Avios points are pretty well useless now

theonlywayisup

jpsartre wrote: »

You are in the sense that you *could* use a cashback card instead of an Avios/Amex reward card. Of course, both cashback and Avios are free in the sense that both are something that you wouldn't get if you made all your purchases using cash.

Here's an example: Say someone knocks on your door and offers you the choice between a brand new Ferrari and £500. You pick the Ferrari. Did you get it for free? Yes and no. You got it for free in the sense that you didn't have to offer anything up in exchange for the Ferrari. In another sense you paid £500 for it since you declined the £500 in exchange for the car.

What an analogy. The Ferrari or £500.

I rest my case. Or perhaps you don't get it?

Either way I will leave you to your justification that my F and J flights are worth less than your £3 cashback. Each to their own.

jpsartre

theonlywayisup wrote: »

Either way I will leave you to your justification that my F and J flights are worth less than your £3 cashback.

It's not about what's worth more. If you're giving up £3 for an F flight then there's a sense in which that F flight cost you £3. That's a great deal but it's still a cost. Nobody's trying to convince you that you should trade your F flight for £3.

Nick_C

theonlywayisup wrote: »

... perhaps you don't get it)

No disrespect, but you are the one who doesn't get it. We are talking about "opportunity cost". Its a well known principle.

We agree that Avois can get you tremendous value for money, but in many cases they come at a cost.

Avios from Tesco cost 0.4p each. At that price, I think they are worth buying, as I can get a penny value from an Avios.

Avios earned by flying with a One World carrier are completely free.

And my Lloyd's Avios are mainly costing me 0.25p, because that is the amount of cashback I'm foregoing by using my Lloyd's Amex instead of my Nationwide Visa.

CM66

stoneman wrote: »

So not the same thing at all then.

You had to spend £10K on your card, pay the £195 fee for the card, it would have cost you more than £200 more in fees than you stated, God knows what else you left out, probably having to position in JER, shall I go on?

Omitting details to make something sound good is a bit lame.

Actually it was the free BA card, so no fee and £20k spend (all work so no personal costs at all) Positioning flight to Jersey maybe 6k avios and £17.50 ...... not lame to me at all!

Nick_C

CM66 wrote: »

Actually it was the free BA card, so no fee and £20k spend (all work so no personal costs at all) Positioning flight to Jersey maybe 6k avios and £17.50 ...... not lame to me at all!

Nice to be able to put work expenses through it!

For most people, the BAPP card is worth getting despite the £195 fee.

The initial sign up bonus is currently 25,000 Avios v 5,000 for the free card. If you use a 2-4-1 voucher once a year in long haul business class, then you will be spending at least £1000 a year with BA. The BAPP will earn you 3000 Avios on that BA spend instead of 1000 Avios. So that's 22,000 extra Avios in year one for £195.

Plus of course you don't need to keep the paid card for a year; once you have earned your 2-4-1 voucher, you can downgrade to the free card and get a pro-rata refund!