British Airways had been planning to move to a revenue-based system of elite status earning since before the pandemic. They announced it was coming back in 2022 and then finally pulled the trigger, with details on December 30th. That’s come under an avalanche of criticism, and they’re taking mitigation measures to ease the pain with customers.
Here are the changes they announced:
- They’re renaming the Executive Club frequent flyer program as The British Airways Club.
- Starting April 1, 2025, how status is earned will be based on spending through the program. You’ll earn 1 Tier Point per £1 on fare, fuel surcharges, and ancillaries such as seat selection and extra baggage.
- And there are new status thresholds. Bronze: 3,500; Silver: 7,500; Gold: 20,000; Gold Guest List: 65,000 (at least 52,000 must come from British Airways-marketed flights, qualifying add-ons, and BA Holidays) with 40,000 to retain (including at least 32,000 from BA-marketed flights, add-ons, and BA Holidays).
- You can earn elite credits by donating money to BA for sustainable aviation fuel (1 tier point and 10 Avios per £1 spent, up to 1,000 Tier Points per year). Vacation packages count towards status (so you can book hotels, etc. and have that count). And British Airways American Express Premium Plus Cardmembers will be able to earn up to 2,500 Tier Points through credit card spending.
Members Found These Changes To Be Brutal
The airline took an absolute shellacking from members and in the press. They’re asking a lot more from members, and not giving members more in return. This change fires a lot of customers!
- A British Airways member who is flying to earn their status (and not booking vacation packages, etc.) would need about £20,000 (~ US$25,000) in qualifying ticket spend to reach Gold status, which is oneworld emerald.
- An American Executive Platinum member has to spend just over $11,000 to keep oneworld emerald status for the next year. (An Executive Platinum member would need just over $18,000 in flight spend to keep their status, but Platinum Pro is oneworld emerald like British Airways Gold is.)
- And fares originating in the U.K. are frequently much less expensive than starting a trip in the U.S.!
BA Is Making It Easier To Earn Status For A Year
British Airways has come out now with what looks like a bit of a rapprochement – they aren’t backing away from the new status model, but they’re offering bonus tier qualifying points instead. They say they always intended to do this but just hadn’t told anyone about it earlier.
With the initial announcement, British Airways shared that new bookings made by February 14, 2025 for travel April 1 onward would receive bonus tier points, on top of the tier points laid out in this new system. Now, they’ve extended the offer of bonus tier points and increased it.
Bookings made by December 31, 2025 for travel starting April 1 onward will earn the following bonuses towards status qualification:
INITIAL OFFER | NEW OFFER | ||
SHORT-HAUL | EURO TRAVELLER (economy) | 50 | 75 |
SHORT-HAUL | CLUB EUROPE (business class) | 100 | 175 |
LONG-HAUL | WORLD TRAVELLER (economy) | 70 | 150 |
LONG-HAUL | WORLD TRAVELLER PLUS (Premium economy) | 140 | 275 |
LONG-HAUL | CLUB WORLD (long-haul business class) | 210 | 400 |
LONG-HAUL | FIRST | 330 | 550 |
And They’re Trying To Reassure Members That The New System Isn’t As Bad As They Think
There are better ways to approach your customers who thought they were in a loyalty relationship.
- Most Golds don’t just squeak into Gold, what does their modeling show about how current elites overall will be affected? That could be useful in comforting members… many have nothing to worry about.
- Help members see what their qualifying spend in the current and last membership year was, so how their current activity ends up!
- And show them what they could do in the program going forward to make up for any shortfall. That could help encourage the kind of behavioral shift they want to see.
Towards that last end, BA is promoting several scenarios for earning status – like earning Silver after:
1x Geneva in Euro Traveller (economy), with bag 343
1x New York in Club World (business) 3,240
1x Singapore in World Traveller Plus (premium economy) 2,561
1 x BAH package to Barbados in World Traveller (economy) 1,429
£300 spent on Sustainable Aviation Fuels 300
And earning Gold with just 16 business class roundtrips – and a vacation package!
13x return flights to Geneva (e.g. a commuter) in Club Europe (business class) 9,971
3x return flights to Club World (business class) to JFK 9,720
A British Airways Holidays package to Tenerife in Euro Traveller economy) 759
It’s disingenuous to suggest this is good for members. I have never seen a program move to revenue-based qualification and make their program better for elite flyers still earning status after the change. But it’s not going to change things for everyone.
What Members Should Do Now
Consider whether these 2025 tier bonuses will help them keep their status. There may be nothing they need to do for a year.
However some people should become free agents, buying on schedule and price or quality (pick Singapore to fly to Singapore and Southeast, Emirates for Dubai, Mideast and South Asia, maybe Delta/Virgin across the Pond).
And other folks might prefer to earn oneworld emerald status through a different program. BA’s Gold doesn’t provide that many benefits over and above oneworld emerald, BA Silver not that many benefits beyond oneworld sapphire. And note that a discounted business class ticket on BA booked through Alaska will earn 250% bonus qualifying miles in addition to flown miles (distance-based).
