Just call me Baldrick. Because I have a plan more cunning than "a fox who’s just been appointed Professor of Cunning at Oxford University" There are trusted people in my life who have no interest in earning free rewards, people like my mum, best mate, neice, etc. So what if, with their full knowledge and agreement, I referred them for a card which they never use themselves. But they request a supplementary card for me (possibly additional rewards) and then I spend on it and manage the entire account on their behalf, making all the payments ? The biggest issues I can see are these, assuming trust and rogue spend are no problem : 1. how can they transfer their points to me ? I'm hoping you experts have already got ideas for some convoluted myriad of transfers which would enable the points to eventually get into an account with my name on it. 2. can we setup the direct debit from a bank account which is in my name and not theirs ? less of an issue as I can always transfer money to them, but DD is always better.
1) They can't transfer points to someone else - as you are the one who gets all the points as they are on your account via supplementary card. 2) no, but you can filter for total spending amount per person via the statement section on the app
Darren I didn't make my idea clear. I want to refer them and get the referral. Then they get their own account and their own card, and earn their own membership rewards. But they won't use their card because they are not bothered. Instead they will get me a supplementary card on their account, so my spend will earn their membership rewards; my spend will hit their spend threshold and I will pay all their bills.
On the trust and rogue spend elements, the only thing I would say is just to be ultra ultra cautious about it - not really because of trust, but just because of any potential credit rating complications it might cause them and because people aren't always comfortable discussing financial stuff openly. Re transferring the points to you, it depends what you want to do with them. I'm honestly not sure if Amex still let you transfer points to someone else when closing an account, but let's assume that's not possible. Rather than trying to transfer directly from their amex account to your airline/hotel account, I'd just do it indirectly. On the airline front, Avios is an option (if you got a bit creative with the 'household' account), similarly Etihad would work I think. Re hotels, Hilton and Marriott would be no problem whatsoever (both allow free transfers) and Radisson can be done too though there might be a couple more hoops there I think. Of course, if you chose Marriott, you could then transfer from your Marriott account to the airline programme of your choice.
Thanks very much Joe. I had wondered about Hilton as an intermediary, and can see from my own account how simple it would be.
Well to me the 9k points are worth about £150 min value in air miles using for business class redemption
Came back to planning this, and found the below site with an interesting idea; just set the destination for membership points to be MY BA exec account on the other person's AMEX account, once I am an authorised person (assume that means supplementary card holder). https://thetravelsisters.com/transfer-amex-membership-rewards-points-to-another-person-spouse/
I'm not sure if that would work or not. It might do, but I've never tried it. The site is American so the rules there could well be different. If you're thinking Avios though, a BA household account should be fine (though may require a little bit of 'creativity' in terms of the address they give when setting up their BA account, assuming they don't actually live with you).
I have got the BA Household account setup and registered my wife with her BA exec number; once I get my wife referred on Amex and she has her online Amex account, I will see what looks to be available. And report back.
Haha Amex are reading this and thinking... great another loophole to close. Would it not be simpler just to try get referrals via this web rather than roping in your family/friends to your financial en-devours?
I have an update on this. Have now referred my wife for the preferred gold card, helped her activate it, then requested a supplementary card for me and received the instant 3000 reward points for doing so. Set my own BA exec club account as the one to transfer membership rewards points to, and have just verified that those 3000 have been confirmed in my account now. So no need to use the household account options and confuse things.
Further updates so far. My wife has also got her own BA Amex card now, and we have just hit the threshold spend for the 26000 bonus Avios. They are set to drop, into MY BA account very soon, to follow the 3000 which dropped when she requested the supplementary card for me. The final thing will be to get her 2 4 1 voucher to also hit MY account, and then we will be closing her BA Amex for the pro rate fee refund, and continuing to use mine, until such time as I am ready to look at Platinum. One of Joe's other semi recent posts on Platinum referrals has me cooking up another scheme.
Not really sure what the benefit of this is unless you are putting their spending through the card. Gnoming is pretty basic but the trust issues both ways are pretty bloody obvious. Very poor ROI timewise I think.
Cinereus that's exactly what we are doing. She has a BA Amex in her name, and and I have a supplementary card on the account. All our spending, where Amex is accepted, goes on those cards now towards the spend threshold. It's just day to day use, replacing the Amex BA account which was in my name, so there is no time invested in anything. As soon as she qualifies for the 241 voucher and it hits my BA account, her BA Amex will be closed for good (until she qualifies for the next referral) and we will get back the pro-rata fee.
I've clearly not logged on for a while, as I only just saw your question. It was definitely 26000 for me. Their website says 25000 now, but it was 26000 via referral.
