Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Got Amex Gold? You will receive a Priority Pass airport lounge card very soon

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

As we suggested was likely last year, American Express has announced some good news for Preferred Rewards Gold credit and charge card holders.

Effectively immediately, your Lounge Club airport lounge access card is being replaced by a Priority Pass.

If you have an Amex Gold card, you will receive your Priority Pass within the next three weeks.

Got Amex Gold? You will receive a Priority Pass airport lounge card

The terms are unchanged

This is NOT the ‘unlimited access for you and a guest’ Priority Pass that you receive with American Express Platinum.

It will have the same rules as your existing Lounge Club card:

  • you will receive two free lounge visits per card year
  • additional visits will be automatically charged to your American Express Gold card at the rate of £20

If you have already used one or two of your annual lounge passes, these will be deducted from the opening balance on your Priority Pass.

When does my Lounge Club card stop working?

28th February.

Got Amex Gold? You will receive a Priority Pass airport lounge card

Is Priority Pass better than Lounge Club?

Yes, for two reasons:

Priority Pass has a bigger network than Lounge Club

Despite both being owned by the same company, Collinson, the Lounge Club network is smaller.

The Priority Pass network has over 1,200 lounges in it (albeit quite a few are currently shut, but give it time ……).

This HfP article is a little out of date but it gives you an idea of the differences between Lounge Club and Priority Pass. Back in 2018, additional UK lounges included Heathrow, Southend, Newquay, Norwich, Exeter, Glasgow, Jersey, Doncaster Sheffield and Derry.

Got Amex Gold? You will receive a Priority Pass airport lounge card

Priority Pass has digital membership cards

You no longer need to worry about forgetting your plastic Lounge Club card.

You can download the Priority Pass app to your smartphone and use the digital membership card to enter lounges.

Conclusion

This is a genuine improvement to American Express Preferred Rewards Gold, giving access to a wider range of lounges.

Being able to use a digital membership card stored on your phone will also make your life easier.

If you don’t have Amex Gold, we ran a full Preferred Rewards Gold review last week.

With NO FEE for the first year, two airport lounge visits via Priority Pass and a whopping 20,000 American Express Membership Rewards points as a sign-up bonus (converting to 20,000 Avios), it is an impressive package. It is also a great first step for someone starting off with miles and points.

You can apply for the card here.

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – April 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

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.

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the famous annual 2-4-1 voucher Read our full review

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & four airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Mastercard

15,000 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:

SPECIAL OFFER: Until 12th May 2024, the Capital on Tap Business Rewards Visa card is offering a bonus of 30,000 points, convertible into 30,000 Avios. You must have a Limited Company to apply. Click here to learn more and click here to apply.

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

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

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus 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 Business Rewards Visa

Huge 30,000 points bonus until 12th May 2024 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 on your spending.

Barclaycard Select Cashback Business Credit Card

1% cashback uncapped* on all your business spending (T&C apply) Read our full review

Category

American Express Gold card

Comments (34)

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

  • Michael C says:
    11 Jan11 January 09:17

    So should I just dump OH’s supplementary BAPP and get him to sign up for Gold?

    • TGLoyalty says:
      11 Jan11 January 09:29

      If they OH had had a personal card for 2 years absolutely. In fact read HfP article on how to maximise sign up bonuses for someone starting fresh.

      • Michael C says:
        11 Jan11 January 09:41

        Cheers, TG.

        • TGLoyalty says:
          11 Jan11 January 09:57

          No worries though I’m not sure it reads very well.

          Meant if the OH hasn’t had a personal card in 2 years 🙂 you’ll earn 9k avios for referring him too (sometimes it’s worth doing that even if they won’t get a sign up bonus)

    • Rob says:
      11 Jan11 January 09:57

      You don’t need to do a) to do b).

  • Justin says:
    11 Jan11 January 10:30

    I’m happy Lounge Club is being replaced with Priority Pass and welcome the change.