What British Airways Should Have Considered Instead
British Airways offered a lot of relatively cheap connecting business class fares from Europe to the U.S. over London Heathrow. And that meant they were investing in customers whose business they want (the customers were buying fares BA was selling!) but they don’t want to spend as much rewarding. I suspect that there are also poorly-aligned internal incentives between the airline and loyalty program that may be driving some of the changes.
There’s nothing magical about distance-based status-earning, but revenue-based status isn’t magic either. A 400 pound one-way flight from London to Paris isn’t the same thing as a 400 pound one-way from London to Los Angeles or Hong Kong, yet the program treats them the same. In any case, the value of a loyalty program is in shifting wallet share, earning incremental business the airline wouldn’t otherwise get. It’s not highest gross spend, but spend as a result of the loyalty investment.
It was pretty clear that Delta realized they made a mistake with their fall 2023 announcement of changes to elite status qualifying. They got scared by the response from customers cancelling their co-brand Amex cards, and significantly rolled back the adjustments. And they didn’t revert to them for 2025 either. I guess BA is following Delta’s playbook here – admit defeat without actually saying so, and then see whether the furor dies down and you want to move fully ahead or not later.
But what remains most striking to me here is that in trying to get more card spend, more vacation package bookings, and more ticket spend, they aren’t giving customers any carrot in the process – just a stick.
The move here reminds me of when United Airlines CFO John Rainey said in 2012, “We had certain groups in this program that were over-entitled if you will.” Or when, in August 2002 as Vice President at US Airways, Ben Baldanza said that customers buying inexpensive tickets (that the airline was offering for sale) didn’t represent the kind of loyalty they were looking for.
It may be true that British Airways was overly generous for earning status. That remains to be seen – they also have a lot of premium seats to fill. But as they make the program tougher for status-earning, why not own that but deliver more to the customer at the same time? Declare that status is exclusive – but also more valuable than ever?
The name change alone will make me come running back. And giving loyalty credit for fuel surcharges almost makes them a pleasure to pay.
LOL
Insult added to injury.
The fundamental failure is not creating incentives to spend in all revenue channels. AA’s scheme recognises stand-alone hotel portal bookings, stand-alone car hire bookings, and shopping portal purchases from which AA earns revenues. Not BA. With BA, if I opt to take Eurostar to Paris or Amsterdam, it could capture my hotel spend. But, as it stands, not a quarter farthing.
I love it when I get the stick. 25k gbp is a tough hurdle to get over and I’m not sure what you get for that.
I was only recently exposed to the idea that BA was a “sophisticated” airline. I have always described it as a product that was acceptable only in a society where taking the bus was a reasonable transportation option. Also who spends on green aviation fuel? Get a grip BA.
It’s not surprising to me that they boost the status qualification requirements by a crazy amount and don’t do much of anything to improve the status benefits. It’s what I would expect: they want us to pay more to get the same or less than before. The wild card is how elastic customer demand is once the value proposition of elite status benefits is watered down by the airline. In Delta’s case they could get away with it. BA’s in a harder situation since being London Air alone isn’t sufficient for it to fly like it does, especially since lots of airlines nibble away at BA’s pie until the pie is more like a donut with a massive hole.
Wouldn’t give them a wooden nickel to earn status
The customer service is horrific on the phone strike one
Strike two if you need to cancel within 24 hours you forfeit the award flight losing your points
Strike 3 if you die BA inherits your account and remaining points
Strike 4 redeeming in their program is more expensive than almost all of their one word partners
Strike 5 if you go to thei website it says you have an open screen tab even when you don’t
so they freeze you out of their site
Strike 6 They are horrible to resolve issues
Strike 7 they block their best seats and you can’t even buy bulkheads
Strike 8 Their availability is worse than their partners how is that even possible and more expensive
Strike 9 unhelpful to disability customers on arrival
Why would anyone spend a nickel with these crooks? I’ve moved on
Strike 10 Did I say their food absolutely sucks and is disgusting in first or business?
Strike 11 Crappy lounge food with good presentation if that matters
Strike 12 Finally when flying into Heathrow no available gates so you pack yourselves in to a jam packed bus like a welfare victim standing cheek to cheek in flu season with strangers
BA is horrible I would rather fly American and many other alternatives.
That’s the short list
Agree with much of the above. A ploy surely to thin the ranks of the Club? Many will abandon the airline in the knowledge that they cant make tier status. This on a carrier whose standards in operational reliability and customer service (particularly on line and on the phone – not the air crew) seem to be in free fall.
@ Gary — I’m sure this is too little, too late for a large number of BA elites. They run a horrible airline, which means their stats should be EASIER to attain than other airlines. And, it ain’t….
In before Tim Dunn defends Deltas elite changes because they are the most profitable in the world yada yada yada
I prefer BA to the US 3, particularly for the soft product (if I’m getting Do&Co food, I’m happy), and they also still have a reasonable amount of upgrade space available. That said, it is easier to get OW Emerald through American, which I fly a lot domestically, so don’t really need status on BA.
