The 2-4-1 voucher with the Virgin credit cards gets easier to use

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The Virgin Atlantic Black credit cards – issued by MBNA (Bank of America) – are a pretty good product. They currently come as a double-pack of an American Express and a Visa card. This model may not continue into the future as Amex fees on co-brand cards to UK retailers are now capped at the same level as Mastercard / Visa at 0.3%.

The annual fee is £140. The representative APR is 57.4% variable, including the annual fee, based on a notional £1,200 credit limit.

The current sign-up bonus is 18,500 miles triggered with your first purchase. This is increased to 21,500 miles if you are referred for the card. Email me at rob at headforpoints.com if you would like me to send you a referral link. My Virgin Black review is here.

Virgin Black

There is also a White card which is free and has a smaller bonus – my review of that card is here.

Two special benefits

There are two benefits for spending on the Black card

When you spend £5,000 on the Black American Express card, you will receive an upgrade to Premium Economy (for one person) when you redeem your Flying Club miles for an Economy class redemption. A 2nd voucher is available when you spend £10,000. These vouchers are issued at the END of your card year, not when you pass the spend target.

Spend £7,500 on the Black American Express card and you will receive a free ticket for a companion (taxes apply) when you purchase a full fare (booking class Y, B, R, L, U, M, W, S or J) cash flight. This voucher is issued as soon as you pass the spend threshold.

You receive the same benefits on the free White card but the thresholds are higher. The upgrade vouchers are issued at £10,000 and £20,000 and the free companion ticket is issued at £15,000.

It is the second benefit – the free companion ticket – that I want to look at today.

My main criticism of this card was that the free companion ticket was fundamentally useless since very few people buy full fare cash tickets. I know that some people got this to work in certain circumstances – you could occasionally find Premium Economy fares that qualify for a few hundred pounds more than the cheapest cash ticket – but this required some knowledge of the Virgin ticketing system and good timing. In any event, unless you needed flexibility, your second ticket would still not be ‘free’ because the ticket you bought would cost more than the cheapest available one.

There has now been some movement on the voucher rules.

The new terms and conditions now say this:

(A full fare qualifying flight are those tickets purchased in booking classes: Y, B, R, L, U, M, E, Q, X, W, S, H and J. Companion rewards cannot be booked online, only over the phone, so agents are able to explain the booking classes at time of booking.)

E, X, Q and H booking classes have been added.

H is a cheap (but not the cheapest) Premium Economy ticket bucket. E, X and Q are Economy ticket buckets.

If you want to know how to book the cheapest ‘X’ class Economy and ‘H’ Premium Economy tickets, I strongly recommend reading this article on Flyertalk. It will tell you everything you need to know.

In plain English, what does this mean?

It means that the 2-4-1 voucher with the Virgin Black and White credit cards now has a little more value.

To be honest, it doesn’t change much in Economy. Because you still have to pay taxes on the 2nd ‘free’ ticket – and taxes make up a large % of the cost of an Economy ticket – you are still not getting a lot of value.

The main benefit seems to be for Premium Economy travellers. You can buy one ticket in H booking class and get a 2nd one at a big discount, probably at least 75% off. The cost of an ‘H’ ticket over the cheapest available Premium Economy ticket should not be that big.

PS. These changes mirror the changes that Virgin made to the ticket classes which can be upgraded using miles. I wrote about those changes back in February.

Want to earn more points from credit cards? – December 2021 update

If you are looking to apply for a new credit or charge card, here are our November 2021 recommendations based on the current sign-up bonus.

You can see our full directory of all UK cards which earn airline or hotel points here. Here are the top current deals:

British Airways BA Amex American Express card

British Airways American Express

5,000 Avios for signing up, no annual fee and an Economy 2-4-1 voucher for spending ….. Read our full review

British Airways BA Premium Plus American Express Amex credit card

British Airways American Express Premium Plus

25,000 Avios and the UK’s most valuable credit card perk – the 2-4-1 companion voucher Read our full review

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold

Your best beginner’s card – 20,000 points, FREE for a year & two airport lounge passes Read our full review

The Platinum Card from American Express

30,000 points and an unbeatable set of travel benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Earning miles and points from small business cards

If you are a sole trader or run a small company, you may also want to check out these offers.

