BIG NEWS: BA moves to revenue-based tier status for Bronze, Silver, Gold and Gold Guest List

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

• Thywillbedone says:

  2 Jan2 January 10:28

  The big surprise here is that it is a big surprise. Just booked LGW-BKK in J for late 2025 and had forgotten BA has no plans to refurbish the Gatwick fleet with Club Suite …so I’ll be paying a tidy sum in £££ and Avios for the privilege of flying ye olde club world …if you didn’t already know they put no value on the leisure traveller (which the long haul routes out of LGW primarily serve)!!

• Misty says:

  2 Jan2 January 10:40

  Hmm. I’m not convinced that a second homer in the Loire Valley takes most of their leisure flights on Ryanair,

  • vlcnc says:

    2 Jan2 January 10:51

    You would be surprised. A lot of well off people prefer a direct connection, unless they live in London, BA isn’t terribly convenient.

    • Matt B says:

      2 Jan2 January 10:59

      Agree, albeit as someone who doesn’t have a second home in the Loire Valley. What I don’t get, though, is why — if they are already travelling in club wherever they go for work, being a high-level executive and all — they will stop flying direct with Ryanair from their UK base in the East Midlands with their three kids every summer simply because BA has now made it a bit easier for them to achieve a gold status they probably had anyway.

    • Danny says:

      2 Jan2 January 11:01

      Intriguing

    • Alastair says:

      2 Jan2 January 11:04

      Even if you live in London, flying Club to CDG, schlepping into Paris, then getting a crowded holiday TGV out to the Loire isn’t exactly premium either and if BA think it is then it begins to explain things.

    • Throwawayname says:

      2 Jan2 January 11:04

      The small provincial airports are also a real bonus for time-poor people, they don’t want to hang around queuing for passport control or waiting for baggage delivery.

      • NorthernLass says:

        2 Jan2 January 11:09

        Agree, we flew FR to LIM in 2023, it was like having a private terminal!

        • Throwawayname says:

          2 Jan2 January 11:36

          I didn’t know they went all the way to Peru!

        • Catalan says:

          2 Jan2 January 11:55

          Do you mean LIG (Limoges)?

  • Rui N. says:

    2 Jan2 January 11:02

    If it is the only direct connection (like it is for many secondary airports in the EU and UK) you bet your ass they do.

• Dominic says:

  2 Jan2 January 11:16

  Are BA really seeing monetary opportunity here?

  I get the targeting higher US spenders… but how many of them are seriously going to switch as a result of this? I figure they’d fly enough to earn status under the old system, and those travelling in F probably don’t care so much for status anyway…?

  • vlcnc says:

    2 Jan2 January 11:41

    Also in the US credit cards are *extremely* generous so it is very easy to build up a massive mound of avios passively from everyday spend to use.

• Jon says:

  2 Jan2 January 11:18

  Ba have misjudged that a lot of travellers only keep flying as the exec club benefits tweak the formula which excuse their sub par product and regular flight cancellations / disruptions and pour customer service. Knowing you are unlikely to achieve status will mean no point trying to book ba cash fair in first place and will simply become which ever is most convenient / affordable when you no longer have status. For most smaller companies that let people choose flights, customers would fly their business and personal travel with ba but once there is no prospect of status you’re happy to choose both on wider criteria. My Last flight to Australia was emirates and probably would use them again next time over a few tier points with no status as the product was much nicer.

• danstravel says:

  2 Jan2 January 11:30

  Having Taken the time to digest the news – I think as a Solo Traveller the game changer might be the using BAH & Amex BAPP route for Silver?

  A 2-week economy holiday booked via BAH to Asia (HK, Singapore, Tokyo – the places that I normally go to) can easily fall into the region of £2.5k.

  Do that twice a year and I would get 5,000 TP as a Solo Traveller.

  The question then becomes the AMEX BAPP… will it be £25k spend for 2,500TP???

  If it is, then this can be achievable with some spend diversions – i.e. if I were to funnel the spend I do on my Barclaycard Avios to the BAPP. If they do something silly and make it £30K or even £50k – then its a No from me.

  • Throwawayname says:

    2 Jan2 January 11:39

    If you are LHR captive or otherwise stuck with (or even prefer) oneworld, you should have no problem qualifying on RJ or elsewhere without having to bother with BAH.

  • Tim S says:

    2 Jan2 January 12:08

    A week in HK or SIN, I get – been there, done that, but just the once, wont ever be doing it again. But Tokyo – who wants 2 weeks in the same hotel in Tokyo? or BKK or KL?

    As to the CC stuff. This is fine for people who already have a corporate buy this for them, but for the leisure traveller £300 entry point to acquire the card is £300 too much

    • Bervios says:

      2 Jan2 January 12:11

      Why would it have to be the same hotel? You can just use custom trip on BA.com and have different hotels in different areas.

    • danstravel says:

      2 Jan2 January 12:34

      Not sure what you mean… what is the problem with staying in the same hotel??

