The HfP chat thread – Monday 14th September

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• David says:

  14 Sep14 September 08:59

  I’m planing a day trip to a non EU destination to save a considerable amount of money on a duty free purchase. Istanbul seems the obvious choice but there is only an hour between arriving and and leaving. Is this possible in the new Istanbul airport or can anyone think of an alternative ?

  • memesweeper says:

    14 Sep14 September 09:04

    Channel Islands
    Isle of Man
    Canaries

    … all outside the EU for customs purposes.

    • memesweeper says:

      14 Sep14 September 09:17

      … but if it’s above a certain value you have to red channel declare it on the way in and pay the VAT? you’d be looking for a cheap item and very cheap flights…

      • David says:

        14 Sep14 September 09:49

        Even if the item is bought in duty free at Heathrow ?

        • Anna says:

          14 Sep14 September 10:27

          We’ll be getting some kind of duty free status when the transition period is over, can it wait till then? Have to say I don’t really know how this will work, presumably like the olden days of the 80s and early 90s? I hope they will increase the allowance from 1 litre of spirits!!

        • TGLoyalty says:

          14 Sep14 September 12:14

          Its duty free for people leaving the UK to then pay the duty where they enter if applicable. For the UK that’s

          “You can bring in other goods worth up to £390 (or up to £270 if you arrive by private plane or boat).

          If a single item’s worth more than your allowance you pay any duty or tax on its full value, not just the value above the allowance.”

          https://www.gov.uk/duty-free-goods/arrivals-from-outside-the-eu

          However, it’s completely up to you to declare or for customs to pull you up/prove it. i.e. if it’s a watch on your wrist or laptop in your bag they are unlikely to notice. if you walk through with a laptop in a box you will be more likely to be stopped.

          From the EU you can bring in anything of any value for your personal consumption.

        • Andrew says:

          14 Sep14 September 12:23

          If it’s bought from a retailer who does offer tax free prices to all, you’re better off buying if flying within the EU as the retailer will pay the VAT on your behalf and therefore no issue on import. At LHR you can even do buy and collect and not have to take it with you on your trip.

        • Andrew says:

          14 Sep14 September 12:20

          Yes even then. However most shops at LHR offer tax free prices to all destinations. Worth checking with the shop in question in advance – I know Louis Vuitton don’t so if that’s what you’re looking at you’ll need to fly outside the EU.

        • memesweeper says:

          14 Sep14 September 12:53

          Correct — although it’s not completely tax free, they just take a hit on the domestic/EU travellers and pocket extra cash for the longer hauls. Same price to the punter. I’ve bought Apple goods and other high-price items for a significant discount when flying domestic. Note, if you call up before flying to reserve the item you might be able to secure an additional discount (eg if buying *two* pairs of AirPods etc) and you will be assured the item is there, ready for you, when you need it.

    • Charlieface says:

      14 Sep14 September 14:37

      What about Norway, Iceland, Switzerland or Liechtenstein?

      Other less obvious ones:
      Åland Islands, Finland
      Heligoland, Germany
      Campione, Italy
      Livigno, Italy
      Gibraltar
      Faroe Islands

      Admittedly Istanbul will certainly have cheaper duty free goods than these

  • Lady London says:

    14 Sep14 September 13:16

    wouldnt try it in IST. Queues out and in too unpredictable. The airport seems to fall into chaos too easily.

    just remembered that was Ataturk but suspect that has not changed.

    Wondering if Andorra, Liechtenstein, San Marino any use.

  • Stanley says:

    14 Sep14 September 16:03

    Just buy it, “miss” your flight, and go home.

    • Lady London says:

      14 Sep14 September 21:14

      does not work. you will need to be escorted out by security (who wont find this entertaining and may waste a lot of your time). They will ask you specifically if you bought any duty free and will force you to return it if so.

• MadeUpName says:

  14 Sep14 September 09:09

  Hi, does anyone know how close to departure you can request a future travel voucher from BA? Or how close to departure you can change the dates as part of the book with confidence policy? Can you do it less than 24 hours before departure?

  • AJA says:

    14 Sep14 September 09:14

    You can claim a FTV up to an hour before scheduled departure of your flight but i wouldn’t leave it that tight as BA need to make sure you’re offloaded from the flight manifest.

    Not sure about using Book with Confidence to change a booking.

• antoinette says:

  14 Sep14 September 09:13

  Need to book an inbound flight for 4 September – I think they are released tonight. Is it at midnight or 1am?
  Also i need 4 tickets in Business, what is the minimum that BA release on each flight?
  I assume as this is a September 2021 flight it won’t be covered by the “Book with confidence” even though our outbound is 19 Aug

  • Anna says:

    14 Sep14 September 10:30

    I am but they can take up to an hour to load all the flights onto the system so you might need to keep refreshing the page. BA guarantee 2 in CW but some destinations are seeing more than that at the moment. Weirdly, on some routes they are releasing more outbound CW seats than inbound – another HFP reader also noticed this.

    • Chas says:

      14 Sep14 September 10:59

      Yup, this has happened to me for Costa Rica next summer. I missed the t-355 date for my outbound, but a week later there were loads of extra reward seats loaded (albeit in WTP which is far from ideal) so grabbed myself 4. But at T-355 (last Saturday) I couldn’t get the inbound seats at all, so am hoping that they will similarly add more seats in the coming days. Otherwise I’ll have to try and find myself a decent cash fare at some point and cancel the outbounds (I’m not wasting 2 x 241s on just a single flight).

