Chase Removes The Annual Fee For The First Year on Their British Airways Card

The Offer

Direct link (currently no links without affiliate links are available. In the mean time you can use the DD link if you like)

• British Airways Visa Signature Card now has the annual fee removed ($95) for the first year. Here are the key marketing bullets for this card:
  • 50,000 bonus British Airways Avios when you spend $2,000 or more within the first three months
  • Card earns at the following rates:
    • 2.5x points on all British Airways purchases
    • 1.25x points on all purchases
  • Travel Together Ticker: If you spend more than $30,000 in a calendar year which is valid for two years. More details can be found here.
  • Other card benefits:
    • EMV Chip + Signature
    • No foreign transaction fees
    • Standard Visa signature benefits

The Fine Print

• Sign up bonus only valid if you’ve not held this card in the last 24 months (you can view more about which cards are churnable by clicking here)

Our Verdict

The bonus on this card has been as high as 100,000 on this card before (the annual fee was not waived on that offer, back in November 2012 and it required $20,000 in spend within a year of account opening to get the full bonus Update: apparently this was also offered in Fall of 2013) I’ve been hoping for a similar offer to come around but without much luck.

I applied for that offer so I won’t be able to receive this bonus until early 2015 (because I received the bonus on the old card in early 2013). Hopefully this no annual fee for the first year offer is still available, but at the end of the day there are plenty of offers in the sea and I’m sure something else will take my fancy instead.

There are a number of reasons why people find Avios so valuable, I’ve listed them below along with some additional reading that I’d recommend doing.

• No fuel surcharges on:
  • American Airlines & US Airways flights within the Americas
  • Air Berlin
  • LAN
• Distanced based award chart. Other airline loyalty programs use a zoning system, but British Airways is based on distance in different bands. This means you can get incredible value (e.g flights for only 4,500 points or Boston to Dublin for only 12,500 points)

Avios Resources:

• Avios Redemption Calculator by Wandering Aramean
• Complete guide to British Avios by Travel Is Free
• British Airways Forum Flyertalk

Just because myself and others find Avios valuable, doesn’t mean they will necessarily work for the trips you want to take. Make sure you educate yourself first to see if you can get good value out of this offer before applying.