American Express Business Gold

20,000 points sign-up bonus and free for a year Read our full review

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus and a long list of travel benefits Read our full review

British Airways Accelerating Business American Express

30,000 Avios sign-up bonus – plus annual bonuses of up to 30,000 Avios Read our full review

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

The most generous Avios Visa or Mastercard for a limited company Read our full review

For a non-American Express option, we also recommend the Barclaycard Select Cashback card for sole traders and small businesses. It is FREE and you receive 1% cashback on your spending:

Barclaycard Select Cashback Credit Card

1% cashback and no annual fee Read our full review

Category

Virgin Atlantic and Flying Club

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

Mycity says:

14 Apr14 April 07:22

I don’t see a £45 card fee increase and extra Avios sign up as big news I think there must be something else
- Matt says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 07:45
  
  +1
- Genghis says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 07:50
  
  Depends on how big a part points collecting is in your life…
- Dom says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 07:52
  
  If they are now advertising on their page a sign-up bonus to entice new applicants, they can’t really be changing anything that is detailed on there.
  - Mycity says:
    
    14 Apr14 April 08:02
    
    The change may come a few months down the line, hence Raffles Big Announcement headline, I still don’t see the new cost and extra Avios justifying that headline but I may be wrong
    - Rob says:
      
      14 Apr14 April 08:15
      
      There is nothing else to announce today. I didn’t actually have the full details myself apart from the fee and bonus increase – I didn’t know if there would be any other news. Seems not.
      - Ed says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 08:20
        
        I suppose since the devaluation the 2-4-1 became more valuable so perhaps inevitable. Though I would of liked a higher sign up bonus to offset the fee increase
      - harry says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 08:20
        
        was that an edit of ‘big’ [announcement or is it just a figment of my imagination? 🙂
      - Genghis says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 08:22
        
        Lol. So much for the BAPSP card…
      - Worzel says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 08:24
        
        Merely a figment of your imagination Squills! 🙂 .
      - Mycity says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 08:25
        
        No Harry, it defiantly said Big announcement in capitals, it’s had an edit. Raffles been teasing us.
      - Rob says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 08:51
        
        I did not have the full details to be fair – I thought it might be worse than it is.
      - pauldb says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 09:03
        
        I was stalling referring my wife and I’m not too disappointed. I’ll happily take the extra 7k avios for £45, especially now I expect to put more spend on it via Curve and the value of MC/Visa has widened. I suppose we could have had the increased bonus without the fee rise by hey ho.
        I have been pondering is the BA Amex really is a better option than the Lloyds card. Get 2 Lloyds cards staggered 6 months apart and spend £14k across the year with the initial double earning rate: you get 2.5av/£. And you get 2 upgrade vouchers which are virtually as avios-valuable as the Amex voucher if used for ET>CE or off-peak WTP>CW. The inflexibility of the voucher and the mechanics of booking are the downsides, but you now save £195 (writing of the Lloyds fees given the FX deal).
        I hope the fee change doesn’t affect by grandfathered £30 card. If it does I think the BA Amex becomes a churner rather than a long-term as only the sign-up bonus makes it stand-out.
      - luke says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 09:52
        
        bit of a damp squib that big change heehee
        
        was hoping for ba silver for as long as u hold the card…now that would have been newsworthy
Brian says:

14 Apr14 April 07:27

Hi re the Virgin 241, can you fly to/from different places?

E.g. can I fly to NYC and return from Orlando? Or does it have to be NYC/NYC?

Thanks
- Howard says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 07:36
  
  I wonder if the £195 annual fee is just for new application.
- Pol says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 07:39
  
  When I spoke to a flying club rep about it, I was told it books into the same class and under the same conditions as if you booked a companion seat with miles. Therefore you should be able to open jaw with it.
Pid says:

14 Apr14 April 07:54

I was going to cancel my card today as now using my partners card, perhaps best to wait to see the changes.
Rajeh says:

14 Apr14 April 07:54

I think the Virgin upgrade voucher is one way. Am I right?
- Pol says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 08:17
  
  It’s a return, although you can use it to book 2 people one way.
  - Rajen says:
    
    14 Apr14 April 08:27
    
    Where did you see this?
    I have been looking for a clear answer in TCs but nowhere it says the word “return”
    - Ben says:
      
