Brussels Airlines American Express has a limited time offer: double sign-up bonus for friend referrals. To receive a personalized sign-up link for this offer, please complete the form below.
- Classic American Express card (€60 per year)
Sign-up bonus: 3000 miles (normally 1500)
- Premium American Express card (€120 per year)
Sign-up bonus: 6000 miles (normally 3000)
- Pay your cellphone bill with American Express
Extra bonus: 2000 miles (one time)
Earning airline miles is not limited to flying, you can earn miles with almost anything these days. One of the easiest ways to earn extra miles is signing up for a credit card. You will receive a number of miles just for signing up for the card and you will get 1 or 1,5 miles per euro spent. American Express also provides a bonus when you spend a certain amount in one year. Unfortunately, the number of credit cards earning airline miles is very limited in Belgium. Still, they can offer you a great opportunity to travel the world in luxury on a budget. For Belgian citizens, the credit card offers are limited to one program, Miles and More of the Lufthansa group. Miles of this program can be used to book (and upgrade) flights on any Star Alliance carrier.
Brussels Airlines offers four Miles and More credit cards: the Classic MasterCard, Premium MasterCard, Classic American Express and Premium American Express. I signed-up for the Brussels Airlines Classic American Express Card in 2008 and switched to the Premium Amex card last year earning me a total of more than 100,000 miles! The key to earning the maximum amount of miles is to pay as much as possible with your credit card. Pay all your bills and purchases (both online and offline) with your credit card, every euro counts! Shopping (including groceries), dining, gas, electronics, hotels, airline tickets, … almost everything! Some payments might even result in an extra bonus. Example: Paying your cellphone bill with your Brussels Airlines American Express card gets you 2000 bonus miles!
The yearly fee also contains a number of insurances:
Classic American Express (€60 per year):
Travel accident insurance
Baggage insurance
Wallet or purse theft insurance
Purchase Protection
Premium American Express (€120 per year):
Travel accident and inconvenience insurance
Trip cancellation insurance
Extended Baggage insurance
Wallet or purse theft insurance
Purchase Protection
So how much are those miles worth?
It all depends on what you spend them. In my opinion, only long-haul Business Class and First Class flights are worth spending miles on. These allow you to maximize the value of your miles as Business Class flights easily cost +€2000 and First Class flights +€8000. Of course airline loyalty programs will do everything to make you spend your miles on less valuable options e.g. use miles to buy goodies in their online shop, book hotel nights or rent a car. You really don’t want to do that! Miles and More is currently selling miles with a 20% bonus, which is still way too expensive, but it gives you an idea how they value the miles.
As you notice, 6000 miles are sold for €135. That’s more than the yearly fee of the Brussels Airlines Premium American Express card which comes with 6000 sign-up miles! Same for the sign-up bonus of the Brussels Airlines Classic American Express card, those 3000 miles are sold for €85 (+600 miles bonus).
How do I maximize the number of miles earned?
I would recommend to sign-up for the Brussels Airlines Premium American Express card now to get the 6000 miles. Complete the form to pay your cellphone bill with the card and earn an additional 2000 miles. Next year, you cancel the Premium card and switch to the Classic card. You will earn the sign-up bonus again (this time for the Classic card, which is at least 1500 miles if there’s no promotion) and you’ll earn another 2000 miles when you register to have your cellphone bills paid with the Classic card. That’s at least 11,500 miles in one year, just by signing up for these cards!
I’m not yet a Miles and More member, where do I sign-up?
You can enroll at the Miles and More website.
To receive a sign-up link with a double welcome bonus, please complete the form below.
Full disclosure: By signing up for a Brussels Airlines American Express card using a personalized link, I will receive bonus miles (friend referral program). Thank you for supporting my travel blog and enjoy your sign-up bonus!
