error of judgement at this point! I could have it refunded by any credit or debit card. I happened to choose Amex as it’s always my first choice! They credited me £450 back to it. This was not related to any previous purchase, it was simply a means for Apple to pay me for my old handset.

As you can guess, this caused a x1.5 removal of Avios! I raised this with Amex and had the debit of Avios reversed. I’m not sure actually if this also removed the £450 from my companion voucher threshold. But at the moment I’m not very bothered about this as I want to trigger it as late as possible before the July deadline.

This was obviously wrong to do this by Amex as it wasn’t for a previous purchase on the card. I’ve learned my lesson and obviously like the choice between a FTV and a refund to the original card, you need to be careful!

As a final thought. I had a deposit on a Iberia Holiday last year of £300, which as it posts as BA got me 900 Avios at the time. They cancelled it and refunded me but the Avios Never got taken back. So I kept quiet LOL!

mikeyfly

AmEx have not done anything incorrectly here. It’s the process date of your spend / refund which is relevant. You chose to take a credit in a different cycle year

pauldb

Why don’t you just play the system the other way round: when you’re ready to trigger the voucher buy a £1500 refundable ticket and cancel it after voucher issue, before year-end. Two wrongs and all that...

To be marginally safer I’d do the £1500 before the triggering transaction, rather than as the triggering transaction. Just, IMO, a chance that reversing the triggering transaction is a little more likely to be flagged up than simpy dropping below the threshold.

PGberkshire

Upgrade to the Premium card. £10k limit needed for CV.