Bits: Concorde Room side door reopens, LATAM deals to Latin America, IHG 15-year bonus

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News in brief:

The Terminal 5 Concorde Room magic door reopens

When British Airways opened The First Wing at Terminal 5 earlier this year (review here), they simultaneously closed the direct entrance into The Concorde Room by the South security channel.

(The Concorde Room – reviewed here – is the lounge for ticketed First Class passengers, Gold Guest List members with 5,000 tier points and Premier Executive Club members only.)

The First Wing actually made life harder for Concorde Room visitors as they had to use the First Wing, walk through Galleries First, leave Galleries First and then walk down to the Concorde Room side entrance. Staff have been saying that a group of senior BA executives, who have Concorde Room access, visited recently and were unhappy with the new arrangement, so the side door has returned.

And, if you’re using the First Wing, the honeymoon seems to be over at peak times as the photo below shows:

First_Wing_queue

New LATAM business class deals to Latin America

LATAM has launched some attractive business class fare to Latin America.

Remember that LATAM in a oneworld member. This means that you earn British Airways tier points and Avios when you fly with them as long as you add your BA number to the booking.

Headline prices are (all flights involve changing in Santiago or Sao Paulo):

London to Rio, £1560 return
London to Sao Paulo, £2020 return
London to Buenos Aires, £1650 return
London to Salvador Bahia, £1560 return
London to Curitiba, £1560 return
London to Porto Alegre, £1560 return
London to Santiago de Chile, £1620 return
London to Asuncion, £1630 return
London to Montevideo, £1630 return

Here is our review of LATAM’s Boeing 787 business class, when we flew it from Madrid to Frankfurt earlier this year. You are likely to be on a 777 which has similar seats.

These deals can be booked here. You must be 9th July, book at least 31 days before you travel and stay at least 5 nights or a Saturday night. Blackout dates apply to each route.

IHG giving out bonuses on your 15th anniversary

Finally, a reader sent me an email he had received from IHG Rewards Club to thank him for being a member of the programe for 15 years.

It’s good to see this sort of data being tracked. As a present, he was offered triple base points on a selected day during the next three months.

What was good about the offer was that it did not activate until the reader clicked a link. This means that he can hold it back for a higher value stay rather than being stuffed if his next trip is a £39 overnighter at a Holiday Inn Express.

IHG Rewards update – December 2021:

Get bonus points: You can earn up to triple IHG Rewards base points with IHG’s new Autumn promotion. It runs from 1st October to 31st December. You can register here and our full article on the offer is here.

New to IHG Rewards? Read our overview of IHG Rewards here and our article on points expiry rules here. Our article on ‘What are IHG Rewards points worth?’ is here.

Buy points: If you need additional IHG Rewards points, you can buy them here.

You will get a 100% bonus when you buy IHG Rewards points by 4th January 2022. Click here to buy or learn more.

Want to earn more hotel points? Click here to see our complete list of promotions from IHG and the other major hotel chains or use the ‘Hotel Offers’ link in the menu bar at the top of the page.