Changes to British Airways ‘Gold Upgrade for 2’ vouchers announced

If you are a British Airways Gold Guest List member, you will have received an email from British Airways about changes to the ‘Gold upgrade’ benefit.

Earn 2500 BA tier points in a year and you receive a voucher known as a GUF2 in the trade.  This lets you upgrade a cash ticket by one class (more details on ba.com here).  These can be used in two ways:

Book a cash ticket via ba.com and you can upgrade to the next category if there is Avios reward availability in the higher class

Book a cash ticket via a travel agent and you can upgrade to the next category if there are cash tickets available in the cheapest ticket bucket (‘I’ for Club World, ‘A’ for First Class) in the higher class

Using a travel agent means that you have substantially better chances of finding availability to use your GUF2 voucher.  The snag is that few travel agents know how to process the upgrade – the best bet is to use a specialist such as Propeller Travel.

Under BA’s changes, you no longer need to have your travel agent process the upgrade.  You can book a standard ticket via the agent and then contact BA to upgrade the ticket.

There is a snag, however.  If BA upgrades it for you, it will only do so if there is Avios reward availability in the higher class.  You need to continue to have the travel agent process the upgrade if there are no Avios seats available in the higher class but there are I/A class cash tickets available.

How to earn Avios from UK credit cards (December 2021)

As a reminder, there are various ways of earning Avios points from UK credit cards.  Many cards also have generous sign-up bonuses!

There are two official British Airways American Express cards with attractive sign-up bonuses:

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 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

You can also get generous sign-up bonuses by applying for American Express cards which earn Membership Rewards points, such as:

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

Run your own business?

We recommend Capital On Tap for limited companies. You earn 1 Avios per £1 which is impressive for a Visa card, along with a sign-up bonus worth 10,500 Avios:

Capital On Tap Business Rewards Visa

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

You should also consider the British Airways Accelerating Business credit card. This is open to sole traders as well as limited companies and has a 30,000 Avios sign-up bonus:

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

Click here to read our detailed summary of all UK credit cards which earn Avios. This includes both personal and small business cards.

(Want to earn more Avios?  Click here to visit our home page for our latest articles on earning and spending your Avios points and click here to see how to earn more Avios this month from offers and promotions.)