Velocity - Where to with Credit Card

[Cruiser Elite]

Am I the only one wondering what might be in store this year with Virgin launching a whole new look Credit Card?

IMHO the Virgin Money Card is really a bit half baked - and if John Borghetti really wants to throw out a serious challenge to Qantas would it not naturally follow that they need a strong CC product?

Qantas with the recent EDR Qantas CC, NAB Qantas Plat AMEX Visa and ANZ Qantas Plat AMEX Visa products have kinda got a stranglehold on the effective ff points earning market have they not?

With Westpac SQ Visa earning rate halving as of Mar 15 we can expect a flight of customers from that product.

Surely Virgin would have to position themselves in this market if they intend to be a serious rival?

 

[Nigelinoz]

I doubt that there will be any major changes for awhile,remember that the Virgin flyer credit card has only been available for a few months so I would expect them to gauge market penetration for at least a few months longer before making any changes.
They will probably tinker around the edges with earn rates and will probably have a few promotions to attract new members but I really can't see them doing anything earth shattering.
In the UK Virgin Atlantic offer a co branded AMEX and BA have an AMEX offering which can be linked to a Tesco club card but I can't see Virgin entering a tie up with AMEX here unless they plan to launch one as part of the rebranding of DJ,but I don't think that's likely.
But these are just my personal opinions-I have absolutely no inside knowledge about what may happen and I could to totally,utterly wrong,it will be interesting to see what happens.
Cheers
N'oz

 

[adamonline]

I'm not sure I would call this a serious challenge but there was a recent change to the Virgin Money Credit Card terms making reference to a new card product.

The new card was called Virgin High Flyer Credit Card whose earn rate was 1.25 Velocity Points for each whole Australian Dollar. No capping limit or reduced earn rate was mentioned. Of course there is no mention of this card on the website yet but the terms do say they are effective from Feb 1.

Given the Virgin Flyer Credit Card is a Visa Platinum card awarding 1:1 points with a half point earning over $1500 p/month there are probably only 2 options for this new card,

1. A VISA Platinum with a large annual fee (eg, $700 like the Citi Select)
2. An AMEX card. (possibly a companion card to the existing product) although Citibank (the issuer of Virgin Money CC's) doesn't have any AMEX cards at the moment

 

[antycbr]

The full details of the High Flyer card are now up on the website:

Compare our cards | Virgin Credit Cards | Virgin Money

The 1.25 earn rate, no cap is good; the annual fee of $249 is not. Doesn't seem that competitive particularly if you have an Amex with travel insurance. Given there's no extra points on booking DJ flights using the Flyer cards, there's no incentive to use this card over the Amex.

 

[medhead]

There is also a NAB velocity card. So I don't think any NAB QF card is exclusive. Plus you can always turn to Amex membership rewards via say a platinum edge card, or etc. Edge card with 25% transfer bonus is at least 1.25 to $1. No capping

 

[AaronBradford]

The full details of the High Flyer card are now up on the website:

Compare our cards | Virgin Credit Cards | Virgin Money

The 1.25 earn rate, no cap is good; the annual fee of $249 is not. Doesn't seem that competitive particularly if you have an Amex with travel insurance. Given there's no extra points on booking DJ flights using the Flyer cards, there's no incentive to use this card over the Amex.

Was going to post that but I can't post links just yet - this website says 11th January, and I did find a cached version from December 21 with details of the card.

 

[stuartfaz]

Odd product addition by Virgin/Citi. As antycbr said, apart from the 1.25 no-cap earn, it's still missing those additional benefits to tie it back to the airline, status credits, additional earn on DJ spend and the like.

That, and the card fee is ridiculous for whats being offered, especially considering you can get a platinum Amex for $149.