Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Why the British Airways Premium Plus Amex is the best card for long-term spending

Links on Head for Points may support the site by paying a commission.  See here for all partner links.

With the sign-up bonus on the British Airways American Express Premium Plus (BAPP) card increased to 25,000 Avios until February, I thought it was worth taking another look at why I rate this card for long term spending.   I have a BAPP and my wife has her own too.

This is especially important given the recent fee hike to £195 per year which may have made you reconsider the value you get from the card.

BA Premium Plus American Express card BAPP

British Airways American Express Premium Plus card

The representative APR is 139.2% variable, including the annual fee.  The representative APR on purchases is 30.7% variable.

British Airways American Express card

The representative APR is 30.7% variable.

A lot of the credit card posts on Head for Points are focussed on sign-up bonuses.  Get a card, spend the minimum required to trigger the bonus, cancel the card, move on.

That works fine for some people.  However, if you are a high to medium spender then the few thousand pounds of card spend required each year to hit your sign-up bonus targets will not be a stretch.  You need to consider where to put the rest of your annual spend.

Many credit card issuers offer incentives for spending £10,000+ per year on their cards.  The value of these perks is often underestimated – they are often worth far more than the points for your normal spend and can be more valuable than the sign-up bonus, especially as you can earn them year after year.

Here are the key cards which offer annual benefits for spending a large sum:

  • British Airways American Express Premium Plus – 2-4-1 voucher on Avios redemptions for spending £10,000
  • British Airways American Express – 2-4-1 voucher on Avios redemptions for spending £20,000
  • American Express Preferred Rewards Gold – 10,000 Membership Rewards points for spending £15,000
  • Lloyds Avios Rewards American Express & Visa – upgrade voucher for spending £7,000
  • Virgin Atlantic Black American Express & Visa – upgrade vouchers at £5,000 and £10,000
  • IHG Rewards Club Premium MasterCard – free night voucher for spending £10,000
  • Hilton HHonors Platinum Visa – Hilton HHonors Gold status for spending £10,000
  • Starwood Preferred Guest American Express – free night voucher for spending £25,000

By a substantial margin, the most valuable of these is the 2-4-1 voucher offered on the British Airways American Express Premium Plus.

A potential 10% return on your spending

When you spend £10,000 on the BAPP card, you get a voucher which gives you two Avios redemptions (on BA planes, ex-UK only) for the miles of one.  You still need to pay the full taxes and charges on both tickets, however.

On an average redemption (two Club World tickets to San Francisco on a peak day, say), this saves you 150,000 Avios points.  On a First Class flight or a longer Club World trip, the saving could easily exceed 200,000 Avios.

I have a very conservative valuation of Avios points of 0.75p.  Most readers value them more highly.  However, even at 0.75p, the 2-4-1 voucher is ‘worth’ £1,100 if it saves you 150,000 Avios points on a trip.

£1,100 of value for spending £10,000 on the card is an excellent return.  Even when you factor in the £195 annual fee, you are still getting a £900 net return on your £10,000 of spending.

Why I prefer the Premium Plus card to the free British Airways American Express

As I wrote in this article, I am NOT a fan of the free British Airways American Express card if you plan to earn the 2-4-1 voucher.

This is the despite the fact that you would save £195 in annual fee by taking out the free BA card instead of the Premium Plus.

Why is this?

The 2-4-1 voucher on the BAPP card lasts for two years, whilst the voucher on the free card only lasts for one year.  This is very important since, on busy routes, you may need to book 11 months ahead to guarantee the seats you want.

You earn an extra 0.5 Avios per £1 spent, which outweighs some of the £195 fee

You only need to spend £10,000 and not £20,000 to trigger the voucher.  Even if you can easily do £20,000 of American Express spending per year, it would make more sense to get a 2nd Premium Plus card for your partner and put £10,000 through that as well – so you generate 2 x 241 vouchers each year, each valid for two years – rather than put £20,000 through the free card.

My full review of the British Airways American Express Premium Plus can be found here.

The official Amex website and application form is here


best travel rewards credit cards

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – November 2024 update

If you are looking to apply for a new credit card, here are our top recommendations based on the current sign-up bonuses.

In February 2022, Barclaycard launched two exciting new Barclaycard Avios Mastercard cards with a bonus of up to 25,000 Avios. You can apply here.

