whereas converting to frequent-flyer air miles can provide great value. British Airways Concorde Room Review – How luxurious is the Concorde Lounge Heathrow? -Plus you get all the benefits of being an American Express member, such as targeted offers and access to reserved tickets for gigs and events. You can keep your points as long as you have your card. As I mentioned earlier, not all Amex points redemptions are equal, and as we’ll see some provide significantly less Amex points value than others. Heavy travellers can also get value from American Express … However, if you transfer your points to one of American Express’ hotel or airline partners, your points … There are a lot of nuances from there. We can also see that the same iPad is available on the Apple Store website for £399. ( Log Out /  One of the best methods of generating consistently strong value for Amex points redemptions is by converting to Avios points (British Airways air miles). The American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Card offers 10,000 Amex points if you spend £3,000 within the first six months. It’s possible to transfer American Express reward points to Club Eurostar at a rate of 15:1. The best way to get good value if you’re applying for an American Express Card is firstly to maximise your bonus points, using a referral and applying for a free supplementary card (plus earning points on your £3,000 spend) to get 18,000, rather than 10,000 Amex points – and then to find the best value redemptions for your points, which include converting to Avios and booking BA Reward Saver flights, or finding well priced hotel rooms. For those who travel a considerable amount, in some instances the whopping annual fee of £575 pa for the Amex Platinum card can actually be offset by the numerous benefits offered. ( Log Out /  You can our get advice, tips and interesting offers to your inbox for free! You may also be interested in our post about how to transfer and use Amex points. For example, if you want to redeem points at one of Amex’s partner retailers, then normally 10,000 points could be transferred for a £50 voucher. You’ll receive the following transfer rates for each of the Hotel partners: I’ve recently written about SPG and Marriott points and estimate the value to be in the region of 0.5p per point (see my review here). The category-2 Park Inn Radisson Nottingham costs £60 for a night’s stay in 3 months’ time. Radisson Rewards Expiration…, Do Avios Expire? Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. ( Log Out /  Once you have a British Airways Executive Club account, you link it to your Amex account via the ‘Use my Points’ option. No Spam. Based on the above, by saving £399 using 99,470 American Express Rewards points you’ll be receiving an Amex points value of a mere 0.4p per point. With a conversion rate between American Express Rewards and BA Avios at 1:1, this was by far the most lucrative Amex points value I’ve ever achieved! Similar situations will apply with Marriott and Radisson, but in each case 10,000 Amex points should get you a free one night hotel somewhere. However, it’s not always exact science and there can still be significant difference in point value between hotels, so it’s always worth dividing the cash price by the points cost. By redeeming your points as vouchers you’ll receive 0.5p for every reward points. With the Amex EveryDay® Preferred Credit Card, you’ll earn 15,000 American Express Membership Rewards points after spending $1,000 on purchases with your new card in the first three months. Within the article I conclude that the value of an Avios point would ordinarily vary between 0.75p and 1.25p. Now, there are two things that everyone should know from the start. For example Hampton by Hilton at Bristol Airport is priced at £95 on 19th May or just 7,500 Amex/15,000 Hilton points. However, as reward saver seats have a set price, if you book one during a high demand time (e.g. Every time you spend on your American Express ® Card you earn points… Disclaimer: This is an amateur, personal blog and this review is based on my experience of using the card. This could be the difference between gaining £45 to spend on Amazon, or 10,000 Amex points being worth £100+, or in some cases £100’s, on travel. American Express lets you redeem your points for a variety of gift cards, including travel, restaurants and retailers. Nothing here should be construed as financial advice, and it is your own responsibility to ensure that any product is right for your circumstances, and that you access the full and up to date information. I recently discovered that as well as earning points for flying, hotel stays, spending on your credit card, running, walking and cycling, you can also earn them for searching the internet! In this instance you may as well pay for the iPad mini on your credit card (and don’t forget you’ll earn 400 points for spending £400 on the card) and then using the rewards points to pay off your credit card balance at 0.45p per point. ( Log Out /  With a redemption rate of 0.45p per point this would essentially provide a base (or more realistically, worst) case scenario for an Amex points value. With a 1 cent/point value goal, that eliminates many of the inefficient programs offered by American Express… By signing up to Microsoft Rewards with a Microsoft account (which you can easily set up if you don’t already have one), you can earn points … You may not know however that you can increase the sign-up bonus to 12,000 points if you are referred using this link. The final option, and possibly the best, is to redeem with Radisson reward points. Below is a handy table with an average, relatively easily achieved, value for 10,000 Amex points … The chances are you’re reading this article because you’ve recently signed up to an American Express credit card or are planning to do so in the not too distant future and would like to work out what the various sign-up bonuses are really offering. Within this review we’ve looked at a variety of Amex points redemptions and it’s clear to see that not all redemption partners provide good value. American Express EveryDay® Preferred Credit Card. American Express Points can be transferred to a range of partners, the best redemption value can usually be found for travel, but there are