New UK credit cards issue by Virgin Money

Head for points had a piece on this today.

Some useful info there about refund of fees etc that applied when they closed their old BMI cards so likely that will apply to the Virgin cards.

Also possible that they just move people over to their general card - this is the option that would actually suit me best for my personal circumstances.

[mitchja]

MBNA did exactly that with my BMI card and simply switched the account over to a standard MBNA card (can't remember which one I got though as it's long been canceled - I *think* it was a cashback card) with the same APR/credit limit etc.

Sad to say I will not be ordering a new Virgin card and have just ordered my BA Black Amex...

Although both BA and Virgin in the premium card have an earnings rate of 1.5 per £1, and a similar annual fee...

- BA welcome bonus is 25K vs Virgin 15K (which makes the fee more palletable)
But crucially...
- BA offer the 241 companion voucher for use in ALL cabins.

As someone who wants to fly business long haul, usually with a companion, with the bigger welcome bonus I should have enough miles after a year of spending for a trip for 2 in business thanks to the voucher and increased welcome bonus.

Gutted to be switching alliance, but with these changes, it’ll take a lot longer for someone with my requirements to earn reward flights with virgin :(

Sad to say I will not be ordering a new Virgin card and have just ordered my BA Black Amex...

Although both BA and Virgin in the premium card have an earnings rate of 1.5 per £1, and a similar annual fee...

- BA welcome bonus is 25K vs Virgin 15K (which makes the fee more palletable)
But crucially...
- BA offer the 241 companion voucher for use in ALL cabins.

As someone who wants to fly business long haul, usually with a companion, with the bigger welcome bonus I should have enough miles after a year of spending for a trip for 2 in business thanks to the voucher and increased welcome bonus.

Gutted to be switching alliance, but with these changes, it’ll take a lot longer for someone with my requirements to earn reward flights with virgin :(

Its a no brainer isn't it, you have to wonder what they were thinking when they launched this card.

Same, as we only fly Virgin once or twice a year for Leisure we have no status so the new cards are not a good deal. Not only is the 2-4-1 rubbish, the earning rate of 1.5 per £ is lower than the black amex currently isn't it? Sure its 2 per £?

We have a decent number of points to burn through and 2 PE upgrade vouchers to book by September then will have to go BA amex probably :(

No brainer for us to switch to the new free card from white mbna card - at least for now.

We've already "left" VS really but the higher non-Amex miles earning will help us "top out" for a final Flying Club redemption. A brief period of work flying on VS to the US stopped about 3 years ago but the PE upgrade vouchers were good for combining with UC overnights - only been in the clubhouse once on way to DXB - those were our rules. Now the voucher needs to be replaced with miles but we're nearly there for another West Coast US.

Meanwhile work flying is european shorthaul/SE Asia and more BA centric or star alliance so we downgraded to white virgin card last year and took out BA Premium Plus for the 2-4-1. Just booked first one to Singapore for next March, and our last VS voucher trip (BOS PE return) is in September so the great VS blowdown will be for after those... Sorry Virgin and SRB...

Not only is the 2-4-1 rubbish, the earning rate of 1.5 per £ is lower than the black amex currently isn't it? Sure its 2 per £?

Yes.

MBNA could afford to be more generous with miles because Amex charged retailers much higher fees than Visa or Mastercard (hence why Amex is much less universally accepted).

Now those fees have been capped by the EU for co-branded cards, the days of generous miles/cashback offers are sadly over.

The BA cards, however, can continue because they’re issued directly by Amex - there’s no third party (eg MBNA) involved so AIUI the EU interchange fees aren’t capped.

To be fair, the new VS Mastercards offer more miles per £ than the current MBNA Visa cards. True, not as good as the Amex - but that ship has now sailed, not just for VS but many other airlines too.

And for those tempted by BA - yes, it’s undoubtedly one of the best cards on the market right now thanks to the 2-4-1 but IAG have confirmed there’ll be big changes to BAEC which could make the concept of reward seats a thing of the past.

