As the data that comes out of customers' loyalty has become increasingly valuable for companies are they passing those benefits onto the consumer?

Loyalty cards were initially designed to offer rewards to regular customers and therefore to encourage them to keep shopping in the same store.

As technology has developed the cards have become a rich source of data for the companies that offer them. Stores reap financial and strategic benefits from using the cards to find out what customers are buying.

But as the cards have become more sophisticated it seems that consumers' benefits have begun to wane.

Coffee stores: plastic vs paper

A great case study to look at when deciding on the value of loyalty cards is coffee stores. Most would be familiar with the coffee stamp system where shoppers are rewarded with a free coffee for collecting stamps each time they buy one.

That was until recently as two of the big high street coffee brands, Costa and Starbucks, decided to start plastic loyalty card systems more akin to supermarket loyalty schemes.

We know already that coffee stores using plastic are getting more data and thus more value from the customers using loyalty cards. But do they offer better rewards in return for the shopper purchasing a black coffee every day?

The answer is almost overwhelmingly no for people who enjoy the cheapest coffee on the menu. Costa's reward scheme, the Costa Coffee Club, offers five points for every £1 spent in their store. That means that someone purchasing their cheapest americano will get five points for the £1.95 it costs.

100 points equates to £1, or 1p per point. Although sometimes there are special double points offers, a customer not taking advantage of these would therefore have to buy 39 americanos to get the 195 points needed for a free coffee. That means an outlay of £76.05 to save just £1.95.

At Caffe Nero where they still have a stamp card, nine coffees of any type will get the consumer a free coffee. Considering the cheapest americano coffee there is £2.05, spending £18.45 will get you a £2.05 return. That is proportionately five times the saving as the plastic card.

Bear in mind that if your ultimate goal is saving money then buying a £1.70 coffee at rival Pret will always be cheaper than Costa, Caffe Nero or Starbucks even with the loyalty card saving factored in.

Is it worth it?

Whether a loyalty card scheme is worth it depends on the scheme and the way in which you shop.

The test case in the coffee situation is the commuter whose only coffee store on the way to the station is a Costa.

Because every working day the commuter is buying a regular coffee they are going to be spending anyway. The Costa loyalty scheme is taking 4p off the price of each of those coffees.

The 2.5% saving on the coffee that they are making is so slight that if the commuter's destination station has a range of places to buy a coffee then the financially prudent thing to do would be to see whether there is anywhere where a coffee costs £1.90 or less.

The problem is that people who use the loyalty schemes have usually given their email address or home address to which the company can send vouchers. But there is anecdotal evidence that the best offers are being sent to shoppers who go elsewhere to keep them spending.

Although it is not much of a reason to stay loyal to one brand in any case. Starbucks director of business intelligence and analytics, Joe LaCugna, said earlier this year that the data the company gathered from loyalty cards had shown them that it was not the regular customer that was worth targeting but the one that flits from store to store.

Some analysts even suggest getting two loyalty cards for one supermarket could help trick retailers into giving you better deals by making them think you're shopping much less frequently.

MoneySavingExpert.com's advice on the matter is: "Never choose where you shop due to loyalty schemes, yet always use it if you shop somewhere with one."

Those offers that companies give to buyers who are casual visitors mean that even though a loyalty card should not dictate where you spend your cash it's worth having one if you want to take advantage of exclusive deals.

Whether you think that that 4p off is all you deserve for giving the store the valuable information that someone buys a coffee in a certain store at a certain time of day at a certain frequency is another question.

Other types of loyalty card compared:



Supermarkets:



Sainsbury's and Tesco are the only two of the big four where savers can collect points from their grocery shopping. Photograph: Ricky John Molloy/Getty Images

The loyalty card that is most likely to be central to a consumer's lifestyle is the one they use in the supermarket. Only Sainsbury's, as part of the Nectar scheme, and Tesco out of the big four supermarket chains have a loyalty card available.

Analysing the benefit of supermarket cards is relatively tough because there are so many factors to consider.

Tesco offer one Clubcard point for every pound spent within store while Sainsbury's offer two Nectar points for the same amount. In terms of value two points equal one pence in Sainsbury's compared to a pence a point at Tesco, so the money off is exactly the same.

You can also accumulate one or two points when you spend at other Nectar and Tesco Clubcard partners and both have credit cards available to help you gain more.

Card holders can save more if they spend points at the schemes' selected partners. For example, if you choose to use your tokens at restaurants or on travel you can increase the value of the points by up to four times.

So instead of getting £2.50 off your shopping bill you could get £10 off your meal bill.

If a loyalty card is just used without redeeming any special extra-points offers then someone spending £70 a week would have to shop in Tesco for just under two years, spending £7000, to get one weekly shop free.

In a comparison of the total price of a shopping list of regularly branded products in September by consumer magazine Which? there was an £11.64 saving made by buying the goods at Asda rather than rival Tesco.

