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British Airways extends Executive Club elite status – for some – and reduced tier points

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British Airways has announced another 12 months extension of elite status for some Executive Club members.

The screw continues to tighten, however. The initial extension in 2020 covered all members. The previous extension in September 2021 covered a quarter of the membership base. This new extension also covers only a quarter of members.

The good news is that ALL members will benefit from the extension to the reduced tier point thresholds.

British Airways Executive Club status cards

There will be no extension to American Express 2-4-1 companion vouchers or any other vouchers. This shouldn’t be a surprise as BA started to expire 2-4-1 vouchers on 1st October. You can stop your voucher expiring by following this method (click).

Who gets an extension?

Only elite members with a tier point collection end date between the 1st April 2022 and 30th June 2022 have received a status extension today.

If your tier point year ends during this three month period, your existing status level will be rolled over automatically for another year. It will on your BA account by 1st January.

For clarity, your tier points will still reset to zero at the end of your current membership year. BA is not extending the time period you have to earn the necessary points for requalification.

Unlike Virgin Atlantic, which has been able to extend status in three and six month increments, the way that Executive Club is set up means that it can only process 12 month extensions.

This means that British Airways has chosen to limit the status extensions today to those whose status was set to expire in Summer 2022 – ie. those whose membership year resets on 8th April 2022, 8th May 2022 or 8th June 2022.

The deadline for requalifying with reduced tier points has also been extended

To make it easier for everyone else to qualify or requalify, British Airways has extended the period in which you can requalify with reduced tier points.

British Airways BA Amex American Express cards

For your tier point collection year which ends in 2022, you will need the following tier points:

  • Bronze status will require 225 tier points (was 300 tier points)
  • Silver status will require 450 tier points (was 600 tier points)
  • Gold status will require 1,125 tier points (was 1,500 tier points)

These thresholds will revert to their normal levels for your tier point collection year which ends in 2023.

You can confirm this on ba.com here.

What this means (at least as BA has written it, which I do not necessarily believe is actually how it will work) is that if your year-end is 8th January then you get nothing from this. You will be expected to earn 1,500 tier points for Gold between 9th January 2022 and 8th January 2023.

This makes no sense since I doubt anyone outside BAEC is expecting a massive improvement in the global travel situation by 9th January 2022. We’ll find out the truth on 9th January when tier point years reset for 1/12th of members – let’s see what target they are given.

What about American Express 2-4-1 companion vouchers?

There are NO extensions to companion vouchers or Gold Upgrade vouchers.

Vouchers began to expire on 1st October so it would be very unfair to those members who have already lost a voucher to extend those which remain.

You can, in any event, artificially extend your 2-4-1 companion voucher expiry date to 30th September 2023 by following this method.

Conclusion

Whilst only 25% of British Airways Executive Club members have received a status extension today, the extension of the reduced tier point thresholds to 30th December 2022 means that all members have an improved chance of earning or retaining status for 2023.

At some point, however, the airline industry needs to make a call. The good customers of 2019 will not be the good customers of 2023. People change companies or get promoted into roles which need less travel. Many companies will be permanently cutting back on business travel.

The industry will have to decide when it should cut people loose. Businesses need to start rebuilding their elite tiers from those who are travelling now, not those who were travelling four years ago.

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Comments (142)

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

  • Mighty Hunter says:
    21 Dec21 December 16:27

    All true, but it’s still a fine balance that could tip the wrong way. BA can’t compete with the middle east airlines, but there comes a point where the product is so different that it’s worth the swap. Add in the number of passengers connecting through LHR who have to use 2 flights anyway, and the investment in better training and supervision becomes worth it. My friends still at BA think the Sean Doyle understands this better than Alex Cruz who was a dyed-in-the wool low-cost man. Obviously he’s had to concentrate on saving every penny recently, but times are starting to change.

    • memesweeper says:
      21 Dec21 December 16:59

      “ BA can’t compete with the middle east airlines”

      If you mainly fly to Australia and other destinations east of the UK not served by BA direct … maybe. London is a fantastically well connected place in terms of direct flights , many routes only served by BA. Who is going to choose fly Emirates to Brazil or Singapore ? Many people don’t care how bleedin’ nice their seats, lounge and food are, they will always be flying direct if possible.

      • Mighty Hunter says:
        21 Dec21 December 17:14

        That bit I meant for flying to the middle east. Actually though, if time is not critical (not for me anymore), and I was travelling first class, I’d much prefer Emirates to fly to Singapore with their fantastic showers, great cabins, free cigar lounge at Dubai, and help-yourself cognac costing £600 a bottle. I think as long as controlled the drinking I’d be much more refreshed on arrival!

      • blenz101 says:
        21 Dec21 December 17:15

        EK is surely an ideal choice to Singapore!

        • memesweeper says:
          21 Dec21 December 17:18

          What, versus Singapore Airlines? No way.
          Versus BA? For leisure? Maybe. I’d take BA F direct myself.
          There’s only a handful of routes the ME3 can really outcomplete for a London-area traveller.

          • memesweeper says:
            21 Dec21 December 17:21

            … my point was that it’s not a fine balance for most status holders. BA have the lion’s share of the direct routes. None of the home-grown competitors are in a major alliance. I’d love to be enjoying the benefits of my recently secured Star Alliance Gold…. but it’s just not very useful unfortunately.

          • Track says:
            22 Dec22 December 01:38

            BA F for LHR-SIN vs A380 suites or new suites? Paying cash fare??

            You must be joking or have been drinking.

      • Track says:
        22 Dec22 December 01:36

        You might be in the wrong forum saying the above.

