American Express UK British Airways credit cards (2021 outdated)

I’ve been talking a lot recently with my friends and colleagues about credit cards and rewards points in general.  These conversations initially led to the inclusion of points earned for the various flights detailed on the blog. A lot of other travel blogs also include information about points programs and credit cards, so I thought it might make sense to include some information here.  Since I split my time between the US and the UK, I’ll cover credit cards and rewards programs in both countries.

I provide the information here just to give people a vague idea if the rewards offered by the card might make sense for them to consider the card.  All information should be confirmed with the card company before applying.

The first credit cards I’ll cover are the American Express UK British Airways co-branded cards.  There are two versions, a £0 annual fee version and a £250 annual fee version.  I use the £0 ‘British Airways American Express Card’, but the £250 ‘British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card’ may well be a better fit, depending on one’s spending habits.  Both these credit cards saw some changes earlier this year (on September 1, 2021), which may change the value proposition if you already have one of these cards, so read on. Both cards have a 2.99% non-Sterling (GBP) transaction fee, like all UK-based Amex cards.

Welcome Offer

The £0 annual fee (BA Amex) card currently has an offer to collect 5 000 bonus Avios after spending £1 000 in the first three months.  The £250 annual fee (BA Premium Plus) card offers 25 000 bonus Avios after spending £3 000 in the first three months.  American Express UK has a rule that you cannot earn a welcome bonus if you have held ANY UK AMEX card in the past 24 months.  However, the BA Premium Plus card (along with the Amex Platinum card) is one of the cards that is exempt from this rule.  The welcome bonuses are worth approximately £50 and £250, respectively, towards airplane flights.  5 000 Avios is enough for domestic or short international flight in World Traveller (economy class), and 25 000 Avios is enough for a transatlantic flight in World Traveller or 1 or 2 Club Europe (European business class) flights.

Earnings

The BA Amex card earns Avios (British Airways reward points) at a very straight forward rate of 1 Avios per £1 spent.  American Express rounds up purchases, so a purchase of £4.80 earns 5 Avios.  The BA Amex card often comes with promotions to earn bonus Avios, such as a recent ‘earn 2 000 bonus Avios after spending £2 000 in 3 months’ promotion.  I generally value BA Avios as being worth about £0.01 (1p = 1.3 ¢) each, which means this card offers approximately 1% back on spending. 

Companion Voucher

Both Amex cards offer the opportunity to receive a companion voucher after meeting a spending threshold over the course of a cardmember year.  The BA Amex card requires £12 000 of spend (£1 000/month on average) and can be used on a World Traveller redemption.  The BA Premium Plus card requires £10 000 spend (£833/month on average) and can be used on any reward redemption on BA in any class.  For both these cards, the voucher only covers the Avios, not the taxes and fees for the second person for the redemption.  The voucher in both cases is valid for 2 years.

Examples of using the card

The answer to if you will get value out of these cards depends on how often you fly British Airways and if you value reward flights.  In order to make back the annual fee on the Premium Plus card (if you don’t use the voucher), you’d need, in theory, to earn £250 = 25 000 Avios.  To get this number of Avios, you’d need to spend £50 000/year on non-BA spend or £12 500 on BA flights.  The ability to use a voucher on non-World Traveller flights, however, could easily offset this difference.  For example, an off-peak return flight to Boston on BA costs 26 000 Avios in World Traveller or 100 000 in Club World.  The BA Amex voucher would be worth 26 000 Avios, whereas the BA Premium Plus voucher would be worth 100 000 Avios in this context.  That additional 74 000 Avios would, therefore, be worth substantially more than the £250 annual fee in this scenario.  However, if you don’t fly BA enough (or spend enough on the card) to get enough Avios for a Club World flight, the ability to use the voucher in premium cabins doesn’t really do a lot for you anyway.

