BA Amex UK Blue and Premium Plus cards Review

Having an American Express credit card in your wallet for purchases is one of the best ways to earn points towards flights. In this article, we will take a look at the co-branded Amex UK and British Airways credit cards. In the UK, three different cards exist : a business card (upcoming review) and two personal cards. Here, we will compare the British Airways-American Express credit card (free), with the BA Amex UK Premium Plus card (£195 annual fee). So is the Premium Plus Card with an annual fee of £195 worth it over the free card? Let's take a look.

British Airways 747 by @josephtakingpics on Instagram

Who are these geared towards?

 - The free BA Amex card is quite a basic card. This one is suitable for people starting out in the points game and who don't want to pay an annual fee on their first Amex card.

 - On the other hand, the Premium Plus card with a £195 annual fee, is a better choice for someone who is serious about collecting points.
With these two cards, you will earn Avios, NOT Amex reward points. This means that you will only be able to redeem award flights on Oneworld airlines (such as BA, Cathay Pacific, American Airlines, Qantas...), and on a few partner airlines. To be eligible for one of these cards, you must be a permanent UK resident with a current UK bank or building society account, with no history of bad debt.

British Airways A320 by @anto.spotting on Instagram

Welcome bonus

When I look at a credit card, the first thing I check is the welcome bonus. If the welcome bonus is attractive and the annual fee not too high, I will definitely read the rest of the card's benefits. Of course you shouldn't judge a card by its welcome bonus (just like you shouldn't judge a book by its cover), but it always gives a little bit of excitement when you see a big number as the welcome bonus.

 - The free card offers quite a low amount of Avios as a welcome bonus: 5,000 Avios. Moreover, you need to spend £1,000 within your first 3 months of card membership to unlock this bonus.

 - The Premium Plus card has a more generous welcome bonus: 25,000 Avios if you spend £3,000 on the card within the first three months.

At Aviation - Travel World, we value Avios at 1.2p/Avios. The welcome bonus of the free card is worth (according to us) £60 (1.2 x 5,000), whereas the welcome bonus of the Premium Plus card is worth £300. Our valuations are based on the average value you would get out of each Avios for the average reward redemption.

British Airways 787 by @josephtakingpics on Instagram

Earning rate

Another important aspect of a credit card is the earning rate (how many points you will earn per £1 spent).

 - The free card offers a reasonable (considering it's free) earning rate of 1 Avios per £1 spent on the card. Contrary to the Premium Plus card, the basic card does not offer double Avios on purchases made with British Airways or British Airways holidays.

 - You will earn 1.5 Avios for every £1 spent with the Premium Plus card or 3 Avios for every £1 spent with the card on BA's website. If you are planning on flying with British Airways quite a lot, 3 Avios for every £1 spent certainly makes a difference.

 

G-EUOH landing at Geneva. Picture by @flyswiss001 on Instagram

Perks

The most valuable perk that comes with both cards is the 2-for-1 companion voucher. You can earn one companion voucher every card membership year. You need to spend £20,000 in that membership year to acquire a companion voucher with the blue card (free card), or £10,000 with the Premium Plus card. With a companion voucher, you can take one person along with you on a British Airways award ticket (one-way or return or open-jaw), no matter the booking class (as long as there's availability). Unfortunately, you still need to pay taxes for the "companion". {A full review of the companion voucher and the best ways to use it will be published soon.} To put in perspective how valuable the voucher is, here is an example with a return trip to Santiago, Chile (BA's longest direct flight). The furthest place you can travel to with BA is Sydney (with a stop in Singapore along the way). With availability being extremely rare, I prefer to illustrate the value of the voucher with a route with a little more availability in first class.

*[I chose Santiago as the destination to illustrate the companion voucher, also because the Avios required to fly there is quite high, thus the Avios saved is quite a large amount. We wouldn't suggest using all of your Avios and paying so much on taxes to fly first class to Santiago. There are much better redemptions that exist, to achieve better value per Avios spent, and spending less on taxes. All will be explained in an upcoming article.]*

For a return first class trip to Santiago leaving London on 09/07 and returning on 15/07 (peak dates), the total cost of the trip would be 560,000 Avios + £1,200 in taxes, fees and carrier charges.

Award flights to Santiago for 2 people in first class

Using a companion voucher would reduce the amount of Avios required from 560,000 Avios to 280,000 Avios! This brings the total cost of the trip to only 280,000 Avios + £1,200. Those 280,000 saved Avios are worth according to our valuations £3,360. So you are effectively saving £3,360 worth of Avios. 

You can't really put a price tag on a companion voucher for two reasons:

        - You can't purchase a companion voucher; it can only be earned with a BA-Amex credit card.

Premimu Plus card on the left; free card on the right

        - The value of your companion voucher is based on the redemption you make with it. Your companion voucher could save you over 100,000 Avios if used on certain  routes. (According to our valuations, 100,000 Avios are worth £1,200). If you use your companion voucher on a short hop one-way from London to Paris off-peak, the value of the companion voucher drops to only £48.

British Airways A319 landing at Geneva Airport; taken by @flyswiss001 on instagram

Additional benefits

 The free card comes with Travel Accident Insurance: click here for details. On the other hand, the Premium Plus card also offers Travel Inconvenience Insurance: click here for more details.

Both cards also include the following benefits:

Both cards provide these benefits

*Refund protection for the free card is up to £200 and not £300

Bottom Line

After looking through all of the details of each card, we can clearly see that the Premium Plus card with all of the card's amazing perks, is a much better option than the free card despite the Premium Plus card's £195 annual fee. The 25,000 Avios sign up bonus is worth more than the annual fee (£300>£195). Furthermore, the companion voucher, the most valuable travel perk in the UK, can save you an incredible amount of Avios. In addition, if you only apply for the free card, you will need to spend a whopping £20,000 a year to earn the companion voucher, whereas with the Premium Plus Card, you only need to spend £10,000. If you really can't afford the Premium Plus card, it is worth signing up to the free card but bear in mind, if you later wish to get the Premium Plus card, you won't be eligible for the 25,000 Avios welcome bonus as you would have already owned an American Express credit card during the previous 24 months.

Disclaimer: None of us at Aviation - Travel World are finance or banking professionals. Therefore we would suggest consulting a professional before making an important decision if unsure.

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