• AJA says:

  14 Sep14 September 09:15

  The 355 days out includes today in the calculation. As for seats BA only guarantee to release 2 CW seats.

  • Jane says:

    14 Sep14 September 09:40

    There have been a lot of them wide open recently. you might be lucky depending on where you want to go.

• Andyf says:

  14 Sep14 September 09:35

  Anyone else see IAG stock price collapse this morning. I always wish I had the inside knowledge to know why! (Well other than COVID, that is.)

  • Scallder says:

    14 Sep14 September 09:51

    It’s due to the fact that the rights issue they’re doing is at a hugely discounted rate: https://www.ft.com/content/71c419ba-fc89-4e66-b91d-ce4fc5af4d1e

    • TGLoyalty says:

      14 Sep14 September 12:24

      share holding is being diluted one share for every 2 already held, hence 33% reduction today.

      However, expect there to be a further reduction when they start trading again on Thursday.

    • Pangolin says:

      14 Sep14 September 12:59

      The rights issue is to pay for WW’s Golden Goodbye bonus

      • Lady London says:

        14 Sep14 September 21:16

        Bad Pangolin !
        🙂

  • Danny says:

    14 Sep14 September 09:58

    The price of IAG shares are being adjusted down on Monday 14 September to take into account the Rights Issue; these Rights are expected to be issued on Thursday 17 September therefore as a proportion of the value of the investment in IAG will be represented by these Rights the overall value of your investment will appear lower from Monday until these Rights are credited.

  • Stanley says:

    14 Sep14 September 10:55

    Its up 5p at 133.8p ?

    • TGLoyalty says:

      14 Sep14 September 15:34

      But 60p down on Friday close

• Andrew says:

  14 Sep14 September 09:50

  BA should consider doing this on the 747s before they retire – could be a little money spinner for them, particularly in premium cabins and helps keep brand awareness and positivity up which BA certainly need at the moment.
  https://www.businesstraveller.com/business-travel/2020/09/14/singapore-airlines-to-launch-flights-to-nowhere/

  • Rhys says:

    14 Sep14 September 09:55

    Don’t hold your breath.

    • Andrew says:

      14 Sep14 September 10:28

      Well indeed – always a good policy when wanting BA to do something nice.

      • aDifferentSimon says:

        14 Sep14 September 14:10

        NIce?
        It reads like a April fools joke to me.
        Let’s burn a load of unnecessary fuel…

• Kevin C says:

  14 Sep14 September 10:25

  Uber is offering me 20% off my next 20 rides. No code so clearly targeted. Check your emails to see if you got it. I’ve not really been using Uber during the end times.

  • Nick says:

    14 Sep14 September 11:02

    ‘end times’ ?! I mean Covid is annoying, but the end of the world?!

  • Lady London says:

    14 Sep14 September 12:09

    do you trust Uber after their denial of the £5 promo

    • Kevin C says:

      14 Sep14 September 15:03

      Well I had an Uber Eats promo code that worked on Friday so yes I would probably give it a go. There’s a big difference between a targeted promo that’s applied automatically and something we got off Facebook. Small print states up to £7 discount per ride.
      Amex Shop Small was very hit and miss this year but I kept trying it.

      • TGLoyalty says:

        14 Sep14 September 15:43

        I did really well out of it in the end.

        Restaurants, bars, bakeries etc

• rams1981 says:

  14 Sep14 September 10:51

  Still had nothing from Curve about their duplicate transaction of £500. There is no way to escalate it seems. What awful customer service.

  • Wing It One World says:

    14 Sep14 September 11:08

    Unless you need the metal card, I would choose the free card and lower your expectations of this company. Paying for a service with this level of customer service is madness.

  • DJ says:

    14 Sep14 September 11:46

    It’s the worst when Curve don’t acknowledge of any potential duplicate transactions, until you discover them yourself by accident. It took me a week trying to get a duplicate transaction reversed.

    To minimise the risk of duplicates, I have been using Curve solely for small day to day transactions to keep other cards active with the “Go Back in time” feature.

  • Genghis says:

    14 Sep14 September 12:28

    I’m surprised as I sorted out my wife’s v easily. Start a formal complaint with view to going to FOS (after 8 weeks or final response).

    • Jtz says:

      14 Sep14 September 13:15

      I’ve had the same issue, a declined transaction but curve have taken payment I’ve emailed them at least 3 times now and they keep saying it should be there in 5 days, it’s been 3 weeks!

  • mark2 says:

    14 Sep14 September 14:23

    Mine has now been resolved. IHG say that Virgin/Curve refunded it but no word from Curve.

  • Charlieface says:

    14 Sep14 September 14:38

    Just chargeback it

  • rams1981 says:

    14 Sep14 September 17:13

    by way of update – they got back to me today. Acknowledged a duplicate and offered one month’s free metal as a goodwill gesture or I can take it forward as a formal complaint. Not really sure what the latter will achieve. Their one month free offer offsets the £12 fee I was charged by IHG mastercard so seems resonable?

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