It also makes sense to look at the incremental benefits of buying a BA ticket with a BA credit card.  As an example, let’s use a return flight from London to Los Angeles (LHR-LAX) flown in World Traveller or World Traveller Plus (Premium Economy) in June 2022.  The return tickets cost £556 and £907, respectively. The BA Amex would earn 556 and 907 Avios, respectively, whereas the BA Premium Plus card would earn 1 668 and 2 721 Avios, respectively (triple).  British Airways (unlike many US-based programs) awards Avios based on distance flown, rather than ticket price.  The discounted economy fare earns 1 364 Avios each way (2 728 Avios total) and the discounted premium economy fare earns 5 456 Avios (10 912 Avios total) without any elite status.  The table below summarizes the Avios earned from this example:

Card	World Traveller Total Avios (% return)	World Traveller Plus Total Avios (% return)	Avios values (WT/WTP)
No rewards card	2 728 (4.9%)	10 912 (12%)	£27.28 / £109.12
BA Amex	3 284 (5.9%)	11 819 (13%)	£32.84 / £118.19
BA Premium Plus	4 396 (7.9%)	13 633 (15%)	£43.96 / £136.33

It’s pretty apparent that for long-haul flights the Avios earned from the flight itself outweighs the Avios earned from the credit card.  But for short-haul flights, it’s a bit different.  For a return flight from London to Copenhagen (LHR – CPH) in June 2022, Euro Traveller costs £165 and Club Europe costs £318 and earns 304 and 1824 Avios, respectively.  The table below summarizes the Avios earned from this example:

Card	Euro Traveller Total Avios (% return)	Club Europe Total Avios (% return)	Avios values (ET/CE)
No rewards card	304 (1.8%)	1 824 (5.7%)	£3.04 / £18.24
BA Amex	469 (2.8%)	2 142 (6.7%)	£4.69 / £21.42
BA Premium Plus	799 (4.8%)	2 778 (8.7%)	£7.99 / £27.78

The Avios earned from having a co-branded credit card are generally going to be realtively incremental, compared to those earned from flying (i.e. actually spending money directly) with BA, but in the case of the Euro Traveller flight to Copenhagen, more Avios are earned (on the BA Premium Plus card) from the ticket price than from the actual flight. This is not uncommon on very short flights on BA.

Are these credit cards right for you?

The answer to if you will get value out of these cards depends on how often you fly British Airways and if you value reward flights.  If you’re spending less than £10 000/year on your card, you won’t earn a companion voucher, and so the Premium Plus card might not be worth it just for the extra Avios.  If you don’t fly BA very often, it may be difficult to accrue enough Avios for reward flights.

Let me know if anyone wants a referral

I’ve been talking a lot recently with my friends and colleagues about credit cards and rewards points in general.  These conversations initially led to the inclusion of points earned for the various flights detailed on the blog. A lot of other travel blogs also include information about points programs and credit cards, so I thought it might make sense to include some information here.  Since I split my time between the US and the UK, I’ll cover credit cards and rewards programs in both countries.

I provide the information here just to give people a vague idea if the rewards offered by the card might make sense for them to consider the card.  All information should be confirmed with the card company before applying.

The first credit cards I’ll cover are the American Express UK British Airways co-branded cards.  There are two version, a £0 annual fee version and a £250 annual fee version.  I use the £0 ‘British Airways American Express Card’, but the £250 ‘British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card’ may well be a better fit, depending on one’s spending habits.  Both these credit cards saw some changes earlier this year (on September 1, 2021), which may change the value proposition if you already have one of these cards, so read on.

Welcome Offer

The £0 annual fee (BA Amex) card currently has an offer to collect 5 000 bonus Avios after spending £1 000 in the first three months.  The £250 annual fee (BA Premium Plus) card offers 25 000 bonus Avios after spending £3 000 in the first three months.  American Express UK has a rule that you cannot earn a welcome bonus if you have held ANY UK AMEX card in the past 24 months.  However, the BA Premium Plus card (along with the Amex Platinum card) is one of the cards that is exempt from this rule.  The welcome bonuses are worth approximately £50 and £250, respectively, towards airplane flights.  5 000 Avios is enough for domestic or short international flight in World Traveller (economy class), and 25 000 Avios is enough for a transatlantic flight in World Traveller or 1 or 2 Club Europe (European business class) flights.

Earnings

The BA Amex card earns Avios (British Airways reward points) at a very straight forward rate of 1 Avios per £1 spent.  American Express rounds up purchases, so a purchase of £4.80 earns 5 Avios.  The BA Amex card often comes with promotions to earn bonus Avios, such as a recent ‘earn 2 000 bonus Avios after spending £2 000 in 3 months’ promotion.  I generally value BA Avios as being worth about £0.01 (1p = 1.3 ¢) each, which means this card offers approximately 1% back on spending. 

