Got a Lloyds Avios Rewards Mastercard credit card? It’s a good time to get a Club Lloyds current account

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If you had the old Lloyds Avios Rewards American Express or Lloyds Duo credit cards, you have probably been switched to the new Lloyds Avios Rewards Mastercard by now. If not, it will happen very soon.

For clarity, before you read on – the Lloyds Avios Rewards Mastercard is NOT available to new applicants. There are no Avios-earning Lloyds Bank credit cards available to new applicants.

What are you earning on your Lloyds Avios Rewards Mastercard?

There were a lot of changes from the old American Express / Mastercard double pack:

the upgrade voucher is dead – the new Mastercard has no ‘long term spend’ bonus
there is no longer be an annual fee, saving £24
there IS now a foreign exchange fees of 3%

This is the earnings rate on your Lloyds Avios Rewards Mastercard:

0.4 Avios per £1 you spend in the UK

0.8 Avios per £1 you spend outside the UK

0.4 Avios per £1 transferred on a balance transfer

Because the Mastercard element of the old Avios Rewards cards was so poor, this actually represents an improvement. You used to get 0.2 Avios per £1 on the Mastercard in the UK and 0.4 Avios per £1 elsewhere.

A lot of people missed the small print about Club Lloyds …..

There is an interesting bit of small print attached to the earnings rates above.

Holders of a Club Lloyds current account earn an extra 0.1 Avios per £1 (0.2 Avios per £1 for foreign transactions).

This means that a Club Lloyds accound holder gets:

0.5 Avios per £1 you spend in the UK

1.0 Avios per £1 you spend outside the UK

0.4 Avios per £1 transferred on a balance transfer

For this to kick in, you must have had a Club Lloyds current account for at least six months.

Why are we mentioning this today?

At present, there is a generous incentive available for opening a Club Lloyds current account.

Take a look at the Club Lloyds website here.

Until 5th November, Club Lloyds will give you £125 if you move your current account to them.

This applies to both the standard account and the Platinum version. Note the terms and conditions which are lengthy.

Technically, the standard account has a £3 monthly fee whilst the Platinum account has a £22 monthly fee. However, the fee for the standard account is waived if you pay in £1,500 per month.

The benefits are not bad, assuming you pay in enough to get the fee waived:

annual benefit of either 6 cinema tickets, an annual magazine subscription, or annual Gourmet Society membership

1% credit interest on balances up to £4,000 and 2% on balances between £4,000 and £5,000 as long as you have two direct debits set up on your account (you would receive £60 per year if you kept at least £5,000 in your account at all times)

The fee for the Platinum account is reduced to £19 per month if you pay in £1,500 monthly. The benefits here look OK but you may already have most of them:

worldwide travel insurance, valid up to 80 years of age (appears comprehensive)

AA breakdown cover

mobile phone insurance

…. plus the benefits of the standard account listed above.

Plus the extra Avios …..

What isn’t mentioned in the benefits above is the additional Avios earned on your Lloyds Avios Rewards Mastercard for having a Club Lloyds account.

If you are spending £2,000 per month on your Mastercard, you’d be earning an extra 200 Avios per month as a Club Lloyds account holder. This clearly isn’t lifechanging but is better than nothing.

If you use your Lloyds credit card abroad – not recommended due to the 3% fee, but perhaps your employer is paying – you will do even better due to the extra 0.2 Avios.

You can find out more about the £125 switching bonus on the Club Lloyds website here.

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

British Airways and Avios

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

will says:

17 Oct17 October 05:33

Just to confirm does the BT rate remain the same for Club Lloyds customers at 0.4/£? Do we have anyone out there who’s tested it to confirm?
- BJ says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 06:55
  
  I’d like to know too. I thought it also increased to 0.5 avios/£. I would be grateful if somebody could also confirm if the £1500 needs to be deposited every anniversary month or every calendar month? The £125 credit was very quick, even before my switch completed.
  - HM says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 08:16
    
    The £1500 needs to be deposited every calendar month – I have a recurring reminder set up to check at the end of the month if fund flows are £1500+ and if not I just bounce some money around to meet the threshold. The £3 fee gets charged and refunded at the start of each calendar month.
    - BJ says:
      
      17 Oct17 October 08:47
      
      Thanks HM.
  - John says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 09:34
    
    In practice it needs to be deposited after interest is paid and before the end of the last working day of the calendar month, else there is a possibility of needing to make a complaint.
- The Streets says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 08:30
  
  Yes I regularly do this and it works at 0.5 avios per £1
  - BJ says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 08:48
    
    Thanks, I thought so.
- Catman99 says:
  
  18 Oct18 October 01:40
  
  I get 0.5 on Balance Transfers (BTs)
pablo says:

17 Oct17 October 06:17

You would earn maximum £60 credit interest per year if you kept £5k in the account because the interest is 1% on balances from £1 up to and including £3999.99 and 2% on any part of the balance from £4,000 up to and including £5,000. In other words the first 4k earn 1% and only the final 1k earns 2%
- Peter K says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 08:32
  
  Correct. The £100 figure in the article is wrong.
  - Rob says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 08:41
    
    Ooops. Fixed, apologies.
PaulC says:

17 Oct17 October 06:38

I spotted my small print from day one and im pretty certain it says 1 extra avios per £10 spent if you hold a Club Lloyds current account not 0.1 point per £1 spent. That makes a difference when spending in multiples of £9.99.
- TGLoyalty says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 08:36
  
  Think that’s just to make it look better as you can’t actually earn 0.1 of an Avios.
  
