How to fly in Business Class using your British Airways Amex card

The British Airways American Express Premium Plus Card makes flying in Business or First Class a more affordable option for people spending over £10,000 per year on their credit card.

I’m going to share my experience of snaring those coveted British Airways Business Class seats, armed with Avios (airmiles) and a Companion Voucher (giving two Avios flights for the price of one).

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Why choose this card?

For me, the main attraction of this card is the ability to book tickets in Business and First Class cabins at a significant discount to the cash price. Over the last few years, we’ve used our Companion Vouchers to book First and Business Class reward flights to New York, Boston and Tampa for a family of four.

However, it’s not a cheap option given the £10,000 minimum annual spend needed to earn a Companion Voucher, £250 annual fee and high taxes on long-haul flights. Finding reward flights can be time-consuming and requires flexibility on dates and destinations.

How do the costs compare to booking with cash?

To illustrate the potential savings, I priced up two Club World return flights to LA in August 2022, costing 75,000 Avios in total (using a Companion Voucher) and £689 in taxes per person, a significant discount to the cash fare of £2,714 per person. However, given the same Economy flights cost £990, the taxes charged on reward flights in premium cabins are significant.

Best ways to earn Avios points

Booking reward flights requires Avios points, so here are my top 3 ways to earn Avios:

1. Welcome offer: currently 40,000 bonus Avios (until 28 February 2022, normally 25,000 Avios) when you spend £3,000 on the card in the first three months.
2. General rate: collect 1.5 Avios per every £1 spent (3 Avios per £1 on BA).
3. Earn extra Avios: the BA eStore works in a similar way to cashback websites such as Quidco, by visiting the site before clicking through to the retailer’s website. I’ve collected around 15,000 Avios per year via the eStore, with some purchases earning up to 15 Avios per £1.

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How to earn Companion Vouchers

Cardholders receive a Companion Voucher when they spend £10,000 on the card in a membership year. Companion Vouchers are valid for two years. But they can only be used on ‘reward flights’ – flights booked using Avios, not cash. We’ve pooled our family’s Avios into a Household Account (including under 18s) to redeem against reward flights.

The person earning the Companion Voucher must travel on the booking. However, their ‘companion’ doesn’t have to be a family member. Supplementary cardholders do not earn their own Companion Voucher, although their expenditure counts towards the £10,000 minimum spend.

How to book reward flights

Reward seats are released 355 days in advance, although more can be added later. I’ve found it easier to find reward seats since BA doubled the number of reward seats to four Club World (Business Class) seats for every flight.

From my experience, it’s easier to find reward flights to destinations with several flights a day (such as New York and Chicago) than to destinations such as the Caribbean and Australia. It’s also more difficult to find reward flights in school holidays.

It’s worth keeping an eye on the taxes. BA introduced the Reward Flight Saver (with reduced taxes from £1) to combat the issue of disproportionately high taxes on short-haul economy reward flights, although these are not always available for Companion Voucher bookings.

Using Companion Vouchers on long-haul flights maximises the value of your ‘two for one’ Companion Voucher. If I booked a return Business Class flight to Johannesburg in November 2022, then I’d be getting the equivalent of 125,000 ‘free’ Avios for the person using the Companion Voucher, compared to 40,000 Avios flying to Madrid.  

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What are the cancellation options?

Given the uncertainty around travelling abroad in the pandemic, I like the flexibility of being able to cancel reward flights up to 24 hours before the outbound flight (for a £35 per person cancellation fee). 

An alternative option is a Future Travel Voucher that ‘freezes’ the Companion Voucher, taxes paid and Avios for use against a future reward flight booking with no cancellation fees. We opted for the voucher when we recently cancelled a reward flight booking as our Companion Vouchers were due to expire. This extended their validity until September 2023.