BA Gold Tier — All You Need To Know

6 min readFeb 1, 2023

If you’re a BA Executive Club member you’ll know that, as well as collecting Avios to book reward flights, you can access a whole other raft of benefits and perks by climbing through the BA tiers. There are more benefits to be had than those you get from just collecting Avios points. In fact, advancing your tier status in the Executive Club gives you access to priority boarding, lounge access, cabin upgrades, and other tempting treats.

What are BA Tier points?

BA Executive Club has four tiers, and the more Tier Points you collect when flying, the greater benefits you’ll receive, as you move up each level. When you join the BA Executive Club to start earning Avios you automatically become a Blue Tier member. It’s free and it’s easy to do, so there’s no reason not to!

Where do you earn BA Tier points?

You can only earn Tier Points by flying. They’re not like Avios, which you can collect in a huge number of ways. You get BA Tier Points every time you fly with British Airways, its subsidiaries, or with one of its Oneworld airline partners, including Iberia, Qatar, American Airlines, and Qantas.

The number of Tier Points you receive will depend on your ticket and destination. A short-haul economy flight will bag you five points upwards, but a long-haul journey in business class will get you 140 Tier Points and more. The long-haul earning bracket shifts at 2,000 miles, and it’s also worth noting that using two connecting flights will earn you more points than one direct flight. The best bit is that you don’t lose Tier Points by booking a cheaper fare during a sale or special offer.

If you want to take a look at how many Tier Points and Avios you’ll earn on a particular flight before you book it, the BA website has a handy flight calculator. If you’ve already booked, don’t worry, you can work it out in the Passenger Information section under Manage My Booking.

If you’ve just recently joined the BA Executive Club you can claim points for British Airways flights taken up to three months before. You need to add your BA Executive Club membership number to each booking to log your points. BA’s Tier Points are usually credited soon after you fly but those earned through its partners can take up to 30 days before they register. You can still claim your Tier Points or missing Avios up to six months after your flights, as long as you save your ticket numbers, in case you forget to add your membership number!

What are the different Tiers?

BA Executive Club is made up of four tiers — Blue, Bronze, Silver, and Gold. When you join BA Executive Club you’ll be automatically enrolled in the Blue tier, the most basic. By collecting tier points you’ll advance through the tiers as you fly, with Gold being the aim of the game — because that’s when you’ll receive the ultimate perks when you fly.

Gold Tier status in BA Executive Club

If you can reach BA Gold Tier status you’ll become an ultimate VIP of the skies. Whilst Silver is a very attractive tier for many Club members; Gold is the pinnacle of travel perks. To earn Gold tier status you’ll need to accumulate 1,500 tier points (that’s a minimum of 4 British Airways flights in a year).

As well as amassing all the associated benefits you’d get with Blue, Bronze and Silver tiers, BA Gold status gives you:

100% bonus Avios on all the BA flights you take, in addition to the Avios bonuses available for travelling in premium cabins
Access to additional reward seats in economy cabins at the standard price
Gold Priority Reward, so, if there’s no availability in your chosen cabin or on the flight you want to book, you’ll have the option of using double the regular Avios to secure a seat of your choice on the flight, as long as you book 30 days or more before scheduled departure
Access to First Class lounges, which most travellers agree, are the creme de la creme of airline lounge experiences. As a Gold Member, you’ll also get access to the London Heathrow Terminal 5 Arrivals lounge when you have a long-haul flight booking.
The use of First Class check-in worldwide, and priority boarding
Free seat selection for your whole party on British Airways operated flights, as soon as you book
Exclusive access to 1A or 1K when travelling in First Class
An extra checked bag, for free, in any travel class for every traveller on your booking*
Additional weight allowance, totalling 32kg for each checked bag in any travel class for everyone on your booking*
Priority Reward bookings without the need to pay booking or service fees
Access to a dedicated team of BA Gold customer support staff
Reservation Assurance and priority waitlisting, should you need it

* except on hand baggage only fares

Exclusive Upgrade Vouchers are available to BA Gold members

Easily one of the best perks available to BA members with Gold Tier status is the ability to earn exclusive Upgrade Vouchers to use on British Airways flights.

Gold members who earn 2,500 Tier Points in a year will be gifted an Upgrade Voucher that can be used for 2 travellers (you must be travelling together) towards an upgrade to the next cabin of their choice. If you earn 3,500 Tier Points you’ll be awarded 2 Gold Upgrade For 1 vouchers, which you can use for yourself, or with a companion.

Get access to the Concorde and Chelsea Lounges

If you manage to make it to 5,000 Tier Points in a year (3,000 Tier Points a year thereafter) you’ll be able to use the Concorde Room at London Heathrow, BA’s signature, most luxurious lounge. You’ll also qualify for access to the Chelsea Lounge at New York’s JFK Airport. The Chelsea Lounge launched to huge fanfare this year, and it’s considered the most opulent, glamorous pre-flight experience any traveller could dream of.

Share your Gold Tier benefits with family and friends

Having Gold status is no fun if it means that only you get to benefit from all the good stuff it has to offer. British Airways recognise that, so they give you the chance to treat those travelling with you to VIP service too.

Once you earn 5,000 Tier Points in a year you’ll get two Executive Club Silver Partner Cards and one Gold Partner Card, so that you can share your benefits with those who matter to you most.

How can you achieve Gold Status?

To join the heady heights of Gold Tier membership, you need to fly with BA or Iberia at least four times plus to earn 1,500 Tier Points. When you hit the points required for Gold tier, you’ll automatically be moved up.

Remember that Avios reward flights will not earn you any Tier Points. You only accrue these on flights you pay for (or the proportion of the flight you pay for if you’re part-paying with Avios).

So, before you dive into the BA redemption finder in search of reward seats it’s worth checking if you’re near your next Tier level. If you are, you might want to pay cash instead to earn the Tier Points and bag the associated benefits.

Your BA Tier Points reset to zero on the annual anniversary of when you joined the BA Executive Club. Don’t panic though — you’ll remain at the same tier status for the next membership year. You can check your points’ expiry date on the Manage My Account page of the Club website.

Lifetime Tier Points

You can take comfort in knowing that your hard earned Tier Points that expire each year don’t actually disappear, they’re added to your Lifetime Tier Points total. If this reaches 35,000 Tier Points, you’ll be given Gold Tier status for life. Some people actually focus on achieving this 35,000 Tier Points goal over the course of a few years, rather than stressing about their annual Tier Points, because they’d prefer to work towards Lifetime Gold Status, where they can access the absolute best package of travel benefits that British Airways provide.

Original Source- https://rewardflightfinder.com/news-and-advice/ba-gold-tier-all-you-need-to-know?utm_source=Google&utm_medium=blog&utm_campaign=website+blog