  Lloyd‘s calculate Avios payable on the final balance of the account not individual transactions and round up rather than down in my experience.
filipino_chino says:

17 Oct17 October 07:19

Had the club lloyds account to act as a savings account for year, never knew about the 0.1 bonus…

You can just bounce £1,500k in and out to make sure you don’t pay any fees…

I get the cinema tickets… 6 VIP tickets with Vue for free – not great, but not bad for free
- John Matrix says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 07:25
  
  Yes cmon but that’s six free cinema *every* year, which is especially great if you’re facing London cinema prices.
  - John says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 09:36
    
    I watch all my movies on Qatar Airways so don’t need to pay London (or anywhere) prices. Anyway some outer London cinemas do flat £5 for everything
Simon says:

17 Oct17 October 07:19

I had the old Lloyds Amex/ Mastercard cards but felt compelled to get rid of them because the customer service was, IME, truly atrocious.
- Doug M says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 10:57
  
  Agreed it is. But so in my experience is pretty much every where else. I have friends that have milked compo from Lloyds because of poor service, and actually like them because of the likelihood of their errors. I have to say on a recent call to Tesco bank the service was excellent, no idea if that was exception or the norm.
Vin says:

17 Oct17 October 07:25

Have just received the replacement Lloyds cards. The letter clearly states that spend on the cards til March 2020 will count towards the Avios upgrade voucher. So perhaps the voucher is not ‘dead’ for all.
- Dave B says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 07:48
  
  The travel insurance accepts a wide range of pre existing medical conditions and lasts until 80.
  - Mark2 says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 08:43
    
    and you can add other conditions at far less than the ‘specialist’ travel insurance policies.
- Nigel says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 08:35
  
  Correct. I got a voucher with spend on the new Mastercard for this year. Runs out July 2020.
- MarkH says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 09:02
  
  That will be your last voucher. After that the upgrade voucher is indeed dead.
  - Anna says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 09:10
    
    Yes – everyone who has had official notice from Lloyds (can’t be many left now who haven’t) have been given until the end of their card year to earn another upgrade voucher. But this is Lloyds so it’s entirely possible that a) the voucher won’t appear and you’ll have to chase it or b) you’ll actually get more than one voucher. I’ve had 5 in 3 years of membership!
- Yorkieflyer says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 09:20
  
  Same here, one more voucher sitting on spend of £6900 till next March
- Gerry says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 10:32
  
  I received a new voucher this week. I have another to book with by the end of this month. I’m sending this from my place in the sun having used another upgrade voucher to get here so they are going to be very sadly missed in my household.
  - Mikeact says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 16:05
    
    +1
Dave says:

17 Oct17 October 08:51

Thanks for this Rob. Pleased to see nothing about Halifax customers being excluded in the T&C’s which I think they’ve done before – may be wrong. Been meaning to ditch my reward account there for a while so this is ideal.
- Andrew says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 09:17
  
  It’s probably a mistake.
  
  Why not keep a BoS (Halifax) account too? Then you can double-dip the discount offers across the brands.
  - Dave says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 12:09
    
    To be honest I’ve already got multiple current accounts and I can’t be bothered to keep the Halifax one anymore or meet the requirements to earn the rewards
- John says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 09:37
  
  Why ditch the reward account, free £24 per year
  - Mark2 says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 10:44
    
    You will only get the £125 if you switch.
    - John says:
      
      17 Oct17 October 11:46
      
      But you can switch from any account (and even open a new account just to switch it)
Adrian says:

17 Oct17 October 09:54

Two questions – a) how do you find out if you’re close to a voucher or you’ve had your last? I last got one back in March and b) do I use this card or an MBNA one that offers 1% cash back?
- Ryan says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 12:06
  
  An MBNA card that offers 1%? News to me, I’ve got 0.5% from the VA MBNA
  - David says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 14:33
    
    I’m vaguely recalling that some people got an enhanced ‘Horzon’ card offer compared to everyone else?
    - David says:
      
      17 Oct17 October 14:33
      
      *Horizon obviously.
- Anna says:
  
  17 Oct17 October 13:06
  
  You should have had a letter advising you of the changes. The bit about earning the last voucher was in the info on the back of one of the pages of my letter, not obvious.
  - Mikeact says:
    
    17 Oct17 October 16:11
    
    Anna, I think what Adrian is asking ,is from a financial aspect! ie Basically, “how much more do I have to spend before the next voucher arrives “? And that, is difficult in my experience.