    There’s one problem I can think of with this, although not so important to some…. I currently don’t see an option for the Priority Pass App to add a second card. For example, I have one with my Platinum Card already and can’t have two Priority Pass apps on my iPhone and would prefer not carrying around an additional card in my wallet.

    From past experience, their system seems poorly setup or the agents were just lazy… when I previously I got a new priority pass card (after upgrading back to Platinum) Priority Pass agents were unable to re-use my email registered to the original Priority Pass card (or even replace my old Priority Pass card number with the new one on that account).

    The only thing they suggested was to create another account attached to another e-mail. Therefore, I already have two Priority Pass accounts. If Priority Pass are unable to add additional cards to a single account, it’d be rather annoying to create yet another Priority Pass Account for the Gold card.

    • Justin says:
      11 Jan11 January 10:35

      And for some reason it only just crossed my mind it won’t be needed anyways as the Platinum version allows unlimited visits… forget what I just said… doh!

      Even though they’re owned by the same company, does anyone know if the smaller Lounge Club network had any lounges not included with Priority Pass?

      • TGLoyalty says:
        11 Jan11 January 10:50

        If you already hold a both the Plat and Gold consider what name you get the gold or platinum in.

        Ie my supp platinum simply says my surname (same for my PP) so any member of my family can use it. It would be the same for your main card for example.

        • Justin says:
          11 Jan11 January 10:57

          Thanks for the tip!!! That’s an excellent idea!

          Out of curiosity, how did you get around entering a Title and Forename for the card? I just checked and those are mandatory when trying online.

          • TGLoyalty says:
            11 Jan11 January 12:18

            you don’t you just choose the name that’s displayed on the card

            the lounge dragon just checks your PP card name vs your boarding pass.

        • C says:
          11 Jan11 January 14:47

          I tried doing this for my parents but when they scan the priority pass at the lounge it shows your full name on the system. The lounge did notice this but they still let me parents in

          • TGLoyalty says:
            11 Jan11 January 15:30

            That is the possible flaw in the plan I haven’t actually registered the supp PP online so no idea what it says but its worked a couple times in the past between my bro and sister borrowing it.

            Would probably have more mileage at premium plaza and Eurostar lounges as they just scan the card and won’t see the cardholders full name.

          • Justin says:
            11 Jan11 January 16:11

            @C Thanks for letting me know, I will keep that in mind. Hopefully staff will be as flexible when my supp holders try this.

            @TGLoyalty I am unfortunately unable to reply to your post directly, but thanks very much for your help. I’ve been putting off giving away my free supp Plat card for a while now and have only given green ones (as I was waiting to see who my first international traveling sibling would be). Thanks to your advice I’ve finally chosen to get the supp Plat displaying just our last name which will be much more useful. I’ll also avoid registering this one on an app!

  • Dan says:
    11 Jan11 January 18:44

    Meh, got the e-mail this morning saying that my Amex Gold card benefits have been ‘upgraded’ lol – I think calling it an ‘upgrade’ is a bit of a stretch considering how tiny the difference is.

    • Rob says:
      11 Jan11 January 19:56

      Depends where you live. Big change if you live near one of the UK regional airports which didn’t take Lounge Club.

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

New to Head for Points?

Welcome!  We’re the UK’s most-read source of business travel, Avios, frequent flyer and hotel loyalty news. Let us improve how you travel. Got any questions? Ask them in our forums.

Latest Forum Posts

Get 40,000 bonus points (worth 40,000 Avios) and £300 dining credit with The Platinum Card

Check reward flight availability instantly for free!

See a whole year of reward seat availability on one page at SeatSpy.com

Get £10 when you spend £150 on your free Currensea card

Booking a luxury hotel?

Our luxury hotel booking service offers you GUARANTEED extra benefits over booking direct. Works with Four Seasons, Mandarin Oriental, The Ritz Carlton, St Regis and more. We've booked £1.7 million of rooms to date. Click for details.

SME? EARN POINTS WORTH 10,500 AVIOS WITH CAPITAL ON TAP

Get 20,000 bonus points, four airport lounge passes and your first year free with American Express Gold

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.

Got it!