You qualify for the bonus on these cards even if you have a British Airways American Express card:

Barclaycard Avios Plus card

Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercard

Get 25,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £10,000 Read our full review

Barclaycard Avios card

Barclaycard Avios Mastercard

Get 5,000 Avios for signing up and an upgrade voucher at £20,000 Read our full review

You can see our full directory of all UK cards which earn airline or hotel points here. Here are the best of the other deals currently available.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 30,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

30,000 Avios and the famous annual 2-4-1 voucher Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

Huge 80,000 bonus points and great travel benefits – for a large fee Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

30,000 bonus points (TO 18 NOVEMBER) and 1.5 points for every £1 you spend Read our full review

Earning miles and points from small business cards

If you are a sole trader or run a small company, you may also want to check out these offers:

American Express Business Platinum

50,000 points when you sign-up and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and FREE for a year Read our full review

Capital on Tap Pro Visa

30,000 points (TO 9TH DECEMBER) plus good benefits Read our full review

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

20,000 points (ONLY TO 9TH DECEMBER) Read our full review

British Airways American Express Accelerating Business

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

For a non-American Express option, we also recommend the Barclaycard Select Cashback card for sole traders and small businesses. It is FREE and you receive 1% cashback when you spend at least £2,000 per month.

Barclaycard Select Cashback Business Credit Card

Get 1% cashback when you spend at least £2,000 per month* Read our full review

Comments (171)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Dave Taylor says:

    Sadly not a great card if you fly solo, I end up gifting a flight to friends for the price of the tax so i personally get no value out of it at all other than the love of my friends but for a £195 its not as good as the upgrade voucher from llyods

    • Alan says:

      The Lloyds card is definitely a good deal for the solo traveller – £24 for easily 45k+ of Avios value stacks up well against the BA cards – even for a couple getting two Lloyds cards might be a better deal if you are planning on spending it on a shorter trip, given the lower fee and target spend.

  • Martin says:

    I’m a fan of BAPP – 241 vouchers great. At the moment good bonus of 10k Avios if you spend £10,000 between Sept and Nov, plus 35% bonus on purchased Avios (if you buy 10k) this makes Avios acquisition fairly easy, especially as you earn Avios if you purchase them with your BAPP!

  • Ian says:

    Does anyone know if you can do an open-jaw return using a companion voucher?
    My partner and I want to fly to Lima and return from Rio next year…

    • Kinkell says:

      I’ve just booked and open jaw .. Fly to Phoenix and return from San Francisco using 241. Check availability , then phone up . CS will book the outward leg. Then check and as soon as return date is released, phone them again. They will tie it all up . CS will deduct the avios from your account(s) and the taxes, although it was several months before the ticketing was completed and the final slug of taxes paid…but I believe this is normal. Our trip is next April
      You might even get a LATAM flight from Lima to Rio which is a BA partner and use avios.
      We did from Santiago to Rio . Cost on GBP extortionate, but only 20k in Y for the 2 of us
      Enjoy the trip.

      • Scallder says:

        The outbound can be booked online, so if booking that at t-355 you can do online and not have to worry about CS and then just call them when the return date opens up

    • KimJoi says:

      Yes you can … because the distance between” Lima to Rio” (A) is shorter than both “London to Lima” (B) or “Rio to London” (C). In theory … the distance of (A) has to be shorter than (B) or (C).

      But you need to call BA to make the bookings.

  • Paul Irving says:

    Apart from the route – i don’t think it’s any better than Virgin.
    Spend £100,000 on Virgin and get 200,000 points – enough for 2x UC flights to most places VS the Same spend for BA and get 150,000 points, enough for 2x CW flights to most places.
    Plus with Virgin you get a visa to spend at £1 = 1 point.
    I prefer UC over CW by a mile, but BA has a huge route network compared to virgin.

  • Aliks says:

    We just got back from a 2 for 1 reward trip to the west coast. Out to Vancouver, back from Seattle.

    I booked well in advance but didnt have a problem with J availability.

    Just saying. . .

  • JP says:

    You can do an open jaw ( as long as the jaw is not longer than either of the flights)

  • Cate says:

    The 2-4-1 voucher is a nice extra but the ongoing 1.5 avios per pound spent is the real bonus for us. The voucher has a 2 years life span; something’s bound to turn up for us to trade it in against.

    On saying that if AMEX suspend our cards again without notice for a financial review then it’ll be dropped immediately and it’s HSBC prem all the way.

  • Nick says:

    I have had good use from my BAPP. It has been, everwhelmingly, the main factor in shifting me from economy to the front of the plane.

    However, this will probably be my last companion voucher. Not because of the increase in the cost of the card, but because BA really have taken the fun out of it all recently and cash fares on more exciting airlines are becoming affordable.

    Availability has always been, and continues to be, an issue too.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

The UK's biggest frequent flyer website uses cookies, which you can block via your browser settings. Continuing implies your consent to this policy. Our privacy policy is here.