      There is enough to see in Tokyo for 2 weeks and staying in one location gives you a central stopping point/location after exploring the city.

      • Tim S says:

        3 Jan3 January 16:17

        Few leisure travellers want to do 2 weeks in Tokyo. They want a few days in Hakone, a few in Kyoto, etc etc. Is there really enough to do for 14 days in Tokyo that beats going to these other places? Most leisure trip to Japan are “once in a lifetime” type trips, you want to get the best of out them, not scrape the bottom of the barrel to avoid moving to an new city
        Bervios- I can see nothing on the “Flight+Hotel” page that enables me to do anything other than book the same hotel for the complete period

• Supersub says:

  2 Jan2 January 11:38

  You do get the feeling there might be some kind of (partial) corporate climbdown soon, once BA’s higher ups are back at their desks.
  As observed above, the timing of the announcement feels rushed, effectively putting many customers’ plans on hold at the busiest travel booking time of the year.
  And I wonder if the aged 20-30 something management consultants behind this fully understood the degree of loyalty in older (wealthier) customers, most of whom would moan about CE, old CW, brunch etc but still keep coming back to maintain status. Bragging about your Gold card at the golf club is highly prized to this group, like when your company car being a Cavalier GLS meant you were more important than someone driving an L.
  Most companies would be desperate to have a customer base that keeps spending money with you, even when the alternatives are better.
  I expect there’ll be a dilutional announcement in the next week or two.

  • danstravel says:

    2 Jan2 January 11:53

    Has BA ever backed down on any ‘enhancements’ made to their loyalty program? The change to Avios earning based on Revenue spent, the increase is RFS fees & surcharges over the years were met with backlash but things still moved on.

    Things related to Food and meals (Brunchgate) have seen reversals but reversing decisions on food is significantly easier than doing so for your loyalty program given all the flowery corporate garbage they have used to justify these changes…

    • Tim S says:

      2 Jan2 January 12:20

      Avios changes are a completely different kettle of fish.

      there’s no cliff edge to those changes. Yes I might now get 20% fewer points than I did before, but the alternative is to gain a few hundred extra points for an airline that I use rarely and hence can never spend. So fewer Avios is till the better option

  • George says:

    2 Jan2 January 12:12

    “Bragging about your Gold card at the golf club is highly prized to this group”

    This makes me sad.

    • Tim S says:

      2 Jan2 January 12:23

      I don’t even know people who go to a golf club. Let alone brag about it.

      In my circle (of older wealthier people) the vast majority might travel once per year. Having status on an airline is just not on the radar

    • Rob says:

      2 Jan2 January 13:00

      You may have a £700 pair of LV trainers, others have a BA Gold card. To be fair I think the latter is more useful as a status symbol.

      • George says:

        2 Jan2 January 13:33

        “Status symbol”

        How sad

        • Rob says:

          2 Jan2 January 13:44

          Come on George. Assuming you’re on six figures you’ll have something which someone would call a status symbol even if you don’t – posh watch, German car, Nespresso machine, Smeg kettle, designer trainers …. would be rather weird if you didn’t.

        • ken says:

          2 Jan2 January 15:41

          In what world is a Nespresso machine a status symbol ?

          Oooh, get you with your £79 from Argos coffee machine

          Do people wear their gold card round their neck on a lanyard ?

  • Rob says:

    2 Jan2 January 12:15

    I highly doubt it. This has the hallmarks of a decision made by a CxO based on their own personal views (likely backed up by a McKinsey exec summary PowerPoint, rather than actual detailed financial analysis), railroading things through. The arrogance and egos of such people shouldn’t be underestimated.

    • Tim S says:

      2 Jan2 January 12:32

      I don’t think that’s there’s anything wrong with the principle of rewarding people based upon ticket price, ending the anomalies of people getting 8 times as many TP for a bargain bucket CE ticket against someone who buys a last minute Economy, for a similar price.

      It’s the thresholds that are wrong. They are 20% too high for people who never did game the system to keep their status.
      3000, 6000 and 15,000 work much better.

      Though the absurdly different treatments of partner airlines needs more work

      • Throwawayname says:

        2 Jan2 January 12:54

        Anyone who is based in Europe and has to connect will need a ridiculous amount of travel to reach meaningful BA status.

        Today BA are advertising Spain-GRU and back for €1700 in business class. If you’re based in Spain you’ll probably need six of those ultra long haul business class returns just to get to BA Silver…Or you could fly AF, an airline which lots of people (including myself) rate its product more highly, get your gold/elite plus card with 2 of them and a little bit of European travel. If you do fly the route six times a year, you’re probably getting Platinum for Life in a decade, as opposed to the 60 years it’d take you for BA GfL.

        • Throwawayname says:

          2 Jan2 January 13:00

          (eagerly awaiting the syntax police to correct the above comment)

        • Tim S says:

          2 Jan2 January 14:13

          And for those of us who don’t routinely travel CW, getting to AF Gold will require 9 RT of the Long 2 category in Economy.

