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Hi all,
I am quite a big spender and have a big family so I’m trying to make the best use of cards in order to obtain free (or lower cost) luxury travel around the world.
I started collecting with Amex Gold about a year ago and have cancelled that card now and moved onto the BAPP card. I have now qualified for the 241 voucher and so I don’t want to hold onto this card and want a pro-rata refund of my membership fee, I should get back 10/12s of the fee. If I downgrade my BAPP card to the free version, can I then upgrade next year to get another 241 card? My plan is to move onto the Amex Platinum as my next card and I will probably continue to hold that card indefinitely as I hope to qualify for the Centurion card at some point in the future.
My wife also started with the Amex Gold, that is now cancelled and so she will also move on to the BAPP card to get the 241 voucher so once she has obtained that she will downgrade to the free version.
We both hold the Barclaycard Avios Plus Mastercards for any non-Amex spending. In total we have managed to collect about 500K Avios to date.
I would appreciate your thoughts on what we can do moving forward.
Have you read this?
https://www.headforpoints.com/2023/01/03/maximise-american-express-signup-bonuses/When did you cancel the Gold? You can get the Platinum but unless the Gold was cancelled over 24 months ago (which Defo not if you only got it a year ago) you won’t get a sign-up bonus.
@scinar welcome to the wonderful world of collecting and leveraging the benefits of travel loyalty points programs! You are definitely in the right place to get the information you need but it may be better to read around all the articles and forums on here and then come back with more narrow questions rather than expect someone to set it all out for you in one post. After all, everyone’s circumstances and priorities are different so it pays to be specific.
What I will add is that the idea you want to avoid paying the £250 annual BAPP fee seems a little out of line with your ambition to eventually acquire a £3,400 a year fee card… Not to mention that churning cards may not be the best way to get you onto the Centurion card invite list!
Have you read this?
https://www.headforpoints.com/2023/01/03/maximise-american-express-signup-bonuses/When did you cancel the Gold? You can get the Platinum but unless the Gold was cancelled over 24 months ago (which Defo not if you only got it a year ago) you won’t get a sign-up bonus.
Thanks for your reply. Yes I am aware I can’t get the SUB for the Platinum card at the moment and I accept this. I will be spending regardless of the SUB and so I am happy to be paying for the Platinum card each year going forward.
If you are big spender, why not earning more Avios with BAPP?
For every £10k spent a year, BAPP gives you 5k more Avios than gold or plat.
If you hit the vaucher in two months, that means that BAPP would give you 25-30k Avios more a year. That’s nonnegligible and It’d make up the fee easily if you are a bigger spender. As most would agree, 241 voucher is the best reward there is in the UK and its value completely depends on how much avios you are willing to spend. You can “waste” the voucher with ClubEurope flights to Paris, or use it for overseas long distance flights — for which you need Avios.Get the voucher-cancel-apply again cycle may backfire — you may need to wait at least 3 months and there is no guarantee that Amex would grant you the BAPP card.
The best strategy would be to get BAPP for yourself and player 2 and keep the cards. If you want Plat, get one and give player 2 a supplement. Since you already have the Barclayscards, you’d have 2 vouchers for 241 and barclaycard upgrade each, which is good. And BAPP fees would easily pay itself. All you need to do is the spread the spends on all these cards.
@scinar welcome to the wonderful world of collecting and leveraging the benefits of travel loyalty points programs! You are definitely in the right place to get the information you need but it may be better to read around all the articles and forums on here and then come back with more narrow questions rather than expect someone to set it all out for you in one post. After all, everyone’s circumstances and priorities are different so it pays to be specific.
What I will add is that the idea you want to avoid paying the £250 annual BAPP fee seems a little out of line with your ambition to eventually acquire a £3,400 a year fee card… Not to mention that churning cards may not be the best way to get you onto the Centurion card invite list!
Thanks for your reply. I guess my question is:
Can I move from the BAPP card to the BA card after I have qualified for the 241 voucher and then move back the other way after 12 months in order to try to qualify for the 241 voucher again?
If you are big spender, why not earning more Avios with BAPP?
For every £10k spent a year, BAPP gives you 5k more Avios than gold or plat.
If you hit the vaucher in two months, that means that BAPP would give you 25-30k Avios more a year. That’s nonnegligible and It’d make up the fee easily if you are a bigger spender. As most would agree, 241 voucher is the best reward there is in the UK and its value completely depends on how much avios you are willing to spend. You can “waste” the voucher with ClubEurope flights to Paris, or use it for overseas long distance flights — for which you need Avios.Get the voucher-cancel-apply again cycle may backfire — you may need to wait at least 3 months and there is no guarantee that Amex would grant you the BAPP card.
