The new HFP chat thread – Friday 7th August

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

• Sukes says:

  7 Aug7 August 10:08

  Morning all, I was interested in the comments y’day here about the CP Kensington & as a result I might book for end of the mth. For those who have stayed recently, can you give colour on current breakfast and club lounge offering? do you get a packed breakfast? How is club lounge operated? Obvs I’ll ring hotel to check the rules on what is and isn’t opened and allowed, but I was interested in what those who stayed recently thought of their experience during Covid. Thks

  • Michael C says:

    7 Aug7 August 11:15

    Not sure about CP, but the Conrad St James is offering an open bar + appetisers for an hour (instead of lounge happy hour), and à la carte breakfast instead of buffet.
    Sure they’ll be happy to fill you in with a quick call.

    • Sukes says:

      7 Aug7 August 15:07

      @MichaelC thks for that, I haven’t stayed at the Conrad but enjoyed drinks in their ground flr bar twice last autumn and was impressed, the staff were excellent. Thks for the recommendation.

      • Michael C says:

        7 Aug7 August 19:04

        Will report back in 10 days! Great prices till Sept. at least.
        Also, St James’ Park tube reopens Aug. 15.

  • memesweeper says:

    7 Aug7 August 15:21

    Breakfast was cooked fresh to order for us. Somewhat limited choices compared to a buffet but I’m not complaining.

    They threw a few free drinks in as the lounge was shut too, which was nice.

• Grimz says:

  7 Aug7 August 10:34

  BA have just cancelled my 241 flights to LA in November and if I take a refund my voucher will expire in May 2021. Ideally I want to be rebooked for November 2021 so taking a voucher is the best option but do people think I could ask for seats without having to try and book 355 days out? I know these won’t be available to book right now but would BA allow this when seats become available.

  • Rhys says:

    7 Aug7 August 10:40

    Under EU261 you can ask for rerouting at a later date of your convenience, so you could try that first (you would have to call them).

  • AJA says:

    7 Aug7 August 12:33

    Further to Rhys’s reply I thought the reroute at a later date at your convenience was subject to the availability of seats which would require reward seats to be available. Given that you can’t book more than 355 days out trying to request seats today for November 2021 will result in a negative response. Even waiting until closer to the original departure date will not yield any seat availability. Plus BA will argue that the rebooking will have to be within original ticket validity which is one year from booking. Given your case I would opt for the Future Travel Voucher if you are determined to extend validity of your existing 2-4-1 but you will still have to find reward seats when you try rebooking in early December 2020 for November 2021.

    • Lady London says:

      7 Aug7 August 15:26

      no rerouting of an avios ticket does *not* require avios seats to be available on your chosen replacement flight. Just any seat in same class.

      If you take a voucher or a refund then you do need avios seat availability on the replacement flight.

      • AJA says:

        7 Aug7 August 18:45

        @ LL You’re getting confused between booking class and cabin. I think under EU261 if you are going for rerouting at the earliest opportunity then you’re correct you do not require reward seats, merely seats in the same cabin. But when it comes to rerouting later at your convenience then the airline can indeed refuse to rebook you unless there is availability in the appropriate booking class. The issue is the booking class. Paid seats in Club for example are usually J, C, R or I class while Reward seats are U class.

        • Lady London says:

          8 Aug8 August 18:47

          EU261 states specifically that on a re-route any available seat in the same class of travel is sufficient for the passenger to be rerouted in. Class of travel means First, Business, Premium Economy. Economy. It does *not* mean fare class which is what you’re referring to @AJA. IIRC contemporaneous reroutes are not distinguished from the passenger exercisung his option to choose a reroute at a later date of his convenience.

          Class of travel is what’s stated as the passenger’s entitlement under EU261 which is a statute and therefore overrides any contract such as airline’s own ts and cs.

          So BA is not doing you a favour by allowing you to rebook your trip to a later date whem they cancel or seriously reschedule your flight. The choice to do that is yours under EU261 (although i.ts the decent thing anyway)

• In-chan Kim says:

  7 Aug7 August 10:36

  Does anyone have the Harrods Amex card? Would be good to hear your opinion on it, and the full benefits too.
  I think the sign on bonus is 1,000 Harrods points (measly £10), with 1 point for each £ spent.
  There were some other complimentary things.
  £150 sign on fee too.
  Does anyone know if the points earned on the Amex would count towards the Harrods tier level?

