Upgrade from BA Blue Amex

[namster]

Hi
I currently have the blue amex and have already spent over 3k this year. I spoke to amex who offered me no upgrade to the BA premium card. What are my best options now to upgrade card which will give me sign-up avios pts and lowest annual fee

thank you

[Guernsey Globetrotter]

Hi

You can upgrade using this link: https://www.americanexpress.com/uk/benefits/upgrade/ba-premium-plus-credit-card/

You won’t get any kind of welcome bonus offer but your current spend on the free BA card will carry over and count toward the £10k target for the Premium BA card’s superior companion voucher.

If you are not keen on the annual fee then the tactic is to only upgrade just BEFORE you hit the £10k spend to trigger the voucher. You can then decide whether to keep the Premium card and pay the annual fee or downgrade / cancel and get a pro-rata refund on the £250 fee.

If you do go for the downgrade / cancel route, the recent experience is that the Amex agents will tell you that you’ll lose the voucher. However, this does not seem to be current practise and once it is in your BA Exec Club account it will stay there. You do need to pay for any flight where you use the voucher with an Amex card but at present there seems BA does not or cannot monitor whether you are using the card that earned the voucher or not (indeed several on here have reported successfully using cards of friends and family to complete such bookings!).

No guarantees that this practise won’t change in future but that’s the game we are playing… Good luck 😁

[namster]

thank you was there a offer to get a gold or platinum card for existing basic card members and also get the sign up bonus or does that not exist ?

[namster]

I just spoke to amex I am eligible for all sign up avios bonus on all cards avaliable to me. Which cards would you recommend if I plan to spend 3000 over next 3 months ?

thank you

• This reply was modified 55 years, 4 months ago by .

[aq.1988]

Hi,

Are you sure you’re eligible for a SUB?

The Amex terms are quite clear that you aren’t entitled to SUB on any of the rewards cards if you have held any personal Amex card in the last 2 years, and you aren’t entitled to the SUB on the BAPP if you have held a personal BA card in the last 2 years.

As you currently hold the free BA card, I would think you are not entitled unfortunately.

Having said that, if you were entitled, and are going to spend £3k in 3 months, I would recommend the Gold card, as its free for the first year and you can get a good SUB.

I currently have an enhanced referral that can get you 34k points for spending £3k in 3 months. Without referral it’s only 20k points now, and the normal referral offer is only 22k.

If you would like the link, please email me at mercedes_carplay@outlook.com and I’ll send it to you.

If you do go ahead, make sure to screenshot the offer page that shows the enhanced offer, and the confirmation from the Amex chat that said you are entitled to the bonus. If you didn’t use the chat and spoke to them, I would double check in chat and then screenshot it so you have it in writing from them that you are eligible for the bonus.

[aq.1988]

You may actually be eligible for a SUB on the platinum card, I checked the language on the offer page and it says you can’t get the bonus if you have held a membership rewards card in the last 24 months, but as you have the BA avios card, it should be ok. But that requires £4k spend and has a £575 annual fee.

[SteveJ]

namster wrote:

I just spoke to amex I am eligible for all sign up avios bonus on all cards avaliable to me. Which cards would you recommend if I plan to spend 3000 over next 3 months ?

thank you

I have no idea what the bolded section means.

If you hold the free BA card right now then the only way you get any SUB is on the Platinum Charge card, but that is ONLY if you haven’t held any membership rewards earning card in the last 24 months.