The best strategy would be to get BAPP for yourself and player 2 and keep the cards. If you want Plat, get one and give player 2 a supplement. Since you already have the Barclayscards, you’d have 2 vouchers for 241 and barclaycard upgrade each, which is good. And BAPP fees would easily pay itself. All you need to do is the spread the spends on all these cards.
Thanks for your input. I guess I was thinking of putting the spending on the Platinum card instead of the BAPP card after qualifying for the 241 voucher in order to build up my profile for the Centurion card in the future. Does anyone know if it would actually make any difference when Amex comes to making an invite for the Centurion if someone was to spend on BAPP as opposed to the Platinum?
You can, but don’t be surprised if Amex decide they don’t want your business at some point. If you harbour any serious ambition for a Centurion invite then endless churning is not the right approach.
Don’t dismiss the Gold card, every £5K spent earns an extra 2.5K member rewards up to £25K.
As mentioned above chiselling at the BAPP refund is an odd approach for someone that wants a card costing thousands a year.
@scinar you have arrived at the churning party just as the staff are clearing up. The world around has changed a lot and Amex has got a lot fussier/selective.
I guess I was thinking of putting the spending on the Platinum card instead of the BAPP card after qualifying for the 241 voucher in order to build up my profile for the Centurion card in the future. Does anyone know if it would actually make any difference when Amex comes to making an invite for the Centurion if someone was to spend on BAPP as opposed to the Platinum?
Centurion invites depend on the type of spend – high spending on hotels, flights and luxury products.
If you are big spender, why not earning more Avios with BAPP?
For every £10k spent a year, BAPP gives you 5k more Avios than gold or plat.
If you hit the vaucher in two months, that means that BAPP would give you 25-30k Avios more a year. That’s nonnegligible and It’d make up the fee easily if you are a bigger spender. As most would agree, 241 voucher is the best reward there is in the UK and its value completely depends on how much avios you are willing to spend. You can “waste” the voucher with ClubEurope flights to Paris, or use it for overseas long distance flights — for which you need Avios.Get the voucher-cancel-apply again cycle may backfire — you may need to wait at least 3 months and there is no guarantee that Amex would grant you the BAPP card.
The best strategy would be to get BAPP for yourself and player 2 and keep the cards. If you want Plat, get one and give player 2 a supplement. Since you already have the Barclayscards, you’d have 2 vouchers for 241 and barclaycard upgrade each, which is good. And BAPP fees would easily pay itself. All you need to do is the spread the spends on all these cards.
Thanks for your input. I guess I was thinking of putting the spending on the Platinum card instead of the BAPP card after qualifying for the 241 voucher in order to build up my profile for the Centurion card in the future. Does anyone know if it would actually make any difference when Amex comes to making an invite for the Centurion if someone was to spend on BAPP as opposed to the Platinum?
I am not targeting Centurion at all and wouldn’t even want the card. But: I have a BAPP and Plat, and I never even use the Plat — except for Offers, Bicester Village and car rentals, perhaps. Many people already mentioned, Cent people look at the type of spend. Otherwise, selfemployed people can put a lot of their expenses on a personal card to pump up the spend, but we know that doesn’t work. (I have a relative who is a self-employed producer in LA and NY, and about a million a year go thru her personal card, I was told, yet no Centurion — it is all catering, car rental etc, rather than Harrods, Saks etc spend)
There were some old AMAs with Centurion concierges on Reddit, but that was before the pandemic. I’d not assume Amex would be as generous with their credit line any more.
For example, I made the mistake of canceling my BAPP last year after hitting the voucher. Waited 4-5 months and reapplied, but my application didn’t go thru due to a technical glitch. Eventually, I had to wait few more months, spent so much time with useless amex cust services. At the end, I got the card, but they slashed my credit limit by half practically. Never again!
There is a cost to your time for the cancel/reapply game, and declining quality of amex cust services suggests that it’ll be more annoying and time consuming in the future.Curious on what benefits from the Centurion card you are interested in? I got the impression that it costs more than you get back.
I was curious so googled… brought me back to an article on this site!
I was curious so googled… brought me back to an article on this site!
I went back to re-read, forgot about the £25k per MONTH(!) spend needed to get on amex’s radar. What is £20.83 monthly BAPP fee when you are spending £25k per month (0.083% of monthly spend).
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