  • Andrew says:

    7 Aug7 August 11:20

    Yes, they seemed to do a marketing email yesterday to Gold and Black tier Rewards members (who are the only ones eligible to apply). Apart from the rather exclusive bronze card with the Harrods log on it, it doesn’t really offer much for the £150 annual fee and so I’ve never bothered with it despite being a heavy spender in Harrods. The points you earn outside Harrods effectively show as bonus points on your account, in the same way as the double points for the birthday week do – the spend thresholds required for the membership tiers are based on the amount of money spent in store and any other bonus points or spend outside Harrods do not count. When you have this card you use it instead of swiping your Rewards card in store and if you pay with a different medium eg cash or gift card then they can still swipe your Amex just for the rewards points (and to get your free tea and coffee in the cafes etc). I think if Harrods is serious about getting people to sign up they either need to increase that sign up bonus to nearly offset the annual fee.

    • KBuffett says:

      7 Aug7 August 12:32

      I think the two extra Harrods Rewards Points per £ spent in store make it 5% in points if you are Black Tier. You make the fee back after spending £3000 in store.

      • Tom H says:

        7 Aug7 August 23:53

        Does this give you access to the Harrods Christmas Grotto?

        • Rob says:

          8 Aug8 August 09:28

          Not sure. I think you need normal Harrods status for that.

• BJ says:

  7 Aug7 August 10:46

  BBC on BA staff cuts today:
  https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53687338

  • Paul says:

    7 Aug7 August 11:19

    I have flown with BA in the last week in Club Europe to and from Glasgow. It is a pitiful experience on just about every single level.

    Heathrow . Vast uncontained queues in what are unsafe conditions not just for passengers but for their staff; the few of them they had working. None of the 4 sanitizer points I tried were working.

    The lounge dragons were to busy talking about shift swaps to pay attention to me swiping in and then got grumpy when I walked past them.

    The highlight was galleries north where the lounge serving staff (notably not BA employees) are just lovely.

    Sadly the same cannot be said for the bogs (no other appropriate word) where you are more likely to catch something other than covid. They were, are, and seem always to be disgusting.

    Boarding was fine but catering was a crushed sandwich in a brown paper bag. Its is awful.
    I don’t recall being offered a drink of any kind on flight up but was on the return.

    Disembarkation is a laughable with the instruction to stay 2m apart in the aisle. I mean please!!

    The return check-in (I had bags) had limited queues but utterly disinterested staff, no priority check in, no recognition, no priority tags, no info. We walked to the lounge to find it shut but despite being both silver cards and club no one said a word a check in or offered any alternative.

    The upper deck is also closed but the Lomond Lounge is currently accepting Priority Pass holders without the usual £15 supplement. It was lovely and the service very good.
    Boarding was again handled well but the food even more dire with a further crushed and soggy bag left on my table. There was at least a drink!

    On arrival we were bussed around T5!! The only flight from Glasgow yesterday and we got bussed!!

    Again the ludicrous instruction to remain 2m apart in the aisle before herding us onto 2 busses (that were late) and packing us in like sardines.

    Its a joke and frankly BA and the airport authorities are paying nothing but lip service to the threat from Covid-19.

    • Lady London says:

      7 Aug7 August 11:26

      being packed into buses because of the extra cost and staff time to provide an airbridge, seems a farce. I am wondering how dangerous airports like Milan MXP are going to be, because I cant ever recall not being packed into a bus to and from planes there. Very worrying.

      Other airlines are only allowing each row to leave the plane individually when called by crew.

      • Dominic Barrington says:

        7 Aug7 August 11:33

        I am writing this in the main SWISS lounge at ZRH, having just flown in from LHR on my way to Antalya. We found a very cheap deal LHR/ZRH/AYT and back in business class on SWISS, and I’m broadly feeling very impressed. LHR/2 was pretty empty this morning, and it all went like clockwork. The LH lounge was fine and had modest breakfast offerings. There was a very impressive hot breakfast offered on board. Plus a contact details form to fill in for tracing.

        Downside was the plane was almost full, and, bizarrely, we taxied to a remote stand at ZRH and had to be bussed. Those of us in the front of the plane had our own bus so distancing worked OK, but this felt odd, given that ZRH is as quiet as every other airport at present.

        But the service standard puts Club Europe to shame. Well done, SWISS!

        • Andrew says:

          7 Aug7 August 11:53

          The service standards of most things put Club Europe to shame!

    • Andrew says:

      7 Aug7 August 13:13

      Ah, you’re making the classic mistake of confusing a Club Europe domestic flight with a regular Club Europe flight. On some domestic flights, notably a Friday evening to Edinburgh, there can be just a handful of passengers who aren’t Gold members.