Tesco's total basket price was £207.46 so that is a saving of over 5%, which would be more than twice the proportion saved than with a Tesco Clubcard even if the shopper was given double points on their shopping for the entire year. It is also more than the 4% back they are getting on their loyalty card when they redeem their points elsewhere, although admittedly the savings were less modest between Sainsbury's and Tesco for that month.

While special offers are given to Clubcard and Nectar card holders it is also worth noting that special offers will be available every week in every supermarket.

It's worth targeting your spending at places which have savings on items that you would usually buy. Some vouchers sent to you by Clubcard or Nectar card may be incentivising you to spend money that you would have saved otherwise.

Is it worth it? Try putting your weekly shop through a comparison site such as MySupermarket.com and see the proportionate saving. It will probably show you that you are making a tangible saving by opting for a particular supermarket that week.

The disloyalty idea mentioned works here too as if you shop elsewhere you could get more deals sent to you to lure you back. In terms of groceries alone, see where the best deals are for you rather than opting for just one supermarket to get loyalty points and offers.

Flying:

Avios replaced the Air Miles scheme in 2011. Photograph: Alamy

There are two main flying loyalty card schemes for long-haul flights: Avios, linked to British Airways and Iberia, and Virgin Atlantic's Flying Club.

Flyers on both schemes get both points to redeem and something else called tier points. The former corresponds to the number of miles travelled when flying so those taking the 3458 mile trip from London Heathrow to New York JFK would get the same in points back. Those travelling in classes higher than economy also get an increased number of points back

The more tier points you get the higher level of membership you will eventually earn and going up in membership also increases the number of points you earn. This means that frequent first class flyers could be multiplying the amount of points they earn by up to four times.

Higher tier members get benefits such as access to club lounges so there is a little bit more for those flying frequently.

You can also collect points with partnered spending cards and redeem them on things other than flying although flights tend to give you the best value for your points.

It usually makes little sense for those on economy travel to save up money for a long haul flight. The surcharges imposed on redeeming a flight outside Europe mean that your Avios or Virgin Flying Club points decrease in value hugely if you want to take a long haul economy flight. Although it might save you money on prices for business and first class seats.

The best value comes when redeeming it against short haul flights. Avios divides the world into nine zones, each of which cost a fixed number of points to travel to. If you have collected a point in the last year then you only have to pay £35 per traveller instead of the full surcharges in Zone 1, which includes much of mainland Europe. Virgin Flying Club offers a similar rate for its Little Red flights to Scotland.

Flying long haul saves you money in the short haul because a round trip to Beijing earns over 10,000 points that effectively earns a traveller a £35 return flight to Prague on British Airways, with 1000 points to spare.

Is it worth it? If you're flying with an airline that has a scheme you may as well have a card as the Prague example shows. However, a Prague flight with British Airways costs £117 so you are saving £82 for opting to fly for the miles. If you can find a flight with a comparable airline to Beijing for that much less, which seems no great feat, then you can keep the £82 to spend on whatever you want. So don't fly for the points alone.

Chicken:



Nando’s recently upgraded its paper loyalty card system to a plastic card and smartphone app. Photograph: Graeme Robertson

Chicken restaurant Nando's is an interesting case because it is transitioning from a paper card scheme to a plastic one but the new cards still function very similarly to how they did before.

Nando's loyalty scheme is based on collecting "chillis" each time that you visit and spend £7. Three chillis gets you a quarter of a chicken, six half of one and ten a full one. You can also get similarly priced items on the menu at each stage if chicken is not your thing.

As the transition between the two card systems has happened the minimum spend has increased by a pound. However, the overall savings are still quite good for loyal Nando's customers.

A half chicken costs £7 so earns you one chilli. That means that if you buy one half-chicken on three separate visits then you get a quarter of a chicken back, six visits you get half a chicken back and ten visits you get a whole chicken.

This translates to eating five chickens over the course of ten visits to get one whole chicken free.

Because the price of a whole chicken is better value than the price of a quarter chicken then diners are actually making a bigger monetary saving by redeeming after three stamps. However you are getting more chicken for your buck by waiting till you have collected ten stamps.

Although it does mean a lot of value can be had from this scheme those people spending more than the £7 minimum are losing out because the value of each chilli goes down as the price of your meal goes up.

Is it worth it? Same rules apply as in the other three cases although restaurants are more of a unique proposition as the end result is not the same - you may save more money by eating at another restaurant but you may just be after decent Piri Piri Chicken. If you are going to Nando's all the time then this card will eventually save you money.

In summary: are they worth it?

As all of the above schemes show if saving money is your main motive then loyalty cards are no substitute for searching for good deals. But in every single one of these cases the loyalty cards are saving you money in some way.

It's always worth having a loyalty card - if you want to save money and do not mind handing over such specific data to companies - so you can get the exclusive deals that come with it but you should never use it as the sole reason to shop in one place.