Air France KLM Flying Blue can be a very useful program, as it has reduced award prices between North America and Europe so that you can now fly one way for 20K miles economy or 50K miles business class. That’s excellent! Additionally, it now offers international first class awards with some partners. This led me to take a closer look at the Air France KLM credit card, to see if it’s just as exciting. Spoiler alert: it’s not.
Current Welcome Offer
| Card Offer |
|---|
50K miles + 60XP ⓘ Non-Affiliate 50K miles after $2K in the first 90 days + 60 XP upon approval$89 Annual Fee Alternate Offer: Going through the steps to make a dummy booking at the Air France website may result in an offer giving 45k miles + a $100 statement credit Information about this card has been collected independently by Frequent Miler. The issuer did not provide the details, nor is it responsible for their accuracy. Recent better offer: 70K miles + 40 XP after $3K in the first 90 days + 60 XP upon approval (expired 12/15/24) |
Air France KLM World Elite Mastercard Review
The Air France KLM World Elite Mastercard is a bit of a snoozer unless you’re interested in earning elite status. For those uninterested in elite status it’s not a bad card, but there’s nothing exciting about it. Even if you just want to earn Flying Blue miles, it’s not very good. While this card earns 1.5x everywhere, you can do much better elsewhere. For example, you can earn 2x everywhere with transferable points cards like the Capital One Venture Rewards card, Citi Double Cash (paired with the Citi Premier), or Amex Blue Business Plus (2x on the first $50K spend each year). Then, you can transfer those points to Flying Blue or to any other supported loyalty program. Even better, there are frequent transfer bonuses to Flying Blue so you could end up with even more miles.
On the other hand, those interested in Flying Blue elite status will find a lot to like with both a one time 60 XP boost upon approval and the ability to earn up to 60 XP each year. Flying Blue Silver status requires 100 XP per 12 months and so this card can get you more than half way there. I’m not sure, but it might even be possible to get multiple Air France KLM cards (by product changing from other Bank of America cards, for example) and then you might be able to get Silver status or higher from card spend alone.
- Annual Fee: $89
- Foreign Transaction Fee: None
- Card Issuer: Bank of America
- What points are worth: This card earns Flying Blue miles. Our current Reasonable Redemption Values pegs them at 1.3 cents each.
- Best Use for Points: Redeem for flights between North America and Europe at reasonable rates with moderate surcharges:
- Economy class: 20,000 miles one-way (with some routes pricing a little less)
- Premium Economy class: 35,000 miles one-way
- Business Class: 50,000 miles one way.
- Earning Categories:
- Earn 3 Miles per $1 spent directly on Air France, KLM Royal Dutch Airlines and SkyTeam member airlines purchases
- Earn 1.5 Miles per $1 spent on all other purchases
- Perks:
- Receive 5,000 Miles every year on your account anniversary after you spend $50 or more on purchases within the anniversary year
- No foreign transaction fees
- Miles don’t expire as long as you make a purchase once every 2 years
- Earn 20 XP towards elite status every year on your account anniversary
- Earn an additional 40 XP (totaling 60 XP) on your account anniversary after you spend $15,000 or more on purchases within the anniversary year
- Who’s this card for? Anyone interested in earning Flying Blue elite status can do well with this card.
- Is this card a keeper? Those seeking elite status will certainly find this card worth keeping. For everyone else, it’s an okay card to keep since it offers 5,000 points every year as long as you spend at least $50. Plus, that spend keeps your points alive.
Air France KLM World Elite Mastercard Pros and Cons
Pros
- Relatively cheap at $89 per year
- Keeps points from expiring by simply putting some spend on the card once every two years.
- Easy to earn 5,000 miles per year with only $50 spend.
- Easy way to pick up extra XP (experience points) towards elite status
Cons
- Low earning rate compared to what is possible with cards that earn transferable points
- Very few perks
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I have wondered if this would be a good card for people flying Delta a ton after all the changes to lounge access. If you credit your Delta flights to FB, it does seem like Gold Status is the key, as that should give you unlimited SkyClub access (something you can’t get on the Delta Reserve without 75k spend). But 220 XP per year seems like a steep climb without either a lot of connecting flights, some paid business flights, or some international travel. It would take 110 domestic economy segments.
But the 3x SkyTeam (not just Flying Blue) makes this a better earner than the Delta Gold.
This card was a no brainer to get with the increased 70K offer and annual fee waived. Got the offer when booking award travel to Switzerland this past summer; just booked 3 adults and 2 kids to Venice for February for only 70K points total. I’ll take the SUB for this card any day especially when economy awards to Europe from US are 16K one way off peak.
You didn’t warn people about the worst thing… you apply at the wrong time and you’ll lose all the free 60XP. I received my card on Dec 16 2023. All the XP expired 14 days later. RIDICULOUS
My experience is that BOA doesn’t product change. I’ve had a no fee card with them for 39 years and asked to change it to the Customized cash rewards also no fee and they said I’d have to apply for a new card.
BofA does allow product changes. However, cards issued in earlier years . . . such as yours . . . are not eligible for product changes. I had a BofA card from the early 1980s and experienced the same thing about five or six years ago. I had to apply for the card I wanted and then moved my credit limit over.
how frequently can I get the SUB on this card? When it’s elevated 70K, I think it’s worth going for especially if over 5/24 and going to do a bunch of non Chase cards in a short period of time (so they all come off at the same-ish time). Can you just cancel and get the SUB again every 24 months? My AF just posted (plus my 5K miles), so thinking of keeping and then plan to get again next Oct (which would be 26 months after receiving the SUB. Does that work?
