Earn Up To 100,000 Avios With theBritish Airways Visa Signature® Card

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Earn Up To 100,000 Avios With theBritish Airways Visa Signature® Card

Welcome bonus:

You can earn 50K British Airways Avios for opening the British Airways Visa Signature® Card and spending $3,000 in 3 months. You can earn another 50K bonus Avios for spending an additional $17,000 in 12 months.

Annual fee: 

There is a $95 annual fee, though the signup bonus is worth well more than that.

Welcome bonus terms and 5/24: 

You can get the bonus as long as you don’t have an active Chase British Airways card and haven’t received a signup bonus on the Chase British Airways card in the past 24 months.

All Chase cards appear to be subject to 5/24 restrictions, meaning that you are not likely to be approved if you have been approved for 5 or more consumer credit cards in the past 24 months. Note that the Chase system automatically counts cards like authorized user cards and store cards as cards that count towards 5/24, but if you explain to Chase that those cards are merely authorized user cards or store cards they can manually approve you for a new card.

You can check your credit report for free at the federally authorized annualcreditreport.com to check how many accounts are shows as being open in the past 24 months.

Card earnings: 

• 1 Avios per dollar everywhere
• 3 Avios per dollar on British Airways purchases.
• There are no foreign transaction fees.

Companion Ticket: 

If you spend $30,000 in a calendar year you will receive a Travel Together Ticket valid for two years when you redeem Avios for a flight on British Airways. Taxes and fuel surcharges apply.

Save On British Airways Flights:

Cardholders receive 10% off all paid BA tickets.

Spend Threshold:

You’ll need to spend $3,000 on this card within 3 months for 50K bonus points and another $17,000 within 12 months for another 50,000 bonus points. If you spend $30,000 in a calendar year you’ll also earn a companion ticket.

You can pay your federal taxes for a 1.87% fee. If you overpay your taxes you can request a refund or apply it to your next year’s taxes.

My local natural gas company allows me to prepay up to $1,000 on a credit card for a $1.65 flat fee. That’s a great way to earn miles and help meet a spend threshold. My electricity supplier allows me to pay with a credit card for free as long as I am enrolled in autopay.

British Airways Avios Award Chart:

Here is the new BA Avios award chart for partner airlines that I’ve put together (as BA still hasn’t published it) for flying on a single partner airline:

Sample Avios uses:

• 6,000 Avios is enough for a one-way short-haul ticket from Iguazu Falls-Sao Paulo, Johannesburg-Victoria Falls, Hong Kong to Taiwan, and Melbourne to Sydney.
• 7,500 Avios is enough for a one-way short-haul ticket between New York and places like Boston, Cleveland, Detroit, Montreal, Pittsburgh, or Toronto, or between Miami and the Bahamas or Cancun.
• 9,000 Avios is enough for a one-way short-haul ticket between New York and places like Bermuda, Chicago, Miami, or Orlando, or between LA and Cabo on OneWorld partner American.
• 11,000 Avios is enough for a one-way flight between Chicago and LA, Hong Kong to Singapore, or JFK to Cancun.
• 13,000 Avios is enough for a one-way flight between the west coast and any of the Hawaiian islands or between New York and the west coast.
• 20,750 Avios is enough for a one-way flight between Dallas and Hawaii or New York and London (though you’ll be hit with fuel surcharges for crossing the Atlantic on most airlines).
• 25,750 Avios is enough for a one-way flight between New York and Brazil or Argentina.
• 36,250 Avios is enough for a one-way flight between the US and Hong Kong in coach. Note that Hong Kong is an exception route and routes like JFK-Hong Kong are charged as a zone 8 award even if it should be a zone 9 award.
• 38,750 Avios is enough for a one-way flight in lie-flat business class on Cathay Pacific from JFK to Vancouver with no fuel surcharges.
• 51,500 Avios is enough for a one-way flight in lie-flat first class on Cathay Pacific from JFK to Vancouver with no fuel surcharges.

Iberia Avios:

You can also transfer transfer BA Avios to Iberia. You can combine Avios via this link via the BA site. Sometimes that link doesn’t work so you can also try this link on the Iberia site to combine points.

You can save Avios on some routes by with Iberia Avios. Iberia’s awards start at 11K Avios round-trip. However Iberia partner awards are not changeable or cancellable, so you’ll typically want to use British Airways Avios to book partner award travel.

About British Airways Avios:

In 2011 BA launched the Avios program and it provides a great value for short-haul flights. Unfortunately their domestic OneWorld partner, American, has been stingy with award availability since they merged with USAirways, but there are still bargains to be had.

• There are no expedite or close-in fees for last minute award ticket bookings with BA Avios. That saves you $75 compared to other programs.
• Earning or redeeming any amount of Avios extends your entire account validity for another 36 months.
• You can cancel tickets and redeposit miles for the lesser of $55 or the taxes you paid.  That means you pay just $5.60 to cancel a one-way domestic itinerary (and you always should book domestic flights as one-ways). That saves you up to $200 compared to other programs when you need to cancel.
• British Airways only charges 10% extra miles for a lap child flying internationally, even when traveling on AA. AA and other domestic carriers charge a whopping 10% of the full fare, which can add up to be a small fortune.
• You can search American and Alaska award availability on AA.com by looking for sAAver awards. BA can’t book AAnytime awards, but you should be able to find all AA sAAver awards on BA.com. BA.com does not display all available awards on all airlines, airlines like Alaska, Aer Lingus, and LATAM have to be booked over the phone.  Additionally you will have to call BA to make a booking if you see a sAAver award on AA.com that’s not showing on BA.com.

Avoiding fuel surcharges:

• There are no fuel surcharges for travel on American within the Western Hemisphere. Flights start at 7,500 Avios plus $5.60.
• Alaska flights have no fuel surcharges systemwide, these flights can only be booked over the phone.
• LATAM flights have no fuel surcharges systemwide. Many of their flights can only be booked over the phone.
• Flights within Australia, Europe, Japan, and many other countries and regions have little to no fuel surcharges.
• There are also no fuel surcharges for flying on Qantas within or from Australia.
• Fuel surcharges on award-winning carrier Cathay Pacific are also very low or non-existent and you don’t even need to fly all the way to Hong Kong (though you should-great city with awesome kosher food, airport lounges with kosher food, and a business or first class flight you’ll never forget!) to get a taste of their awesome bed, seat, pajamas, and amenities. They fly a daily 777 nonstop between JFK and Vancouver which I reviewed in this trip report.
• You can significantly cut the fuel surcharges when flying on Iberia by transferring your BA Avios into Iberia Avios
• British Airways 5th Freedom Flights (flights that don’t depart from or arrive to the UK) have significantly lower fees. For example even though Singapore-Sydney is a longer flight than NYC-London the fees in first class on Singapore-Sydney are less than half of those from NYC-London.
• As long as you have earned a single Avios within the past 12 months then fuel surcharges for intra-Europe and intra-Africa flights will be very low. You can transfer points from AMEX, Chase, or Marriott to activate that benefit.

Will you signup for the Chase British Airways card?