EK Skywards Gold Status with ADIB (Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank)
 

This is probably a bit more relevant for those based in the UAE...

Interestingly enough, ADIB has launched a pair of new credit cards which offer a fast-track to Skywards Gold status merely by spending as little as AED 5,500 (USD 1,500 approx.) with EK on tickets.

Some data points to consider:
ADIB Skywards World Elite card -

• Primary cardholder receives Skywards Silver membership with a fast-track to Gold on completion of AED 5,500 EK spend
• Opportunity for supplementary cardholder to receive Skywards Gold status on an additional spend of AED 5,500 with EK plus achieving total spend threshold of AED 200,000
• 50,000 welcome skywards miles plus another 70,000 skywards miles on achieving some spend thresholds
• Annual fees of AED 4,500 which is clearly the downside to this card

ADIB Skywards World card -

• Primary cardholder receives Skywards Silver membership with a fast-track to Gold on completion of AED 5,500 EK spend and achieving total spend threshold of AED 150,000
• Opportunity for supplementary cardholder to receive Skywards Gold status on an additional spend of AED 5,500 with EK plus achieving total spend threshold of AED 300,000
• 40,000 welcome skywards miles plus another 20,000 skywards miles on achieving some spend thresholds
• Annual fees of AED 1,500 which seems to be more in line with other card offerings in the UAE

Has anyone else heard of other cards offering similar benefits either in the UAE or the UK? As far as I'm aware, this seems to be the only pathway to Skywards Gold without actually flying EK all that much or being nominated by a Plat...

Just to clarify, I'm not associated with ADIB or have any experience of dealing with them - maybe we have others on here who might be able to share positive or negative experiences with ADIB?

I wish we could get something like that in the UK :)

Fantastic option, thanks for posting. The Gold benefit for spending AED 150K/200K is annual, as you'd expect.

One also earns 2.5 miles per dollar spent on Emirates or flydubai, 1.5 for international spend, 1 for most domestic spend, and 0.25 for certain categories like fast food restaurants, compared to 2, 1.5, 1, and 0.25 on the Emirates NBD Infinite card.

Not hard to spend those figures in the UAE. I’ve just signed up for AMEX Platinum which is cheaper and gives me wider benefits (we are both gold anyway).

I have the AMEX Platinum too. I haven't done a detailed analysis of the redemption opportunities dollar-for-dollar in light of AMEX partners, but I like the Centurion lounge access in the U.S., and their travel concierge (handled, at least on the front-line customer service level, locally) has helped me a few times. The start-up fee was a hefty AED 3,000, but with various incentives to get it partially refunded.

I am close to EK Gold but am projected fall short, so will consider the ADIB card. I suppose this is not the forum, but I wonder if anyone can compare their overall banking services with Emirates NBD, which has provided good service to me at times and major headaches at times -- typical for the UAE!

A few years back I signed up for the EY ADIB top tier credit card (forget what they called it but you get the idea) & the customer service experience in; getting miles credited, bonuses posting etc etc was absolutely & utterly hideous. Never ever again will I entertain dealing with that esteemed organistion! Some friends ignored my advice - seduced by bonus sign ups......they deeply regretted doing so! Be afraid, be very afraid!

hence I went for AMEX Platinum

I used to have accounts with Barclays in the UAE. A few years ago Barclays sold their UAE operations to ADIB.

I was happy with my dealings with ADIB but later changed my accounts to Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank to take advantage of their free rounds of golf. At the time I think ADIB only had credit cards linked to Etihad which makes sense since both have their headquarters in Abu Dhabi.

Amex Centurion in Germany offers EK Gold. Not sure in other countries.

Yep, have an AMEX Platinum issued in the UAE too but it's in USD currency and there's a 2.8% fee for non-USD transactions which is pretty steep in my eyes especially when compared to an ADCB Traveler card... I see now on the AMEX website that they've launched the Platinum charge card in AED currency too which I'll be asking about soon enough! Any tips on the incentives to offset the USD 750 annual fee?

Haven't banked with ADIB yet but will definitely consider this card when and if I'm falling short of Gold... be great if they could come up with a spending threshold to hit Platinum on this card :) :)

Amex platinum UK has quite good offers . Not sure if they do the same in the UAE.

Just used a £50 off £250 spend for hilton and had a similar one for Marriott as well.

Also the hotel status (hilton,marriott etc) is quite good.

If you like a bit of luxury then booking hotels through amex fine hotels and resorts gets you special perks like breakfast room upgrade, special amenity at the hotel etc

Just used it for a holiday in spain

The main issue is the foreign transaction fee which is nearly 3% for UK cardholders.

This was offset by a £60 off £300 spend offer that i has saved to my card. ( offer was for leading hotels of the world but seems to be connected to fine hotels and resorts and they paid out)

Not sure if amex platinum charges the forex fee everywhere?

Yes I got the aed card.

to offset the fee I got a 50k sign up and 50k bonus if I spend 10k usd in 3 months which equals 50k Ek miles.

I don't fly EK often enough in Y to know how much difference there is between Gold and Silver, but in terms of the credit cards themselves, ENBD Infinite is AED 1,500 after the first year so from this point you would need to be getting AED 3,000 worth of additional value from the ADIB World Elite card vs. the ENBD card.

I was initially drawn by the prospect of a near-complimentary fast track to Gold too, but concluded that Silver + PriorityPass is sufficient for those times I am travelling within the region in Y.

Here in the UAE, we seem to get the hotel status but not the promos - it would actually be good if AMEX brought around a few interesting promos for cardholders based in the GCC... The 'Offers' section on their local website is quite poor honestly...
I have the USD card and am planning on getting it converted to the AED version - I have a few but not as many USD transactions every month and the ~3% foreign currency fee tends to pinch once you're looking at spending over 8-10k+ on the card

FHR benefits easily outweigh the annual fee.