The Lloyds Avios Rewards credit cards bite the dust …. what now?

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• James H says:

  2 Mar2 March 04:57

  I thought the smart money was on the BA/Amex partnership continuing but with a chunky annual fee that could include Bronze/300 tier points?

  Do you now see a Visa/Mastercard product as more likely?

  • Gavin T says:

    2 Mar2 March 08:16

    I think that was Rob saying what he would do, as opposed to what he thinks is likely.

• Elena Nikolova says:

  2 Mar2 March 05:24

  I am very sad to see this go. I got the card about 6 months ago just because of the 0 exchange fees, which is very handy when living abroad.

  Sadly for me, the Amex card never worked it always came up with a fraud cancellation only Mastercard worked. I hope they keep the card live until they issue something else with 0% fees, very handy personally for me.

  • John says:

    2 Mar2 March 07:29

    If you live abroad you shouldn’t have been able to get the card…

    Have a look at Tandem for 0% forex fees

    • Callum says:

      2 Mar2 March 08:58

      It’s very easy to just give a UK address if you have a UK history…

• Kevino says:

  2 Mar2 March 06:14

  The EU cap will not. have to be applicable post Brexit, so who knows what happens next year?

  • Jonathan says:

    2 Mar2 March 06:48

    Considering it was the UK Government who initiated the action which ended up with the 0.3% limit being imposed then I’d say it’s pretty unlikely the situation will change post Brexit (when/if it ever happens!)

  • mark2 says:

    2 Mar2 March 06:50

    It looks like it will be ‘Pretend Brexit’ so no benefits.

• Kim says:

  2 Mar2 March 06:48

  For someone who was considering getting the card for mainly its 0% forex fees, do you expect that this benefit would be maintained even if it is changed into a non-Amex card?

  • roberto says:

    2 Mar2 March 07:08

    To be honest without amex option AND the 0% FX the card is dead in the water so my gut says yes it will be retained moving forwards. What guise that will be if at all is all pie in the sky of course.

  • John says:

    2 Mar2 March 07:34

    There are plenty of 0% forex fee Visa/Mastercards (Barclays, Santander, Halifax, Metro Bank, Revolut, Monzo, Tandem).

    The Lloyds card does have a forex fee – a fixed £24 per year, which is offset by Avios earning.

    Though when we say no, fee it means no fees from the bank – all Visa cards have approximately 1% forex fee over Mastercard due to the way Visa works.

    • guesswho2000 says:

      2 Mar2 March 07:50

      The £24 fee is irrelevant, as you pay it whether you use it at home or abroad, and the Lloyds card has other benefits, not just no forex fees.

      Would I pay an annual fee on the Creation ED or Nationwide Select cards? No. But Lloyds I’ve been hanging on to in spite of the fee.

      • mark2 says:

        2 Mar2 March 08:24

        And if you are lucky and get a card which does not work very well you can get hundreds of pounds in compensation.

      • John says:

        2 Mar2 March 15:29

        Assuming 1p per Avios, if I planned to spend less than £960 on the card within the first six months (due to 2.5 avios per £) or less than £1920 per year, then I would be better off with the Halifax Clarity, whether or not this spending was in the UK or overseas.

        So the £24 fee is very relevant especially if you got the card because of the 0% forex fee.

        If you’re going to achieve the voucher then the fee doesn’t matter so much.

    • Intentionally Blank says:

      2 Mar2 March 09:00

      Worth noting that the Santander card has 0% charges on cash withdrawals from santander branches in NE US (Boston, NY, etc), of which there are plenty of branches. Very, very handy 🙂

      There’s also the occasional Hilton / Singapore airlines flashback deals when using the card also.

      Apart from that, no other benefits other than a decently long 0% for purchases when first taking the card out.

    • Lady London says:

      2 Mar2 March 13:24

      Metro Bank is only free for transactions in Europe not, for example, the US. My business account got badly stung by them. A US client paid in Euros into the account. Metro Bank said even though they received Euros into the account then as the payment came from the US this did not count as fee free.

      Thanks for the list of others that aren’t charging the FX fee ripoff I might look into one or two of them.

      • John says:

        2 Mar2 March 15:21

        Yes Metro Bank’s debit card is only forex fee-free in Europe, but not sure what that has to do with receiving wire transfers.

