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Hey RTE Radio listeners! Welcome to TopMiles, the world’s first interactive site that teaches users on how to travel for almost nothing using miles.
Before we dive into Irish specific credit cards, I would advise that you first look at my beginner guides that will teach you the very basics of what miles are and what they can be used for.
Miles Essentials
New to Miles? Read these guides.
Introduction to miles
All about loyalty program
Credit cards & Big Signup Bonuses
All about your credit score
How to earn your miles
Which frequent flyer program to credit to:
If you are flying with British Airways, you will want to credit your flights with British Airways. Unless you are flying over 50,000 miles annually, in which you should look into crediting your flies to American Airlines, a British Airways partner, which currently has the best award program for premium travel.
If you are flying with Aer Lingus, don’t credit your miles to them directly. Instead, credit all your flights to United, a partner with Aer Lingus. This is because United has a substantially much better frequent flyer program when compared to Aer Lingus.
Best Credit Cards for Irish Citizens & Residents:
As mentioned before, the US credit card market is much more lucrative compared to other countries in the world. This includes Ireland. Since the EU approved legislation to cut down on the amount of transaction fees cards can charge retailers, awards have been drastically slashed and cut down.
There are currently only three credit cards that earn any kind of useful miles that can be used for foreign travel, all issued by American Express. Unfortunately, the annual fees are quite steep.
American Express Platinum Card
Annual Fee: 550 EUR
Benefits: Priority Pass Membership, Complimentary Elite Status for Club Carlson (Gold), Accor (Platinum), and Starwood (Gold)
American Express Gold Card
Annual Fee: 300 EUR
Benefits: Travel Insurance
American Express Green Card
Annual Fee: 100 EUR + 35 EUR membership reward fee
Overall the pickings are slim, and the gold card really makes no sense to me, as you’re not gaining any real benefits for the extra 150 EUR spent per year.
If you travel quite frequently for work, or can expense the fee as a business expense, then the Platinum card could be a good fit, otherwise, I would suggest you sign up for the American Express Green Card.
Unlike the US, there are NO sign up bonuses.
Best Transfer Partners:
For Irish card holders, AMEX membership award program has quite a few airline transfer partners. However, almost all of them are poor value except for the British Airways Avios and Singapore Airlines Krisflyer miles.
Singapore Airlines & British Avios both have some great redemption values. You can experience the legendary Singapore suites for less than 58,000 KrisFlyer miles one way from Frankfurt to New York.
While British Avios lets you redeem your miles for intra-european routes for as low as 4500 miles. (Although that benefit is going away soon and will be raised to 7500 miles).
Irish AMEX points transfer at a rate of 3 MR points to 2 British Avios and a 1:1 ratio with Krisflyer.
Overall Recommendation:
Overall, you need to make sure you’re spending at least $7000 annually on your daily purchases to consider getting the AMEX green card. Anything less and the card is not worth paying for the annual fee.
Flights to Europe still can cost as low as 4500 miles, which can be a great value for Irish credit card holders.