      Don’t expect anything special, for many it’s just commuter bus.

      • Nick_C says:

        7 Aug7 August 17:27

        Last time I flew Club Europe it was pretty awful and we were transferred to the terminal by bus. And that was to Portugal last year. Nothing to do with Covid. Just a poor quality product.

    • Erico1875 says:

      7 Aug7 August 19:58

      Pretty much our CE experience EDI- LHR -BLQ. gate staff were stroppy. flight was 1 hour late lost both our bags for 4 days out of a 6 day break !
      Complete contrast with a very efficient (and direct) Ryanair BLQ- EDI flight. took off bang on time and arrived 20 mins early.

  • Andrew says:

    7 Aug7 August 11:21

    See discussion on page 1 of this thread.

  • ChrisC says:

    7 Aug7 August 11:55

    I have a few friends who have worked for BA for quite some time as both cabin and flight crew.

    Some have just given up and took the offer and have / will move onto other, better things away from airlines. . As one said to me months ago how can anyone left be motivated to do anything more than the bare minimum when the management treat the staff with pure disdain.

    The others have been quiet so not sure of their thoughts but likely won’t be enthusiastic even if they do decide to stay.

    I also have a couple of friends at VS (a pilot and a member of cabin crew). Both are safe from redundancy at the moment and whilst this is not a nice process they have said that the management and communications from them have been good and so they have felt valued and supported which means that when they fly again they will be motivated to do a good job.

    I’m perfectly aware that the industry needs to lose jobs and not just in this country but why is it that many other airlines have been able to treat their staff with dignity during this process whereas BA can’t (or is it that they simply don’t want to)?

    And yes I have been made redundant myself in the past and been involved in the process to make others redundant but at least we did our best to show some basic humanity to our employees.

• Matt says:

  7 Aug7 August 10:51

  IHG Creation payments
  Hi All, people here have been talking about how to pay this off with any card over the last few weeks. Tesco debit card actually did not pay out.
  Has anyone successfully used MBNA or Virgin without any cash advance fees being charged?
  Thanks in Advance!

  • Anna says:

    7 Aug7 August 11:37

    Do you mean the Tesco debit card was declined? Some issuers won’t allow their cards to make payments to other financial institutions. Barclaycard works (though not the other way round).

  • stevenhp1987 says:

    7 Aug7 August 13:37

    VS card is fine.

    • bazza says:

      7 Aug7 August 16:17

      The FREE Virgin one has never worked for me on the website or App. I always have to use Curve

      • James says:

        7 Aug7 August 16:42

        Correct me if I am wrong but were people stating they can pay off credit card with other credit cards not using Curve and not getting advanced fees?

        I have always used Curve for these types of transactions with no issues. Only one I can not pay is Barclaycard though I can use the card to pay another institute

        • Ash says:

          7 Aug7 August 17:47

          can use m & m prepay charge card. Others not working

    • Matt says:

      7 Aug7 August 20:15

      Hey Stephen,
      You can use virgin WITHOUT Curve to pay off IHG with no cash advance fees, correct?
      People seem to be saying different things now, and that you have to use curve?
      Tesco debit card recognises this as a money transaction and does not give points.

      • Clickhere says:

        8 Aug8 August 10:25

        Worked for me with the free VS.

        Does not work with M&M – £3 advance fee charged.

        M&M works fine with revolt, no need for curvy

  • The Urbanite says:

    7 Aug7 August 21:40

    Tesco do not award points for MCC 6012 transactions. They do publish the exceptions – https://www.tescobank.com/current-accounts/rewards/

• BJ says:

  7 Aug7 August 11:01

  Bit of an obscure one for HfP but may be of interest to some…you can now gift Vodafone VeryMe rewards to others to use.

• Nick_C says:

  7 Aug7 August 11:15

  Just noticed that Shop Small credits dating back to 25 June posted on Wednesday (BAPP and ARCC). I had previously had confirmation emails but had not chased.

  • Darren says:

    7 Aug7 August 12:35

    Me too, but from a month ago.

  • Craig says:

    7 Aug7 August 13:22

    +1

• Waribai says:

  7 Aug7 August 11:57

  Worth holding out a little longer if you have Spanish flights in August or September booked that you no longer need. Despite what they said last week, BA are starting to consolidate services. Just had a sms from BA cancelling my Ibiza flight in 10 days time and moving me to a later flight in the day which is ideal as with the quarantine we have decided to go to Italy instead. It means we can now get all our avios and cash back rather than a cruddy voucher.

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.