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British Airways to offer app-based BAEC cards, scraps plastic cards for Blue

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According to Business Traveller, British Airways is about to roll out digital membership cards for the British Airways Executive Club.

It will appear in the next update to the existing British Airways iOS and Android apps, and will presumably (on iOS) integrate into ‘Passbook’.  The screenshot provided by BA look pretty smart:

BAEC-app-smartphone-account-screen

…. with most of the membership information currently found at ba.com copied over.

The introduction of the app-based card will coincide with the removal of plastic cards for Blue members.  You will now have to achieve Bronze status or higher in order to receive a piece of plastic through your letterbox.


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Comments (20)

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

  • Frenske says:

    Good for environment and less cost for BA. I don’t like having too many cards in wallet, so often I don’t have card with me anyway.

  • Jenni says:

    Good move. I always found the Blue card pointless, I mean what are you supposed to do with it?

    • JQ says:

      It’s for people who fly very occasionally and book their tickets with a travel agent in person or something. They need to bring their Blue card to the airport because they don’t realise they can just write the number on a piece of paper. Although I don’t know how they would get a blue card, perhaps they phone up BA to order it.

      • flyforfun says:

        Also “required” for when rocking up to Avis to take advantage of their 2nd person drives free instead of the ludicrous daily extra charge.

        Saying that, when I’ve used Avis, they didn’t ask to see the card anyway and I assume that as the booking came via BA.com it was fine.

  • Brian says:

    Just out of interest, do you actually need to show your Silver Card to gain access to lounges or are you in the system? I will be triggering Silver status in January, but will not be home for a couple of months after that and I don’t have a smart phone.

    • Alba says:

      It should be fine as long as your BAEC number is associated with your ticket.

    • Brian Peers says:

      Brian – I had a similar but reverse issue. I had recently qualified as AA Platinum (~ BA Silver) and was trying to get into the BA lounge in Amsterdam. I had significant problems as the BA system was had not updated to my AA status, I managed to get in after several phone calls and showing my virtual ‘AA’ card. The lady impressed upon me the fact that the plastic card is king and she was doing me a ‘favour’. You might have the reverse issue trying to get into other Oneworld lounges.

    • Roger Wilco says:

      Some contract lounges want to see the plastic – TLL and BUD comes to mind.

  • Cheshire Pete says:

    I hope they fix the bug I encountered yesterday when using a Flight Transfer at T5. I’d landed back and run out of Data but had checked in and downloaded my boarding pass. Showed this OK at the entrance to flight connections. But after passport control the App had reverted to not showing anything in my account! So I couldn’t show my boarding pass at the final exit from Flight Connections before security.

    Obviously this should not happen with the App in Off Line mode.

    By the way I’d never use Flight Connections again when going back to Domestic. It is a complete joke with just 1 immigration officer which makes Fast Track unworkable. Even the fast track security afterwards was a complete joke with everyone just mixed up.

    Next time I will leave via the normal extra and re enter! Thanks BA for another joke of a system you have there.

    • RIccati says:

      It is the same for connections at other Terminals and has to do with Heathrow services (the charge for which on an international ticket is above 50 quid on connection on top of Government taxes).

  • go here says:

    go here

    British Airways to offer virtual Executive Club cards

  • Oh! Matron! says:

    I was rather impressed with the KLM lounge that BA use at Schipol… I couldn’t find my Cathay Pacific card anywhere and proceeded to log in so I could show the kind lady my status. No worries, she says, just go in… I did eventually manage to log in and show her, but she replied with “I trust you!”

  • sinizter says:

    Sounds good. No idea where my card is anyway … Or whether I even received one.

  • Andrew S says:

    I dont beleive blue cards have been sent in the post for quite a while, you are invited to print a paper version…

    • Jimmy says:

      Got my plastic Blue card in the last month or two, having unceremoniously crashed out from the dizzying heights of Bronze.

      It’s not the most worthwhile of cards, I grant you.

    • flyforfun says:

      Up until recently you could ask for a Blue card. Maybe I’ll ask for another just for old time sake. I like my collection of airline cards I’ve got and one day I plan to put them in some sort of artwork!! 🙂

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