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I lose out with MBNA’s replacement for Diamond Club

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Letters started to land on doormats yesterday from MBNA explaining what rewards scheme would apply to ex-bmi Diamond Club credit cards now that the Avios scheme has closed.

Interestingly, MBNA has decided to make different offers to different people.  It isn’t yet clear if they are doing this based on the card type you used to hold OR the amount of money MBNA made from you in the past.  It seems to be the latter.

There are at least three different variants:

Some people are told they will get no rewards

Some people who held the Mastercard are being offered an eye-wateringly good 0.75% cashback on all future spend (details here) on what will now be a free card

Some people who held the Amex and Visa combination are being offered 1% back on the American Express and 0.5% back on the Visa (details here) on what will now be a free card

What did I get?

Nothing.

My Diamond Club will be converted to an MBNA credit card.  This card will carry no rewards or cashback at all.

What is interesting about this decision is my ‘history’ with Diamond Club.  I am responsible for probably the biggest single transaction ever made on a bmi Diamond Club credit card.

Despite this, I have paid a grand total of £0 interest on the cards over the last decade.

So, why have I been given a card with no rewards?  Have I historically spent too much?  Have I paid too little interest?  I imagine I will never know.

For the rest of you – or at least those of you who did not also receive the ‘no rewards’ card – there is a substantial arbitrage available here if you are self-employed or have any other reason to pay tax to HMRC.

Let’s take VAT payments for sole traders.  The credit card fee is 0.38%.  Because it is a business expense, the net fee for most people is nearer to 0.25%.  Giving you 0.75% cashback represents a decent profit.

Even on your personal tax payments, where you cannot write off the card fee as a business expense, you will make a margin of 0.37% which is worth having.

Anyone who receives the 0.75% cashback Mastercard deal should consider themselves lucky and should be thinking carefully about why they may want to use a rewards Visa or Mastercard instead.

I am not yet sure what I should do.  I am tempted by the Lufthansa Miles & More card, purely as a way of getting Lufthansa First Class redemptions.  I may not qualify for the sign-up bonus as I have had the card before, but I would get a 33% bonus on my spending for 6 months.  That would make 1 mile per £1 on their Visa card.

I also qualify for the HSBC Premier World Elite Mastercard as I have the current account – I used to work for HSBC once and lifetime Premier came as a perk – which pays 1 Avios per £1.  There is a £195 fee but the sign-up bonus offsets this in Year 1.


best travel rewards credit cards

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – December 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

18,000 bonus points 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

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) plus good benefits Read our full review

Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa

10,500 points (=10,500 Avios) and NO FX fees 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 (119)

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

  • Steve says:

    No rewards for me either. They clearly don’t value me as a customer.

  • mark2 says:

    I am not surprised that they did not value me as a customer since I took loads of Avios from them and never paid a penny in interest as I paid the whole balance monthly by direct debit (as with all my cards).
    Really we should be grateful that they paid us 2/1 per £ for so long.

  • Andrew says:

    No rewards for me I spent just over £1m on the card for each of the last 2 yrs and very little in interest.

  • Martin says:

    No rewards for me either, just the basic card.

  • Geoggy says:

    HSBC drive me insane. As good as that Premier MasterCard sounds I’m not sure I have the will to get one. I’ve got a Premier account, I’ve got the Premier MasterCard so I went in branch to upgrade and add my wife as an additional card holder.

    Ohhhh you need an hour appointment for that Sir, how’s 2 weeks on Wednesday at 2.45?

    Is there no other way of getting one? Yes just call the number on the back of your card.

    Did that, ohhhh we have to send you a form for that Sir. A week later, no form, call back , ohhhhh sorry sir we will send another.

    Form arrived – rubbish form, blurb mentioned additional card holder but nowhere on form for you to add them. Call them up, ohhhhh sir you need another form for that once you’ve been successful.

    At this point I asked them if it was 1981 and told them to stick their card.

    Add a recent failed mortgage application because of their incompetence and insistence on 2 hour telephone calls most of which is them reading from a script and I think I need a new bank.

    • Yuff says:

      You can complete it all online.
      I would get your card first then add your wife. It was instant when we upgraded both our HSBC cards and the cards arrived within 10 days.
      Search previous articles, when the card came out, I’m sure the way to do it was in the comments after the article 😉

    • John says:

      You really should have more than one bank.

      Premier is good to have if you have accounts in many countries, but you certainly shouldn’t keep any more than the minimum balance required with HSBC.

      The only other thing which HSBC really beats other banks in all countries is handling cash (no other UK bank takes sixpences and old Gibraltar banknotes without asking any questions – but how often do you need to deposit these?)

    • Yuff says:

      HSBC love form filling, dotting the I’s and crossing the t’s, however if it falls outside of their parameters, of business, it really is “computer says no” moment.
      I have banked, business and personally, with them for 25 years. After they contacted me regarding a buy to let mortgage, I went to an appointment- they know what I do, however because all my income is generated from property they will not give me a mortgage, for anything. The mortgage was more of a personal loan secured against an asset 4 times the value of the mortgage and an 8 year term, however they considered that too high risk….. 🙂
      However once you have their products they are generally very good.
      The elite card is definitely worth having with the bonuses etc

    • Kevin says:

      It took me a couple of months for me to get the elite card. HSBC sent me the wrong forms then the wrong card (the old one). It seemed especially hard to apply for the card for my wife. Then when I complained, they started a lengthy complaint process during which time I couldn’t be sent the cards.

      Now I actually have it, I like it.

      • Genghis says:

        Poor show making it difficult for ordinary folk but they’ll happily facilitate money laundering…

    • Zander says:

      HSBC has been going down hill for quite some time, the main benefit that I found useful was the account opening in Dubai but Premier service is useless UK side (I recently settled a claim against them for being missold) and I’m seriously considering my options with Citi being #1 choice.

    • the_real_a says:

      I never really believed the banking nightmares people spoke until i tried to open an HSBC account. The process is in the 1970`s with every transactions forcing you to go “into branch”. The branch staff are clueless, the call center is based in India who are very polite but utterly useless and cannot move from their script.

      It has taken me 5 months to open a current account and USD currency account.

      The complaint or escalation team attitude is shocking. Not even a word of apology, i should be grateful that i got my accounts open.

    • Callum says:

      All banks read from long tedious scripts now. You can blame the people who claim they were “missold” products so should get free money from the bank for that. Because of them it now needs to be documented that we’ve been told and agree with every mind-numbingly tedious aspect of the account.

  • Mike says:

    I’m going with the MBNA AA visa card to simply keep my small number of AA miles live and ticking along.
    BMI cards have now been shredded, as will the rubbish replacements I got offered (basic card)

  • Stuart says:

    Another fellow “no rewards visa card” offered here. Never paid interest or a fee for the BMI card.

    Back to BA Amex and AA visa/amex for me.

  • Our_Kid says:

    Well I called in – really good Customer Agent on the line but yes it’s a basic card or reapply for something new. I like the look of that MasterCard but they’re not making any money out of me which is a shame for them!

    If you call they will ask for the letter reference in the top right of your letter. That seems to be the code determining what you will be moved onto.

    Hope this helps!

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