[Anonymous]

[paulcourt]

Amex (American Express) has increased the annual fee on the British Airways Premium Plus card from £150 to £195! Everything stays the same for the privilege of this increase and you don’t even get access to an Amex lounge! Switch cards time

[SimonS1]

I got rid of my Amex years ago.

Acceptance seems to be declining, again due to high charges, this time to the merchants. For example my local petrol station has ‘No Amex’ all over it.

[AlanOrton1]

If you pay for an Amex Platinum card (£450) the fee for the Premium Plus card is waived.

That said, the Platinum Card was increased from £300 (I think) to £450 about 3 years ago.

Good insurance benefits with the Plat card.
Mrs O receives a complementary Plat card which allows the family of 4 to access Priority Pass lounges without additional cost.
Two of the main reasons we keep the card, along with occasional use of their Fine Resorts & Hotels programme, and the BA 2-4-1 voucher.

[WillieWelsh]

So BA aren’t the only ones demanding more for less.

I gave up on any card I have to pay for at least ten years ago – but then I’m a mean Scot!

[GivingupBA]

Amex suddenly increased their annual fee in the Far East by [if I recall correctly] 400-500% a couple of years ago. It happened to me and I couldn’t believe my eyes. Nothing new was offered to explain/ justify the increase.

I cancelled the card immediately.

[DanielRawson]

AlanOrton1

How do I go about not paying for my BA card since I’ve Amex Plat as well. I wasn’t aware this was the case?

Loved the letter I received today from Amex telling me about changes to the card. The only change was the increase in price, nothing else!!!

[esselle]

If you step back and consider what you get for what you pay, it still represents good value.

Even if BA F is not what it was, getting a free ticket annually in that cabin for £195 cannot be described as poor value.
Spend your £10k on petrol etc, which is very easy to do, and the free ticket is yours.

We’ve done “freebies” in R, to Cape Town, New York, Mumbai, Mauritius, Dubai……what’s the gripe?

[LondonSurgeon]

This is more about credit card fee capping in the EU.

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/news/cards/2015/03/eu-agrees-card-charges-shake-up-but-will-shoppers-actually-pay-less

There were/are concerns that the fees will not be enough to support points and cashbacks from credit cards

[Gin&Tonic]

I ditched the platinum some years ago after the benefit for the fee’s became uneconomic, I could buy the benefits for less that the Amex fee. I retained gold with subs for wife and kids, primarily because there is no cap on transactions and spend, just every no and again due to some exceptional circumstance you need to pay out a lot of money without the need to juggle own accounts etc, and for that Amex is priceless.

[K1ngston]

The Amex Platinum Card here in Singapore is a whopping $1700 I was incredibly polite when I told them to stick where the sun has not shone for many years!!

I think the last time I paid in UK was £350-400 which was a lot but this is ridiculous I will make do with other cards …..

[AlanOrton1]

DanielRawson:

I’d suggest speaking to the people on the Plat tel number.
I had the Plat first and then a few years later signed up for the Premium Plus / BA Amex card.
I asked at the time whether there would be two separate fees and was advised, ‘no’.
This is as best as I remember it from 12+ years ago.

[MartynSinclair]

For how I use it, I think the Plat Card provides tremendous value.

I used to have a Centurion card from the start of the programme, but gave that up some years ago…. for me that had little value..

[peter19]

I feel its still worth while but will bounce between the basic and the premium plus card. I will hit the 10k spend for the second year running so it makes sense just now (to get a voucher each for me and my partner) but after this i may not so will drop it to basic to save the fee and then cough up again if i am near the 10K spend the next year. I also use the Hilton card for getting gold so it just depends what i am targeting when.

[rferguson]

If you make use of all the perks of the BA premium card – spend £3k in first three months for bonus avios, spend £10Kp.a for companion ticket – it still represents good value. The c20K Avios bonus at sign up would cost around £335 if purchased direct from BA. And if you make use of the companion voucher on say a trip that would cost in the region of 150K avios it’s well worth the £195. If the intention is just to collect the Avios per pound spend yes it’s a daft idea to have the card.

In addition – i’ve found the Amex staff in the call centre in brighton to be amongst the friendliest most professional lot i’ve ever dealt with.

[Author]

Posts