What is a "Companion Voucher"?

blindman

jumperabv3 wrote: »

This page includes terms and conditions ... where can I find a definition of WHAT THIS ACTUALLY IS ... is this a "duplicate" ticket for another companion? If I buy a Business class ticket, then the companion gets the same for free?

For a possibly clearer explanation of what this is and if it's worth getting look at Headforpoints

Though if you didn't know in the first instance when applying for the card maybe it isn't for you :cool:

malkie76

You pay for a flight with avois, and a friend comes too for no additional avios. You pay fees and taxes on both tickets. Tickets are cabin matched (ie buy one business ticket then get one free), but there must be availability for avios bookings in your cabin of choices on your date of choice (unless you have a 'joker', which only applies to higher status members).

You must fly on a BA plane, not a code share with other airlines.

You may wish to upgrade from your current BA Amex to the Premier Plus one which triggers at £10k spend rather than £20k. You earn more per spend, but you pay an annual fee of £150.

lutonlagerlout

myself and my brother in law have been playing this game for 2 years
he referred me for an amex gold card ,he received 9000 point and I received 20000 on minimum spend in 3 months

we then refereed as many friends and family as possible and spent as much as we could afford on big ticket items (holidays,kitchens,electrical goods,meals out etc)

you then transfer your point to a BA executive club account and after a 6 month hiatus (minimum between amex cards) you spend the required 10k on that and bingo hopefully we have enough for 4 business class returns to pretty much anywhere in the world

this is a simplified version but I have found that lately more and more small retailers are accepting amex, as amex are matching visa and mastercards terms for corner shops etc

its a long game but in our opinion the best value is to be had with the long haul business class flights

cheers tony:beer:

silvercar

malkie76 wrote: »

You pay for a flight with avois, and a friend comes too for no additional avios. You pay fees and taxes on both tickets. Tickets are cabin matched (ie buy one business ticket then get one free), but there must be availability for avios bookings in your cabin of choices on your date of choice (unless you have a 'joker', which only applies to higher status members).

You must fly on a BA plane, not a code share with other airlines.

You may wish to upgrade from your current BA Amex to the Premier Plus one which triggers at £10k spend rather than £20k. You earn more per spend, but you pay an annual fee of £150.

Good summary.

To add, you can only be given one companion voucher a year on each Amex. For a couple that are big spenders, you could have one Amex each to get 2 a year.

We flew business class return London to Las Vegas/ Los Angeles last year.

The hardest thing is to find flight availability: there has to be 2 reward (Avios) flights available for the trip.

The more expensive Amex gives you a 2 year validity on your companion voucher.

malkie76

The 'more expensive' Premier Plus card does allow you to have 2 companion vouchers banked at any one time, and like you say have 24months validity.

This means you have get 4 tickets for the price of 2 on a single flight (subjective to availability and you still pay fees).

The card holder must be one of the passengers, and the card must be used to pay the fees.

blindman

Mrs B has the Amex card and we're flying First class LHR-RIO, then back from Sao Paulo-LHR in March :T

Won't be using the Amex route again though as flying from Ex UK airports and being able to use Avios on Non Ba metal are better options IMHO

Handy tool for looking for Avios reward availability on BA

It's also an app

jumperabv3

malkie76 wrote: »

You pay for a flight with avois, and a friend comes too for no additional avios. You pay fees and taxes on both tickets. Tickets are cabin matched (ie buy one business ticket then get one free), but there must be availability for avios bookings in your cabin of choices on your date of choice (unless you have a 'joker', which only applies to higher status members).

You must fly on a BA plane, not a code share with other airlines.

You may wish to upgrade from your current BA Amex to the Premier Plus one which triggers at £10k spend rather than £20k. You earn more per spend, but you pay an annual fee of £150.

Thank you for explaining it so well.
Thanks.

jumperabv3

I used to have Silver VIP in Moneybookers but unfortunately I'm Bronze now ... (or maybe that's fortunately as gambling is not my thing anymore).

Every 2-3 weeks Moneybookers lets me deposit up to 550 GBP ... so if I deposit 550 GBP I pay around 6 GBP fee with the BA AMEX Card, and then around 2.5 GBP to withdraw the funds, so it's like 8.50 GBP fee to get 550 Avios PLUS I spent 550 GBP out of the 20,000 GBP required.

20,000 / 550 = 36
36 x 8.50 = 306 GBP

Is it worth spending around 300 GBP just to get 20,000 Avios plus a Companion Voucher?

Moneybookers let me deposit and withdraw the funds immediately, I don't need to risk those funds or deposit them, in fact I get the withdrawal back usually same day and it takes 2-3 days for the charge to appear in the BA website, so I can actually earn interest on those funds until I pay them back to the BA Card.

What do you think about this system?

callum9999

jumperabv3 wrote: »

I used to have Silver VIP in Moneybookers but unfortunately I'm Bronze now ... (or maybe that's fortunately as gambling is not my thing anymore).

Every 2-3 weeks Moneybookers lets me deposit up to 550 GBP ... so if I deposit 550 GBP I pay around 6 GBP fee with the BA AMEX Card, and then around 2.5 GBP to withdraw the funds, so it's like 8.50 GBP fee to get 550 Avios PLUS I spent 550 GBP out of the 20,000 GBP required.

20,000 / 550 = 36
36 x 8.50 = 306 GBP

Is it worth spending around 300 GBP just to get 20,000 Avios plus a Companion Voucher?

Moneybookers let me deposit and withdraw the funds immediately, I don't need to risk those funds or deposit them, in fact I get the withdrawal back usually same day and it takes 2-3 days for the charge to appear in the BA website, so I can actually earn interest on those funds until I pay them back to the BA Card.

What do you think about this system?

That depends on how much getting a companion voucher would save you, and whether you can get it with normal spending or not.

It also relies on AMEX treating Moneybookers as a purchase and not a cash advance - are you sure you get points for depositing there?

Personally, if the companion voucher saves you £200 or more then I'd say it's worthwhile. It purely depends on what you'll use it for though.

jumperabv3

callum9999 wrote: »

That depends on how much getting a companion voucher would save you, and whether you can get it with normal spending or not.

It also relies on AMEX treating Moneybookers as a purchase and not a cash advance - are you sure you get points for depositing there?

Personally, if the companion voucher saves you £200 or more then I'd say it's worthwhile. It purely depends on what you'll use it for though.

Yes, I've done some purchases before with the AMEX card & Moneybookers, you do get Avios and the purchases do count towards the 20k requirement. That is 100% based on my experience.

I am expecting to make some purchases with this card and not only with Moneybookers but I was thinking of using Moneybookers just to meet the 20k requirements ... just not sure if this voucher is worth it or not .... I think it would be a good thing to treat my wife nicely and I should have with this voucher over 50,000 Avios which is enough for Business class for some BA flights etc.