      14 Apr14 April 08:37
      
      Trouble I found with the Virgin vouchers is they expire after a year, I’d have only ever used them if I couldn’t find a cheap Ex-eu J fair. I accumulated 3 of them but as it turned out I always found a cheap fare so they just got wasted.
      - Liz says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 09:42
        
        You only need to book within the year for a date beyond – I got Virgin to confirm this to me – we will be getting our vouchers early June.
    - laikaspacedog says:
      
      14 Apr14 April 09:24
      
      I’ve used them several times before and each voucher is for a return trip. You can split one voucher between two people for a one way trip, too.
    - Pol says:
      
      14 Apr14 April 09:38
      
      If you’re talking about the upgrades, not the companion, I’ve used them several times, one voucher; both as a return and as one way for 2 people.
David Butcher says:

14 Apr14 April 08:33

After the Avios devaluation, and living as I do well away from London, this card became of little use to me. I cancelled mine about two months ago to avoid another year’s fee; the latest increase would have made it even less attractive for me so for once I’ve made the right decision. For me, anyway – I realise others will have different circumstances. Horses for courses I guess.
- Worzel says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 08:37
  
  We are in a similar position David.
  
  Apart from the obvious £45 initial(potential) gain, I wonder what the strategy behind this might be?
- Regional says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 15:50
  
  Ditto.
  
  We fly only to Europe and were using it for business class (even though it’s a rubbish product) but it’s no use now with no free regional flights.
  
  We’ve started using Flybe now where we can and will only take out the BAPP again when we decide to do an infrequent trip to USA, Australia etc.
  
  I’ve asked Amex to offer us the free BAPP as many long standing Platinum card holders have as it would then be worth using again – we’ve had the Platinum card for 30 years so we’ll see what their response is.
  
  The problem we have now is between dumping BAPP and the IHG premium card being taken away (we churned that one) we have no decent cards with £10K target spend to use now and we’re back using our bank of scotland visa again!!
  - Alan says:
    
    15 Apr15 April 04:46
    
    Might be worth you both taking out the Lloyds card if you could each hit the £7k target for the upgrade voucher?
Brian says:

14 Apr14 April 08:35

Just wish Virgin would change its rules so that you can use the companion voucher with points rather than cash, same as BA.
- Pol says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 10:00
  
  +1
David L says:

14 Apr14 April 08:42

Will they grandfather the £150 fee for existing members? If not, I presume we should all just refer our partners and cancel existing cards (once achieved 241) to take advantage of sign up bonus? In fact, I guess we should probably be churning these anyway…

Interestingly in T&C it says Amex could bring forward your membership year where “…a different fee becomes payable…the membership year will run from the date the fee change took effect on our systems.”

Doubtful they will apply this as don’t rememver that happening last time there was a fee increase.
- Will says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 10:20
  
  for the gold card increase from £125 to £140 it was only for new card signups. Those who had the gold card already stayed on £125 (and 7500 bonus MR’s rather than 10,000).
  
  I imagine those on £150 will remain on that level based on the above. Its more a case of if you want the sign up bonus’ I guess
Kip says:

14 Apr14 April 08:59

Re BA Amex, can an existing supplementary card holder apply in their own name and get the sign-up bonus?
- pauldb says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 09:05
  
  Yes. You can even refer your supp card holder and get the double-bonus (as long as they haven’t had their own BA Amex card for 6 months).
  - luke says:
    
    14 Apr14 April 10:10
    
    6 months loosely enforced in my view…I churn it every couple of months and have had no prob getting welcome bonuses so far
    - Mr Fluff says:
      
      14 Apr14 April 11:24
      
      I had a premium card, which I ‘downgraded’ to a free one after hitting getting the bonus and 241 voucher, and still got the sign up bonus on the free card. If I upgrade it to premium again after a few months am I likely to get the sign up bonus again, or should I cancel the free one and reapply separately?
      - Rum says:
        
        14 Apr14 April 16:35
        
        Would be interested to know hoe you applied for the basic card in order to get the bonus target again. Did you do it online with Amex or over the phone with them?
- Rob says:
  
  14 Apr14 April 11:50
  
  Yes, not a problem.