I’m on my second 21 months apart. No issues went to instant approval on the past 70K SUB offer (March 2024). I have a long term banking relationship with BOA which of course probably helps. Now my 60 XP never posted, but I thought let’s not rock the boat with Flying Blue. Can’t fly XPs.
I’m on my second, about 30 months apart. Applied again while I still have my original card, surprisingly got approved with an even higher credit limit > $20k. I don’t have any other relationship with BoA except a military checking account closed 15 years ago. The card is churnable, but YMMV.
I just got FB gold, so when that higher offer comes around hopefully, I will definitely look at applying 🙂 Will be nice to keep mid or higher tier status for a bit.
Usually shows up around May.
You don’t explain what all elite status is and XP points
How many for what
20 XP gets you an AF concierge who will Google things for you that you’re too lazy to look up yourself. You may want to check that out.
Google the following:
Flying Blue XP
One result will bring you to a complete overview. Good luck.
I’ve had the card two years (2nd anniversary was this week), and it’s a keeper. It used to be my go-to card for non-bonused everyday spend on international trips, but the Altitude Reserve can do that job now. I use it for MSing fee-free GCs at Staples/ODOM. I don’t have (and can’t get) a C1 Venture, Citi Double Cash, or Chase Ink (yet), so this is my second-best option. It enables me to print AF miles cheaply in parallel with my Chase/Amex/Bilt/US Bank points activities. Getting the 5,000 annual miles offsets the annual fee for me, given that Promo Rewards can be had for as low as 11k. The aforementioned and a couple of casual purchases of $1200 MGCs at Staples is an almost-free one-way to Europe in Y, without burning transferable points, and can’t be beat.
At 1.5x, that’s $7333 in spend, or ~ 4 trips @ $1800 to staples. If you’re new enough to all this that you can’t get an INK card, how pray tell are you unloading your $1800 trips?
Being new or old hat has zero correlation with the ability to get an Ink card. Everyone does not start playing at 0/24, nor accepts the opportunity cost to stay 5/24 in lieu of more lucrative SUBs over the last four years. Ink cards will be there when one gets to them, I’m but a couple months from 4/24, and my strategy changed since my post. I put that MS spend on the Hilton Surpass & Bilt Rent Days until I got the FNC & Gold Status respectively. I can start anew in 2025 with a freshly minted Ink Cash. That’s the beautiful thing about the scientific method; try out different approaches and see what works best.
It’s simple enough to liquidate $2000+ in GCs at a time, and it took about a week to put a robust system in place and hone that skillset last year.
Any data points if having 2 FB cards stacks the 20 yearly XPs?
Why no mention at all of the issuing bank? That makes a pretty big difference as to the attainability for some people.
Bank of America
The article expressly states Bank of America. I often miss such details myself.
If you get silver status, like I did when signing up last Summer, you get a free bag on any SkyTeam booking. Just provide your Flying Blue id to Delta when you book an economy ticket and you get that perk, regardless of the payment method.
About the 1.5 earning rate – yes, you can do better with Citi Double Cash, Amex BBP etc, but only in USA. If you travel outside the country this card has no foreign currency fees and a very decent rate for unbonused spend.
Could do better with Venture or Venture X (2x on everything) or 2.62% cashback with BofA Premium Rewards with Plat honors (No FX txn fee), or 4.5% cashback towards travel via ApplePay on Altitude Reserve.
I picked this card up during the recent 70,000-mile offer, also got the $100 statement credit, plus 40 XP bonus upon completion of required spend ($2000). Added to the initial 60 XP for my application, I was suddenly at Silver, and it was just before my end of summer trip to Italy on a Flying Blue Premium Economy award ticket that I got for 106,000 miles RT +$340. Silver status got me Sky Priority boarding, at least, if nothing else. Unfortunately, I had already paid for the seat assignments months prior.I’ll keep this card for the annual bonus, and to keep my miles alive without having to jump through any hoops. I even did a speculative transfer from AmEx when the extra 25% was offered. I know that goes against conventional wisdom, but I’m confident I’ll be able to use them with Flying Blue next year.By the way, service was excellent on KLM and AF, during both my outbound and inbound flights.
By the way, this card gets BofA offers, too.
And free museum visits first weekend of the month (not sure if this is ending after 2023). Some darned expensive museums, too!
If you spend a little time in Europe and do a bit of paid AF travel, this card is actually a keeper. In the first year, it is pretty easy to make Flying Blue Silver, which can help with things like seats and bags when buying discount AF tickets. (You get almost nothing on within-France flights, but cheap RTs to Spain, for example, accumulate XPs pretty reasonably. As you guys have posted lately, AF Business availability and price make AF miles a good value – getting 5,000 each year pays back over half of the annual fee. Conversely, spending occasionally on the card is the easiest way to keep your AF miles alive.
Also, in Europe, 1.5x on non-bonused spend is not bad in an environment where Chase Unlimited and Amex Blue Business (our usual “whatever” spend cards) have prohibitive out-of-US fees.
Agree that it is niche, but if you fit into that niche, it’s a nice piece of the toolkit.
“out-of-US fees.”
Does that just mean literally foreign transaction fees? Otherwise I’ve never heard of the concept
It’s not easy in the first year if you fail to apply for the card in January. I got mine Dec 16 or so, all my XP were deleted 14 days later.
And, the elite status ain’t worth talking about either. As you said, other prospects.