        A payment in euros within the SEPA would usually be a SEPA transfer which should incur no more fees than a domestic transfer, but this is not the case for a wire transfer from the US, which may go through several correspondent banks each imposing its own charge (which your client should really have instructed their US bank to pay)

      • Lady London says:

        2 Mar2 March 19:25

        The client did instruct their US bank to pay the net amount due to me and all charges to be borne by my client so that I received the net amount. This did not happen and in addition even though the Euros (net of US charges so less than should have been paid) did reach my bank account as Euros to add insult to Injury Metro Bank, whose publicity and terms had all said “Euro transactions are free” told me as it came from the US it was not free free and they helped themselves to a chunk as well.

        Frankly I was glad when that piece of work was finsihed as I was losing money on every payment ! 🙂 sorry for the OT

  • Rob says:

    2 Mar2 March 08:53

    No. It has been made quite clear to me in recent weeks by various people that FX fees are the ONLY way of making money on travel rewards cards now, given we all clear our balances.

    • RIccatti says:

      2 Mar2 March 09:19

      But then equation balances: what you gain in points = what you spend on FX.

      This only works if claiming expenses in GBP elsewhere.

• Keith says:

  2 Mar2 March 07:06

  As a solo traveller who’s taken advantage of the free upgrade voucher three times now, I’m sensing my time is up. If this card does get withdrawn, I hope that an alternative with the upgrade voucher transpires otherwise it’s effectively turning off all us solo travellers

  • Alan says:

    2 Mar2 March 09:34

    Agreed – about to start collecting towards my 4th upgrade voucher. Got £50 from Lloyds for not being notified for a couple of months about my last one being issued and the ongoing lack of spend tracker.

  • bill says:

    2 Mar2 March 09:41

    In order for the upgrade voucher to survive then I assume the Avios earning element would also need to be retained. How else would they expect you to earn points to pay for the flight?

• JamesB says:

  2 Mar2 March 07:08

  “In the medium term, it would be logical to see British Airways drop American Express and launch a Mastercard / Visa product.”

  Didn’t you argue before that BA amex cards would likely remain viable because of existing/new fees? Still, nothing amex can do if BA decides to jump ship. Regardless of whether they stay with amex or move, given these Lloyds changes, it would be smart if any BAPP(ish) card were to offer holders the option of a either a 241 or a Lloyds style upgrade voucher (for a lower spend) to keep the solo traveller market onboard.

  • pauldb says:

    2 Mar2 March 08:19

    The Amex might be viable but with greater acceptance a Visa/MC would be more profitable.

• Ian says:

  2 Mar2 March 07:15

  Sad to see it go. I’ve achieved massive avios savings with the upgrade voucher, using it on CW flights to Santiago and Singapore. The upgrade voucher isn’t just useful to solo travellers either. My sister and brother in law have used their’s to upgrade their 2 outbound flights for holidays.

• Anna says:

  2 Mar2 March 07:21

  If it moves to one avios platform I hope the IT is better than avios.com! Half the time I try to look for availability I get an error message.

  It’ll be sad to see the Lloyds card go and non-Amex spending may be very dull if it does. Due to Lloyds infamous mess-ups with posting points, though, I’ve had £350 compo, 12,000 extra avios and no less than 3 upgrade vouchers in my first year so it’s been pretty good ????

  • John says:

    2 Mar2 March 07:35

    🙁 everything has gone perfectly between Lloyds and me so not a penny of compo.

  • Leanne says:

    2 Mar2 March 09:28

    I’m hoping for similar. Currently have points not posting to Avios and have triggered the upgrade voucher (also not linking to Avios) although no need for it just yet as I’ve used all of my Avios on a CW+F BA companion return to New York at Christmas.

    Some extra comp Avios + a slightly delayed upgrade voucher would be great for me, as long as these stay in tact for at least a few months!

  • Lady London says:

    2 Mar2 March 13:26

    Metro Bank is only free for transactions in Europe not, for example, the US. My business account got badly stung by them. A US client paid in Euros into the account. Metro Bank said even though they received Euros into the account then as the payment came from the US this did not count as fee free.

    Thanks for the list of others that aren’t charging the FX fee ripoff I might look into one or two of them.

  • Lady London says:

    2 Mar2 March 13:28

    No wonder they are canning the card then 🙂

  • AndyR says:

    2 Mar2 March 15:15

    How did you get the £350 comp Anna? Are you past the 26 weeks period? I’ve only had £100 so far, wondering what I am doing wrong? 🙂

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