          Which is pretty much where I am with BA WT – and however good the AF on-board package my be, choosing AF over BA/QR for my LH needs, is usually undesirable because of a very early morning departure.

          FWIW – I’m really not understanding the ire of people here who see CW as the benchmark for travel. Surely people who routinely travel CW get all the perks that they need from the ticket type. Their FF Status adds next to nothing.

    • George says:

      2 Jan2 January 15:05

      “Come on George. Assuming you’re on six figures you’ll have something which someone would call a status symbol even if you don’t – posh watch, German car, Nespresso machine, Smeg kettle, designer trainers …. would be rather weird if you didn’t.”

      Maybe I do.

      But going out of your way to tell people you have a gold card is rather pathetic and I’m glad I don’t mix in such insecure circles.

      • ken says:

        2 Jan2 January 15:45

        some think a metal platinum card is a status symbol and wildly impresses the girls and boys.

      • ba says:

        2 Jan2 January 16:00

        True, George. But I’m more glad not to mix in circles where people brag about their Nespresso machine.

      • James says:

        2 Jan2 January 19:16

        @ George – it really is sad

  • vlcnc says:

    2 Jan2 January 12:45

    I don’t think we’re going to see them reverse it to the old model, but we might see a partial reduction in the very high thresholds. The fact remains though revenue based reward is a terrible system for loyalty, so it’s always going to rubbish from now on, not to mention that over the years the thresholds will creep back up again anyway even if they mitigate it now because of the backlash.

    • Tim S says:

      3 Jan3 January 16:30

      I can’t agree with your basis premise. Revenue based rewards is the ultimate fairness in rewarding loyalty.

      It takes away the nonsense of people being able to book premium seats on unpopular routes at lower cost (but higher rewards) than economy seats on popular routes.

      What’s wrong with this new revenue based model, is that some revenue spend is worth more than other revenue spend. Leading to a different set of people being able to game the system.

      And the thresholds are too high

• grumpy chicken 81 says:

  2 Jan2 January 11:49

  As others have surely said, all BA needed to do to reduce the numbers of silver card holders (and therefore pressure on the lounges) was end the double tier points promotion with BA Holidays. I’m getting a bit fed up winter holidays in the canaries for the 320TP anyway. Silver would still have been attainable for me through a couple of club upgrades on my normal flying. As it is, under the new system I have absolutely no chance of hitting silver so will spend my money going forward on the best fare/time/quality option. I’m not pretending I’m a high spender or a particularly valuable customer, but I did choose to spend my money with BA when they were very often not the best option. There must be hundreds of thousands of people like me who’s money BA can no longer be assured of – quite a pool of income to turn your back on. Hotels.com all over again in my view.

  • Ed says:

    2 Jan2 January 11:55

    Similar applies to me. Have often booked BAH where I’m sure better options exist which gets Bronze and the odd hit of Silver some years but as soon as I find availability for our 450k Avios for a family of four (the student “kid” still seems to want to go to nice places with us) then that’ll probably mean that’ll be it for my spend with BA.

• James says:

  2 Jan2 January 12:05

  the summary is, 99% of readers here are very dissatisfied because they will no longer be able to get something for nothing.

  lets take a step back – lounge access and freebies inside are not entitlements – they are rewards that the business, in this case BA, decides to give to whoever is valuable to them. thats all.

  • BrancasterLancaster says:

    2 Jan2 January 13:53

    Not “something for nothing” more like “something for making conscious decisions about where my business and leisure $/£/€ is spent, as opposed to corporate travellers who have no choice and who do actually get something for nothing.”

    Many people commenting, myself included, have made these decisions in the past. As another commenter said a few (many!) pages ago – the reasonably attainable status offset the reasonably poor offering (when compared to other carriers).

    Take away that ability to earn status, not necessarily the top status, just something that recognises the loyalty then a) BA has to compete on routing/price/quality for a decent chunk of the market and b) you can see why people are somewhat aggrieved

  • Tim S says:

    2 Jan2 January 14:25

    It’s not for nothing

    It’s for my choosing to fly BA to SIN at £650 when I can fly SQ for £600, so that I can use/earn my OW status.

    If I only ever flew to SIN, I could collect point for SQ status, but I don’t. Next month I might fly to SFO and IME transfer of points between SA partners is nowhere near as seamless as it is with OW (Been there, done that – more than once got zero status points on my LH card for flying with a partner.)

    • Lady London says:

      2 Jan2 January 16:42

      Ummm…I think you have to be very special if you choose LH as your program amongsr the Star Alliance programs if you live in the UK.

      • Tim S says:

        2 Jan2 January 17:45

        I used to fly weekly to Germany, and at the time SA included BMI flights

        It’s a legacy account, that I still try to dump my SA points into. With little to no success

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