        We go into trouble of ex-EU to fly Qatar metal to Singapore and AU.

        Direct flights have the appeal of time-saving, if you are restricted in number of days to spend at your destination — eg if you only going for a 2-3 night business trip or conference and returning.

        Equally if you only have 5-7 days only for a family visit in AU, you would fly direct. But this and above, both are limited cases.

  • cannonc says:
    21 Dec21 December 16:28

    So what happens if you legitimately hit your status – do you get the extension and the year on top? So May 2022 extends to 2023 but because you qualified its 2024?

  • Mal Kiely says:
    21 Dec21 December 17:15

    Sorry but just to clarify my Gold membership renewed on the 9th Dec 2021 so I need only 1125 tier points to retain gold for a further 12 months from 8th Dec 2022?

  • David says:
    21 Dec21 December 17:22

    The double tier points BA Holidays promotion also appears to have been extended, now to 31/10/22, however it is stated on the relevant BA webpage that bonus TPs are taking up to 60 days after the return flight to post. Does this mean that you now need to ensure your holiday is scheduled to end at least two months before your TP year end (to ensure they count in the correct collection year?). In addition the hotel needs to be booked for the duration of the trip; does this mean that if, say, you are on a 2am flight back from Dubai, you need to have included a hotel night on that final day (even though you would unlikely use it, bearing in mind airport transfer and check-in times?)

    • Secret Squirrel says:
      21 Dec21 December 17:33

      I take it if you book BA holidays say in PE but upgrade to CW using AVIOS do you just get the double TP’s on PE flights not the upgraded CW flights?

    • Rob says:
      21 Dec21 December 17:46

      I was told that the TP are backdated, although 60 days of backdating is a bit extreme.

  • Andrew Roberts says:
    21 Dec21 December 17:33

    Don’t understand the reduced tier points comments to re-qualify. My tier point date is 8 January. I had understood that provided I reach the reduced level in the period 9 Jan to 30 June,, i would re-qualify. Would appreciate clarification.

    • Rob says:
      21 Dec21 December 17:45

      Not according to BA’s new rules. For any tier point year ending in 2023, the old thresholds apply. I don’t believe this but they told me to change the site to say this, so …

      • will says:
        21 Dec21 December 17:56

        That was always pretty bug question in the way they worded it, ie if you qualify in the reduced TP period but your membership year end was after it, are you expected to get the normal points by membership year end in order to retain, and moreover would you be stripped of say gold on Jan 1st 2023 if you had qualified by year end under reduced TP thresholds but the membership year end was after Jan 1st 2023.

  • Cheshire Pete says:
    21 Dec21 December 17:39

    To Sum up more clinically. BA has now extended All members for 24 months. Feels like a natural line will be drawn now. As Rob speculates those travellers in 2023 seems a far cry from what they earned in 2019. I think something will change next year, but let’s see how this Omicron spike finally plays out. We haven’t seen a Doubling every 2 days as was predicted by the so called experts, we seem to be bobbling around 90,000 now for a week. So once again some of this was fuelled by an over pessimistic reaction from the epidemiologists, who just like in July when lockdown was lifted, got a lot of coverage even back then saying we would be luck to not exceed 100,000 a day, as we never even got much above a third of that. Government is right in its balance this time. Thinking today is omicron has peaked.

    Also goof to hear BAH double TPS extended,

    • babyg says:
      21 Dec21 December 17:57

      youre conflating a lot of issues in on paragraph… i suspect we are reaching the number of tests per day as we are already seeing a shortage of test kits in london… i suspect we are way past 100k cases per day (just run out of test kits/capacity).. The UK government has not been right at any point during the pandemic, its “luck” is unlikely to change now…

    • bafan says:
      21 Dec21 December 19:09

      I’ve only been extended once I think. From Sep 21 to 22.

    • Geoff 1977 says:
      22 Dec22 December 06:16

      “ as we never even got much above a third of that”

      Why are you making stuff up?

      Sad!

  • Andy Garrett says:
    21 Dec21 December 18:26

    I have just had my tier points for a flight on 7 Dec denied as the collection year ended 8 Dec the BA system only credited the Avois on 10 Dec. Is this normal practice?

  • Mark says:
    21 Dec21 December 22:24

    I’m a bit confused now…. I have a BA Holiday booked with double Tier points that will get me 360 tier points. Was it the case that until the extension covered here I had until the end of June to earn the extra 90 tier points for reduced threshold silver? The holiday is booked for after the end of my tier point year on the end of 8th February.

    If so (and that’s what I believed to be the case) is BA now saying the reduced threshold no longer applies to me at all from the start of my next tier point year, and therefore the bar is now raised for someone in my situation. Annoying if that is the case as I choose to book the holiday as opposed to a 2for1 redemption with hotel points bookings on that basis. If it is the case I certainly won’t be spending the money with BA to make up the extra 90 points that I was otherwise planning to.

    • Rob says:
      21 Dec21 December 22:35

      Yes, under these new rules your double tier points won’t help you – you’d be 240 short of Silver. Wait until 9th January though and let’s see what the 8th January cohort see as their renewal target.

      • Mark says:
        21 Dec21 December 22:49

        Thanks Rob. I’m surely not the only one who thinks the whole system is bonkers… We”ve never been particularly minded to chase status and this reminds me why. On exactly the same flights my wife stood little chance of achieving silver anyway as her year end is April. Last time we earned status many years ago she got silver and I didn’t, again on exactly the same flights purely down to our different fixed end dates. OTOH we should both earn Virgin silver next year from redemption flights, so maybe we”ll send more money their way…. I’m sure the status quo drives all kinds of behaviour that doesn’t necessarily benefit BA.

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