BEST Avios credit card in the UK? Amex BA Premium Plus vs Barclaycard Avios Plus.

Amex refund rule changes: • Amex UK rule CHANGES
Let's compare 2 premium credit cards that earn Avios: BA Premium Plus from Amex and Barclaycard Avios Plus. These cards have many similarities as well as some key differences. Join me to find out more!
Timecodes:
0:00 - Intro
1:01 - Welcome bonuses
2:00 - Avios earning rate
2:50 - Barclaycard Cabin Upgrade Voucher
4:18 - Amex Companion Voucher
7:04 - Which vouchers is better?
8:05 - Miscellaneous benefits
9:29 - Annual fees
10:36 - Which card to pick?
11:13 - What if I don't fly BA?
#americanexpress #avios #barclays #britishairways #creditcards

[@roblincolne]

Thanks for the video.

[@LoyaltyLlama]

You're welcome!

[@ThalysAguiarGomes]

Thank you, assuming keeping a BA card 1.5:1£ and the free avios master Barclays one 1:1. What would be a cheaper option to get access to lounge for a family of 3 people?

[@praisethesunn6541]

The Barclaycard avios is a great product, especially for grabbing an easy welcome bonus. However its worth mentioning that in my experience the registration process and customer service with Barclaycard is terrible. American Express is still the top of that list. Barclaycard make you register for the app by using a device they send in the post that took two weeks. Staff in my local branch were not helpful. Amex takes 10 minutes to register and the customer service is stellar.

[@LoyaltyLlama]

Agree that Barclaycard is great for an easy welcome bonus, esp for those who've already gotten the Amex bonus recently. As for customer support, I know a lot of people love Amex for this but in my experience the best I can say is that they're consistently very polite. When it comes to actually resolving queries, they seem to mostly be good with trivial / common queries and struggle quite a lot with something more complex. Can't compare with Barclaycard though as I haven't interacted with their support much.

[@faizmirza4376]

You should also mention the monthly avios bonus you receive if youre a barclays premier banking customer

[@LoyaltyLlama]

That’s a good one but it’s not really a benefit of the credit card (i.e. you can have it without taking out Barclaycard Avios). I do talk about it in the video about the best ways to earn avios - kzbin.info/www/bejne/jqubp5hmgreGg6Msi=NlqYacDdmr2hfz8L

[@harleybradlley]

Do you think the free a avios Barclay card would be worth paring with the platinum card?

[@LoyaltyLlama]

I do! It's good to have a non-Amex reward card for cases when Amex is not accepted. I'm using the free Avios Barclaycard exactly for this purpose.

[@harleybradlley]

@@LoyaltyLlama great thank you! Have been thinking about it for a couple of weeks and now finally going to the platinum card, need to decide what to do with the gold card. Will most likely change over to the Barclay avíos card! :)

[@frankiepang6912]

@@LoyaltyLlama would you say the free Avios Barclaycard is easy or hard to get for someone with fair to good credit score? I applied for one months before but instead they offered me the 0.25% cashback reward card to me. It is not bad card but does not add much value as I already have the Lloyds 0.25% cashback card.

[@mlyyra]

In your opinion, in the long term, not only for the first year, which card is better value for a traveller, the Amex Gold Card or the Amex BA Premium Plus card? Which card gives you more Avios points? If I travel once a year with my partner in a long haul flight, which card do you think would be better value for the money? Thanks

[@LoyaltyLlama]

Unless you're interested in the companion voucher (which can be very valuable!) or are a super heavy BA spender, I wouldn't consider the BA card at all. Amex Gold can give you more avios: it effectively earns 1.5 points / £1 on all purchases, 2.5 points on airline purchases and 3.5 MR on Amex Travel (the extra 0.5 point everywhere comes from the "Earn as you go" rewards). However, If you spend £10k / year on the BA card and earn enough avios in a year (through the card and from elsewhere) to pay for a long haul ticket, the voucher could give you the 2nd ticket for free (but you still have to pay the cash taxes).

[@mlyyra]

@@LoyaltyLlama Exactly, that's what I'm not sure, if a long haul flight would be cheaper for me and my partner with the voucher or just with points. It would be great to have a calculator to see which card would cost me less to buy flights for us with a spend of 12k a year on credit.

[@user-en4gm7wt2e]

​​​@@LoyaltyLlama1.5 points per £1 effectively for the first £25,000 spend on the gold card. The £5000 spend bonus of 2500 stops after they've given 12500 points in a year. So if you're a higher spender, you have to take this into account.

[@softestpower]

You talk about BA and BA associated arilines. Does it mean any airline using Avios? Is Amex card equally useful on other airlines using Avios (e.g Cathay)? Can the voucher be used on other Avios airlines, assuming that it is being used to get a 50% discount on avios ticket purchase?

[@LoyaltyLlama]

Unfortunately, you can only use the voucher to book on BA, Iberia and Aer Lingus

[@fwzmhmd]

No qatar?

[@BareKnuckle666]

@@fwzmhmdQatar and Qantas included! 👍

[@fwzmhmd]

@@BareKnuckle666 How so? i’ve searched google & the companion voucher is only valid on british airways.

[@vanillacoke8981]

Do you know how tor get a metal Amex Gold in UK?

[@LoyaltyLlama]

In the UK they're currently offered in plastic only. People were hoping the metal version would come out in Oct of last year when Amex hiked the annual fee to £160 but that didn't happen, sadly.

[@gamesmaster90]

@@LoyaltyLlamathat would’ve been awsome. We get nothing cool here in the uk. They even had a rose gold one too in the US.

[@elvinimali706]

Does Barlcaycard allow you to transfer the Avios from BA to Iberia?

[@LoyaltyLlama]

You can transfer your Avios to Iberia regardless of how you earned them. Barclaycard will be linked to your BA account and your Avios will be deposited there monthly. From there you can transfer to Iberia. HFP has a good article on how to do this: www.headforpoints.com/2023/02/21/how-to-transfer-your-avios-from-british-airways-to-qatar-iberia-aer-lingus-vueling/

[@petermitchell6348]

Sounds like a hell of a lot os faffing about just to benefit.

[@andrewd128]

Which one have car rental insurance ? Amex told me they don’t offer it for my Gold one. Any chance for Barclaycard to get that ?

[@LoyaltyLlama]

Unfortunately, Barclaycard doesn't offer it either. You'd have to look at Amex Platinum for that.