Companion Voucher

Both Amex cards offer the opportunity to receive a companion voucher after meeting a spending threshold over the course of a cardmember year.  The BA Amex card requires £12 000 of spend (£1 000/month on average) and can be used on a World Traveller redemption.  The BA Premium Plus card requires £10 000 spend (£833/month on average) and can be used on any reward redemption on BA in any class.  For both these cards, the voucher only covers the Avios, not the taxes and fees for the second person for the redemption.  The voucher in both cases is valid for 2 years.

Examples of using the card

The answer to if you will get value out of these cards depends on how often you fly British Airways and if you value reward flights.  In order to make back the annual fee on the Premium Plus card (if you don’t use the voucher), you’d need, in theory, to earn £250 = 25 000 Avios.  To get this number of Avios, you’d need to spend £50 000/year on non-BA spend or £12 500 on BA flights.  The ability to use a voucher on non-World Traveller flights, however, could easily offset this difference.  For example, an off-peak return flight to Boston on BA costs 26 000 Avios in World Traveller or 100 000 in Club World.  The BA Amex voucher would be worth 26 000 Avios, whereas the BA Premium Plus voucher would be worth 100 000 Avios in this context.  That additional 74 000 Avios would, therefore, be worth substantially more than the £250 annual fee in this scenario.  However, if you don’t fly BA enough (or spend enough on the card) to get enough Avios for a Club World flight, the ability to use the voucher in premium cabins doesn’t really do a lot for you anyway.

It also makes sense to look at the incremental benefits of buying a BA ticket with a BA credit card.  As an example, let’s use a return flight from London to Los Angeles (LHR-LAX) flown in World Traveller or World Traveller Plus (Premium Economy) in June 2022.  The return tickets cost £556 and £907, respectively. The BA Amex would earn 556 and 907 Avios, respectively, whereas the BA Premium Plus card would earn 1 668 and 2 721 Avios, respectively (triple).  British Airways (unlike many US-based programs) awards Avios based on distance flown, rather than ticket price.  The discounted economy fare earns 1 364 Avios each way (2 728 Avios total) and the discounted premium economy fare earns 5 456 Avios (10 912 Avios total) without any elite status.  The table below summarizes the Avios earned from this example:

Card	World Traveller Total Avios (% return)	World Traveller Plus Total Avios (% return)	Avios values (WT/WTP)
No rewards card	2 728 (4.9%)	10 912 (12%)	£27.28 / £109.12
BA Amex	3 284 (5.9%)	11 819 (13%)	£32.84 / £118.19
BA Premium Plus	4 396 (7.9%)	13 633 (15%)	£43.96 / £136.33

It’s pretty apparent that for long-haul flights the Avios earned from the flight itself outweighs the Avios earned from the credit card.  But for short-haul flights, it’s a bit different.  For a return flight from London to Copenhagen (LHR – CPH) in June 2022, Euro Traveller costs £165 and Club Europe costs £318 and earns 304 and 1824 Avios, respectively.  The table below summarizes the Avios earned from this example:

Card	Euro Traveller Total Avios (% return)	Club Europe Total Avios (% return)	Avios values (ET/CE)
No rewards card	304 (1.8%)	1 824 (5.7%)	£3.04 / £18.24
BA Amex	469 (2.8%)	2 142 (6.7%)	£4.69 / £21.42
BA Premium Plus	799 (4.8%)	2 778 (8.7%)	£7.99 / £27.78

The Avios earned from having a co-branded credit card are generally going to be realtively incremental, compared to those earned from flying (i.e. actually spending money directly) with BA, but in the case of the Euro Traveller flight to Copenhagen, more Avios are earned (on the BA Premium Plus card) from the ticket price than from the actual flight. This is not uncommon on very short flights on BA.

Are these credit cards right for you?

The answer to if you will get value out of these cards depends on how often you fly British Airways and if you value reward flights.  If you’re spending less than £10 000/year on your card, you won’t earn a companion voucher, and so the Premium Plus card might not be worth it just for the extra Avios.  If you don’t fly BA very often, it may be difficult to accrue enough Avios for reward flights.

Let me know if anyone wants a referral link (UK-based applicants only)