also shopping and subscription options. Amex don’t clarify exact point value, but they tend to work out at 1p = 2 points or £1 = 200 points. However, when you book flights, MR points are worth 1 cent apiece on Amex Travel, or 1.54 cents if you have The Business Platinum Card from American Express OPEN and use the 35-percent point … Some will know that it’s actually possible to use Amex Rewards points to pay off your credit card statement. American Express Points can be transferred to a range of partners, the best redemption value can usually be found for travel, but there are also shopping and subscription options. How to earn American Express Membership Rewards points. The best way to earn the Avios points required by the BA Avios Points Calculator This sign-up bonus can be increased to 12,000 points if you use this referral link. In addition, you’ll earn 1 point per £ spent, which means another 3,000 points on the £3,000 spend = total 18,000 Amex points. When do Radisson points expire? For most points currencies, your best rule of thumb is 1% in cash. No charge. – Everything to Know About BA Avios Expiration, The Air France Credit Card UK – Earn Miles for Air France and Others…, British Airways Gold – The Benefits of the BA Executive Club Gold Card. It would also be great if you decided to hang around and check out my other posts via the homepage. So, if you were to pay for this using Amex points, you’d need to transfer 35,875 Amex points … As you typically earn 2 points per $1 spent with your American Express Explorer, this means you'd need to spend $500 on eligible purchases to earn 1,000 points and get $5 of value based … Amex Points Value UK. View all posts by Tim - Take me to the Points. By redeeming your points as vouchers you’ll receive 0.5p for every reward points. We’d strongly recommend avoiding using your points to shop through the American Express website which offers notoriously low points value. Using American Express points for gift cards. The second thing you should know is that the Amex points value is not the same for everyone. Points accrued on basic cards, like the American Express EveryDay card , will typically convert at 0.5 cents per point, while some of the elite cards may offer 1 cent per point. If you’re interested in other current reward credit card options, there’s an excellent summary at ‘The Financial Wilderness.’. (Note the whopping 56.7% representative APR though – this is definitely to be used only as a rewards card, i.e. I’d recommend avoiding these – you’re better off hanging on to the points for future travel than making a quick Amazon redemption. Read next: What can you get with 20,000 Amex points? Jet transcontinental in a lie-flat Business Class suite for 71,000 Velocity Points return. Moscow, Gran Canaria or Malta, (17,000 points return). We will only send you our blog posts and articles. American Express Membership Rewards points are worth different amounts depending on how you use them. No. With an good sign-up bonus of 10,000 points, an ongoing earnings rate of 1 reward point for every £1 you spend on the card and 2 free airport lounge passes, you’ve come to the right conclusion with the Gold card! Microsoft Reward Points. You can read about how I value an Avios point here. I thought I’d start with highlighting the base-case scenario and then work through to methods that drive significantly higher American Express points value. Let’s take a look at a few examples which will provide values in the region of 0.5p to 1.2p. Let’s take a look at a few examples which will provide values in the region of 0.5p to 1.2p. Similarly to the Gold card, you can boost the sign-up bonus from 30,000 reward points to 35,000 reward points by using this referral link. you’ll want to pay your statement in full each month), You can increase the welcome bonus to 12,000 points if you use this referral link. If you like any of the places where Amex points get you … This is a popular first Amex card, due to it’s travel benefits and welcome bonus, although we recently highlighted that the Amex Nectar Credit Card may also be worth considering if you’re primarily interested in the welcome bonus, or not sure you’ll spend £3,000 in 3 months. By far the most popular Membership Rewards card is American Express Preferred Rewards Gold. I recently booked a return flight in school holidays for 9,000 Avios, which was priced at over £1,000. Use the AMEX Points Value Calculator to calculate the dollar value of your Membership Rewards Points based on the redemption options. In doing so we’ll look at the various Amex points redemption options and which one is likely to provide best value for you! Read my review here where I cover the value of each of these perks. You could see points as being ‘free’ and using them any time an opportunity comes up. school holidays), this could end up being worth significantly more. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. How do I redeem American Express Membership … We hope you’ve found this review interesting and please do reach out with any comments. Membership Rewards® Point Summary; BlueBird Alternative to Banking; International Payments for Businesses; Credit Tools and Support. Transfer Points between Hilton Honors and Marriott Bonvoy (formerly SPG). First off, in order to determine the best value of Amex points, we need a baseline to compare it to actual currency. Radisson points are poorer value at the bottom end, with the cheapest UK Park Inn hotels now requiring 28,000 points. If, as above, you accumulate a total of 18,000 points, then you could upgrade this to business class (15,500 points), secure two return seats (18,000 points) or travel further in economy to a zone 3 destination, e.g. – The bonus for a £3,000 spend in 3 months is 10,000 points. When redeeming points, your base-case scenario should be to either use the points to pay off your credit card at 0.45p per point or convert to vouchers at 0.5p. Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email. Fixed Points … If you’re reading from the US, then make sure you visit ‘The Point Calculator’s’ handy American Express Reward Point Calculator to get a better idea of how far your points might go. Below is a handy table with an average, relatively easily achieved, value for 10,000 Amex points with key partners. If you manage to book a reward saver seat on a high demand route, potentially you can get fantastic value out of 10,000 Avios points. Reward saver seats have a fixed price based on which ‘zone’ you’re travelling to. A standard-class ticket would require 1000 Club Eurostar points, which at the aforementioned rate would equate to 15,000 Amex points. Log in to ensure you see the offers for which you are eligible, and then check that the Points value … In the event your Membership Rewards points balance is not enough to cover the charge for the total amount of the subscription, American Express will separately charge the portion of your subscription that you did not cover with points to your American Express Card account and you will receive a statement credit only for the amount of points … Now we’ve seen that the base-case value of an Amex point is in the region of 0.45p. If you are booking travel through the Amex Travel Portal, then you will get 1 cent per point in value. You can enter any amount of points … That’s a dizzying array to choose from, but only eight publicly available Amex … 10,000 Amex points is worth a minimum of £45 (0.45p per point) for shopping, giftcards or statement credit. These points can be converted into Avios air miles. Your email address will not be published. Hilton Honors: 1 Membership Rewards point to 2 Hilton Honors points, Radisson Rewards: 1 Membership Rewards point to 3 Radisson Rewards points, SPG / Marriott: 2 Membership Rewards points to 3 points. By doing this you’d save roughly 11,200 Amex points – that could be enough for a return British Airways flight within Europe! -There is a $75 hotel credit for any bookings of 2 nights+ through the ‘Hotel Collection’. We’ll cover numerous examples below so you can decide what method is likely to provide the best use of Amex points for you. You need (70,000 / 3) 23,333 Amex points for the most expensive hotels and if you assume a £250 per night cash cost then 1p per point is realistic. To get these seats you need to be ready to book early, and quickly, see my post: here.Converting Amex points to Avios via British Airways Executive Club, and using for reward saver flights tends to be a very good use of Amex points. Dad of 4 trying to do some luxury travel on a budget. Gran Canaria, which required the least number of Avios per mile flown, also shows good Avios value at between 1.4p and 1.6p. Avios is one of the most popular points schemes in the UK, and BA Executive Club even has a handy calculator to work out the cost of reward saver flights. Amex Points Redemption with Vouchers. You can see a list of points required for a number of reward redemptions below. However, American Express Rewards provides 3 hotel transfer partners. If you’re new to reward points or just trying out (or considering) your first American Express card then it’s likely you’re wondering what 10,000 Amex membership reward points is worth, and what you’ll get for it. For example, redeeming with Hilton, 10,000 Amex points is worth 20,000 Hilton points (1:2 transfer rate) and will generally get you a standard room priced at around £70, but there could be options worth anywhere in the £50-100 range. That’s almost double the average value – so it’s worth looking at pricing. These are Hilton, Radisson and the recently combined Marriott and Starwood loyalty programmes. If you’re … The hotel partners use dynamic, rather than fixed, points pricing, which means achieving significant increases in value isn’t usually possible. Your email address will not be published. You can enter any amount of points to see how much your points. You’ve most probably done your research and concluded that either the (free for the first year) American Express Gold or premium Platinum credit card are by far the best ways to earn Amex points. When you spend American Express Membership Rewards on Amazon, they're worth 0.7 cent each — a low value compared with other ways you could use them. There are no category-1 hotels in the UK, however there are a few category-2 hotels which would require 15,000 reward points for a redemption. Other airline and hotel partners of Amex return a value up to 8 cents per point! Now we’ve seen that the base-case value of an Amex point is in the region of 0.45p. Required fields are marked *. Tip: You can increase the Gold Card bonus to 12,000 Amex points using our referral link (here) and also bag 3,000 extra Amex points by adding a free supplementary cardholder once you have the card. Hilton Honors are moving towards a revenue-based redemption structure and as such the points value tends to be less than both SPG and Radisson. 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No spam. Fortunately not. If used against your credit card statement, the sign-up bonus of 10,000 points with the American Express Gold card (12,000 if you use this link) could be worth as much as £54. You can learn about how I used American Express reward points and a BA branded credit card to earn enough points in a year to fly from London to Sao Paulo in First Class with British Airways (reviewed here). If you rarely travel then you’re unlikely to want to redeem the points for flights and as such you should base the valuation on your personal circumstances. Whilst this is still not the best way to spend Amex points in the UK it’s a very easy method of redeeming membership rewards points. A minimum of 1000 points is required to transfer to this Partner, and the transfer amount … As we’ve seen, redeeming for a budget Radisson hotel can offer good value of up to 1.2p per point. This calculator can help. Amex EveryDay® Preferred Credit Card from American Express — $95, earn 3x points at US supermarkets (on up to $6,000 spent each calendar year, then 1x), get a 50% points bonus when you … Le Club Accor Credit Card UK – What’s the options? As we’ll see, this is one to avoid at all costs. 10000 Amex points is worth 10000 Avios (1:1 transfer rate), this could get you: 1 Economy Reward Saver Return Flight from London to 50 ‘Zone 1’ destinations including Paris, Amsterdam, Geneva, Copenhagen and Milan (off peak 8,000 points/peak 9,000 points + £35 taxes per person). However as you can read in my BA Club Europe review (short-haul Business Class), I recently managed to achieve a points value in the region of 3.2p per point.