After working my way to gold for several years BA have yet again not failed to disappoint. Forcing me to book hotels and car hire through them when being a frequent flier do they not think I carry other status which gives me benefit?.
Status access to lounges is great, avios flights are impossible to get and filled up with staff.
Give us some proper benefits please
Loyalty can be a fickle thing
Hi Arthur
SFO-based here.
I would have agreed with you 1000% in preferring BA over the US3, but after a multi-year hiatus, I’ve flown United on my regular trips to London recently and have found both their hard and soft products to be vastly improved over past years. And coupling that with UA’s powerful app capabilities and flexible changes/cancellations, I’m getting more and more sold on them.
(especially since BA keeps flying those old 380’s to SFO 🙂
Too late
After 8 yrs Gold now the connection was broken
They did it
No come back no regrets
Agree with all above. I’ve always been loyal to BA. Default to their (crappy) app and just book. Their planes are knackered. The food is awful. The crew (especially UK to U.S) is generally fed up and unhappy. I fly long haul to UAE and SE Asia. They can’t hope to compete with the quality of Emirates, Qatar, Singapore, Cathay and more. Dated and overpriced. Yet, I still used them and mostly BC or first. So Gold wasn’t of much value but welcome and deserved. As I control my company spend, I will only use BA if it is more convenient and cheaper. The fact Virgin have just matched my status and I’ve binned my BA Amex for Virgin Atlantic + card makes this a matter of principle. Breach of Trust BA.
Ah the glorified Ryanair, unfortunately for BA this could be a self destruct button. As a gold member for the last few years plus family members who are lifetime gold this decision has made flying with another airline far easier. For years we stuck with BA based on executive club status, but like many we know full well there are other airlines who charge similar prices if not better for far better service, far better lounges, far better seating configurations in club and first plus more on board dining options. This move from BA has made that decision even easier and the “tweaks” they have made make absolutely no difference. I am sure many like us will be going elsewhere. As for their holiday packages, what are they really offering that the average holiday company isn’t? These package holiday companies have the same hotels and usually at a cheaper rate also so even if I was going for one of those I may as well go elsewhere as there is no reward for loyalty from BA! So at both ends of the spectrum when travelling in business or higher there’s far better options with a much better customer service etc plus for a quick hop abroad in the sun there’s also cheaper alternatives. Congratulations BA for really paying attention to long term loyal customers who have put up with your rapid decline in customer service, these “tweaks” make absolutely no difference and this whole executive club change needs to go back to the drawing board if you want to keep long time customers.
So, one thing that both American and Finnair have going for them is that you get added LPs (or whatever you call them) for bookings as you move up the status stack. BA isn’t doing that. BA also has quite weak CC status earning, though I know that’s a US vs UK/EU difference.
The real difference is that they’ve basically got something akin to Delta’s hotels program (which I’ve only ever used to burn up the CC credits during “also get MQDs!” specials, basically giving me a few hundred MQDs for free) rather than AA’s (far more lucrative) program. Put simply, if AA could get hotels to give me some significant degree of status recognition at hotels when booking through them, I’d probably toy with binning my Marriott status (though not Hyatt) and they’d get basically all “other” bookings from me. But they also offer “whatever you get from the booking plus ten miles/dollar” (this can easily crack 30 miles/dollar if the hotel is short of customers during the off-season) with their fancy credit card while Delta (and BA) only want to offer one mile per dollar, and that’s a proverbial fart in a hurricane compared to even the internal hotel offerings.
Basically, as others have noted, BA put the “internal” spend threshold /really/ high vs the equivalent elsewhere and doesn’t offer any realistic “other” paths to status. BA really needed to try to roll something out closer to AA’s more mature program with this.
“There’s nothing magical about distance based earnings” Gary are you serious? Maybe not for you but most programs are now spend based. It is magical when you spend a few thousand to earn status that is actually worth it (2nd, 3rd, or top tier) unlike most frequent flyer programs lower tier statuses which require $3-5k in spend.
As most of my flying is between the UK and USA it appears that I would now be better off collecting American Airlines points instead of the new very disappointing British Airways tier points.
Under the new BA system, I might not always be able to retain my silver status in future years but I would certainly be able to retain the silver equivalent under the AA points system.
And let’s be honest how many of us are going earn points by contributing to the BA sustainable fuel program
My silver status was up for renewal in Oct / Nov and new tier points expire at end of March ie. Given my spend pattern it’s impossible to hold onto silver. They are loosing another customer here
Why can’t BA employ common sense and stop trying choke people with carrots! However you look at there generosity it is solely designed to make their massive profits even more massive. My wife and I travel to the states once a year to Denver, (our son works there) and occasionally other longhaul flights.
We once achieved Bronze membership but that slithered away as the points total end each year.
They employing ‘famous cooks’ to redesign the cuisine which just goes from bad to worse. I am old enough to remember BOAC and BEA. BA are second rate and drunk on their false publicity. Unless they really and truly reward loyalty and not other corporate organisations who are paying for the comfy seats they will continue the downward spiral.