Barclays upgrade voucher conundrum

[Mick S]

I have a Barclays Premier account which I pay for each month and will get the cabin upgrade voucher soon. Once I get the first voucher I’m considering closing down the account. I’m a solo traveller most of the time and the upgrade vouchers have always worked out well. However, with the increase in surcharges I’ll be starting most trips from Dublin in the future – this will save the monthly fee to Barclays, and the crazy fees imposed by BA.

just working out some figures

1. Barclays account £144 per year in fees, in return for a voucher and 18,000 Avios
2. Dummy booking from DUB-HOU in Club – 156K Avios and £363 in fees.
3. Dummy booking from LHR-HOU in Club on same dates, using upgrade voucher
a) premium economy avios 65K
b) club fees £842

So, if I didnt have the Barclays account and flying from Dublin it’s a saving of £479 + £144. The offset I lose 18,000 ‘free’ avios, and it’s cost an extra 91,000 Avios. So an extra 109,000 Avios in this scenario.

I suppose the question is 109,000 worth £623 ?
anyone else had similar thoughts?

[SamG]

The way I see it is I’m buying the Avios at 0.8p. Worst case scenario I’ll use them at Sainsbury (ok, a tiny bit of a loss as I’m losing out on Perks at Work + earning an Avios back) . This makes the voucher pretty much free. As you say, long haul ex-London is looking poor value so I wouldn’t use it for that but I did recently use it for a Club Europe to the Canaries.

Even taking into account the fact it has to be the £1 RFS option it still worked out pretty nicely for me for something I’d be booking anyway

[meta]

Barclays upgrade vouchers can’t be used starting from outside UK so for me Barclay’s cards/accounts have 0 value. They would have to throw a lot more Avios for me to consider it.

• This reply was modified 54 years, 4 months ago by .

[Mick S]

meta wrote:

Barclays upgrade vouchers can’t be used starting from outside UK so for me Barclay’s cards/accounts have 0 value. They would have to throw a lot more Avios for me to consider it.

Thats where my head is at right now. If the upgrade voucher could be used for starting outside the UK then great, but as its not and I’m likely to start Dublin then I’m not seeing the value right now, as I’m sat on quite a lot of avios right now.

[alig4th]

Mick S wrote:

If the upgrade voucher could be used for starting outside the UK then great…

I’d even be happy if it was usable with the “standard” RFS Avios and £50 taxes for Club Europe, but offering only the £1 option (and therefore devaluing Avios used in that component) means I have collected two vouchers (one Premier account, one Barclaycard) that I don’t think are of any real value at all and will probably let expire (having already cancelled my Premier account and downgraded to the free Barclaycard)

[Dace]

Yeah, I thought I could do the old book one voucher, one way, then book the return with the other voucher. No luck. Will be closing my Avios Premier Account.