The most loved credit cards in Britain

We polled the lovemoney.com community to find out which credit cards you love the most. So which one came top?

We recently polled lovemoney.com readers to find out which credit card provider offers the credit cards you love the most. We asked you to rate your cards on a wide range of criteria - from interest rate and customer service to rewards and cashback. And then we looked for the card provider that scored the best across all four categories: your Most Loved credit card. 

Drum roll please..... here are the results:

Runner up

In third place is the John Lewis/Waitrose Partnership credit card, a card which rewards your shopping in both stores.

Why you gave this card a Cheer award

At first glance, the Partnership credit card doesn't look all that out of the ordinary, offering 0% on purchases and balance transfers for the first six months. However, what makes this card special is its rewards programme, whereby users gain one point for every pound spent at John Lewis, Waitrose (and their websites) as well as Greenbee.com. You also get one point for every £2 spent elsewhere. For every 500 points you rack up, you'll get a £5 voucher to spend. Those vouchers are then dispatched three times a year.

Cardholders also get access to a range of deals from partnered organisations, including English Heritage and the Royal Academy of Arts.

Runner up

In second place, the Co-op and its range of credit cards including the Members credit card and Clear credit card.

Why you gave this card a Cheer award

There are a number of quite clever features offered by the various Co-op cards which have attracted your love:

• The Platinum card, which offers a low fixed rate of 9.9% for a whopping five years on all purchases and balance transfers.
• The Clear credit card, which offers one rate - 12.9% - on all card transactions, whether they are purchases, balance transfers or cash withdrawals. You also don't get whacked with a charge for making a withdrawal which is a pretty neat feature.
• For ethical borrowers, there's the Think credit card, which helps protect the Indonesian rainforest when you use your card - for every £100 you spend, 25p goes to the RSPB's Indonesian Rainforest Project.
• And finally, for those shoppers who are particularly loyal to the Co-op brand, there's the Members card, which funnily enough is only open to actual members of the Co-op. This card offers 0% interest for six months on both balance transfers and purchases, as well as a cashback programme where you get 1p back for every £1 spent at the Co-op, with 1p for every £2 spent elsewhere. This cashback is then added to your share of the Group profits, and paid twice a year.

And the winner is...

However, the credit card provider you love the most is American Express, and its suite of great credit cards including the Express Rewards card and the Platinum Cashback card.

Why American Express won

American Express is a brand with a very loyal following, but it also helps that its credit card range is fantastic.

Top cashback card

Let's start with the Platinum Cashback card, which offers a phenomenal return on your spending. You get 5% cashback on your spending in the first three months (up to a maximum of £100), with a tiered rate of cashback up to 1.25% depending on how much you spend over the year. A typical family, spending just £1,500 a month, would earn nearly £280 cashback with this card.

Top air miles cards

The firm also offers two fantastic cards in association with British Airways which are great if you are a regular traveller:

• First there's the simple American Express British Airways card, which is fee-free. For every pound you spend, you get one BA mile, with 1,000 BA miles available if you spend £500 in the first three months. Those points can then be used to pay for all sorts of British Airways services, from flights to hotels. Even better, so long as you spend £20,000 on this card over the year, when you redeem your BA miles for a plane ticket, you will get a companion ticket absolutely free (barring taxes, etc).
• Secondly, there's the American Express British Airways Premium Plus card, offering even better rewards: 1.5 BA miles for every pound spent (and up to three BA miles for money spent at British Airways), with 6,000 bonus points provided immediately once you use the card for the first time. The Premium Plus card also offers the companion ticket when you cash in your BA miles on a flight, but you only have to have spent £10,000 over the year. However, you should be aware that the fees for using this card will set you back £150 a year.

Top rewards card

Finally, your love for American Express is only likely to increase with the launch of the American Express Rewards card, which sees your spending rewarded with vouchers which can be spent at stores like iTunes, Amazon and Homebase. Spend £500 on the Rewards card in your first three months and you'll already have your first £25 voucher in the bag, and be well on the way to your next one!

You even get 0% on purchases for the first six months!

For more on the Rewards card, watch our video: Get £150 just for using your credit card!

Top tips

If you're thinking of taking out one of these cards, however, it does pay to bear in mind that Amex cards aren't designed for borrowers. If you can't pay off your bill in full each month, you'll be hit by a very high interest rate which will cancel out the savings you make through the cashback and rewards schemes. Secondly, Amex isn't as widely accepted as Visa or Mastercard. However, you'd be surprised at how many retailers do accept it, nowadays.

Finally, if you are going to go for one of these cards, a sneaky tip is to take out an associate card for another member of your family (if you trust them). That way, everything they spend on the card will rack up extra rewards/air miles/cashback for you! It's very easy to double your return in this way. Just be aware that you and you alone will be responsible for paying off the bill in full each month.

Do keep an eye out for more  features on other results of our poll, which will be published in the coming weeks. You might also like to check out our video on these winners in Your most-loved credit card

And let us know what you think using the comments box below!

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