Just about to pay my first Virgin Money Mastercard bill. I notice from the PDF statement that the bank details seem to be a Lloyds Bank collection account - sort code is 30-00-00, account number 00240753 (then obviously your card account number as the reference).

When I go to setup a new payment destination with my bank (first direct) and select Virgin Money Mastercard as the payee, first direct are providing account details that seem to point to a HSBC account (40-xx-xx sort code).

Does anyone know which details are correct? I'm minded to ignore first direct and go with the ones on the PDF statement.

[mitchja]

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Does anyone know which details are correct? I'm minded to ignore first direct and go with the ones on the PDF statement.

Having successfully paid my first VS statement the other week and having had a standard Virgin credit card for some time now which has never failed for faster payments, I've just checked my online banking settings and they are both set-up with the following account details:

Sort Code: 40-64-25
Account number: 41320424

Those details are the ones also printed on the statement as well in the payment section.

I’m another one not going over to the new VS card. Like others my status make the rewards virtually useless for what we need. As we only use VS for holiday flights and we like to go UC it’s only really the miles I’m interested in. In the 8 years or so I’ve had an MBNA Black Amex card I’ve never made use of the upgrade or companion rewards that I’ve received almost every year.

I’ve decided to go with the Amex Gold Preferred Reward Card. With a lovely 20,000 points intro bonus ( boosted to 22,000 points by a referral from Rob at Hfp) it gives me 1 point for £1 spent and the flexibility to transfer the points to any loyalty program.

I also got accepted for the Amex card immediately whereas the VS credit check has rejected me even though they both use Experian ........... work that one out !!!

Why not have both? Sure, make the Amex your primary card but if you get the free VS card as well, while you may not spend enough to trigger the rewards you’ll still get a (small, admittedly) sign-up bonus and still earn miles in the many places that don’t accept Amex.

I also got accepted for the Amex card immediately whereas the VS credit check has rejected me even though they both use Experian ........... work that one out !!!

The fact that both AMEX & Virgin Money use the same credit reference agency is irrelevant. Yes, they will access the same information about you, but each lender can tailor their "scorecard" differently, e.g. some lenders will be happy if you're in a new job, some will prefer that you've been with the same employer for a while. Ditto with moving address (& being on the electoral roll), some are happy with frequent changes, others less so etc.

Likewise. I was rejected by the Virgin eligibility check despite being a virgin black card holder for almost a year, although my credit score isn’t the best.
I have however moved over to the Amex Gold charge card and also taken the IHG Premium mastercard for places that don’t accept the Amex.
My plan is to use the Amex MRP to keep my FC miles topped up, then use the IHG points towards a hotel stay when I decide where i’m flying UC to

Just got accepted for the free version. Now deciding between the Gold and Platinum Amex to compliment it.

[mitchja]

Just something to be aware of and something I’ve only just noticed so not sure when AmEx changed this? The Gold AmEx Rewards card is no longer a charge card anymore, it’s a standard credit card issued with a credit limit now whereas the Platinum card is still a charge card

AmEx still have one of the best apps IMHO giving you things like instant spend push notifications as well as instant account payments.

Though I suppose anything is better than the none-existent Virgin Money app!!

Virgin Money on Twitter have now changed their responses about ApplePay to ‘its coming soon’ so hopefully that won’t be much longer!

AmEx MR to Flying Club transfers are almost instant as well, often complete in <5mins

Just something to be aware of and something I’ve only just noticed so not sure when AmEx changed this? The Gold AmEx Rewards card is no longer a charge card anymore, it’s a standard credit card issued with a credit limit now whereas the Platinum card is still a charge card

AmEx still have one of the best apps IMHO giving you things like instant spend push notifications as well as instant account payments.

Though I suppose anything is better than the none-existent Virgin Money app!!

Virgin Money on Twitter have now changed their responses about ApplePay to ‘its coming soon’ so hopefully that won’t be much longer!

AmEx MR to Flying Club transfers are almost instant as well, often complete in <5mins

I did notice that! Assume there is little difference though if you plan on clearing the balance in full each time? Still trying to weigh up if I can justify the Platinum Fee.

The BA cards, however, can continue because they’re issued directly by Amex - there’s no third party (eg MBNA) involved so AIUI the EU interchange fees aren’t capped.

I don’t think this is correct. BA are the 3rd party, and Amex appealed the EU decision on that and lost, so the BA cards are capped, unlike the Amex only ones.

Amex’s problem is the BA cards are enormously popular and big revenue generators, they can’t simply pull them. Whether they’re sustainable in the long term without changes is a different matter. Pulling the Amex cards issued by other banks like the MBNA ones was an easy decision, the BA ones are much trickier for Amex.

Hi, has anyone been told they can, or have been able to, carry over their same credit limit to the new card? Thanks in advance!

I'm going round in circles with this so hoping for some advice.

We currently have the black amex cards - three of us on one account. I pay our balance in full every month, we use the miles approximately twice a year for UC flights to MCO, LAX or ATL. We fly from Manchester, not business travellers, and currently have 200,000 miles in the account.

Would the new cards be a good bet or am I better going elsewhere?

Kat IMHO you need to divorce the credit card from flying club

Only get the new card if it suits you and your family and your financial circumstances - remember it's not guaranteed you'd be given the new one - and I'm not sure if you can get secondary cards on it either. If you can't then your mileage earnings will drop.

Miles and (possible) upgrade certificates are only part of the picture. If you don't spend enough then it's not really a benefit. And even then there has to be availability.

I just applied for the no fee Virgin money card and part of the application asked if I wanted any other card holder.
My guess is that would also apply to the fee card.
I will only get .75 miles per £
The fee is £160 and that earns 1.5 miles per £
For £160 you could buy at 10,666 miles or more if you can use miles booster.
You need to spend £7111 on you card to earn that number of miles.
If your annual spend is more then it's worth it.


Dick D

Thank you both, the replies are really helpful

We use our cards for all of our purchases, everything goes on the cards so it'll be worth it in that sense.

I've already done the eligibility checker and so far so good.

We've been very lucky with availability and have always managed to get flights - if not exactly when we want we're adaptable and have no complaints.

From what you've both said it looks like that the cards will be okay for us for what we need.

Just wondering, hypothetically, if I bought something big on the black card, you know, that would earn lots of miles, then, sadly had to return it after the card closed, would they take the miles back off me again?

I have just done my application for a new Virgin MasterCard and thankfully been approved. I have also put an additional user on the card no problem. I must admit I was in two minds whether to bother as I have a Nationwide select credit card which gives me 1% cash back on UK purchases and no fees on foreign transactions. So the new MBNA cards will be cancelled. I got a credit limit of only £600 less than my MBNA card so was quite relieved. I spend in the region of £5k a year on flights a year with Virgin so will lose £10k bonus points straight away with the black card and worked out that on last years spend I will be another 15k down. Not ideal when the only way I travel is for leisure and will always try to travel business class long haul. I am therefore only interested in the air miles. I used to be able to get two man-MCO flights a year upgrade economy to upper a year for 100000 miles and approximately £1200 per trip for the two of us.Now I am lucky to get one trip full reward for 210000 miles and £1100 for the two of us. I know it is not viable for the airline to continue to give people like me such a good deal but it was great when it lasted and maybe I will be looking at Europe a bit more frequently from now on .

You will still earn purchasing from Virgin on the new cards.
Rule3 says
You’ll earn double miles when you spend directly with Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Holidays (via their Contact Centres and online only). Spend in Virgin Holidays retail stores does not qualify. The double miles will be included in your monthly credit card mileage earning.

Dick D