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The HfP chat thread – Wednesday 23rd December

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We have decided to run this daily chat thread on Head for Points during the coronavirus outbreak.

Historically, the daily ‘Bits’ articles were the de facto repository for random comments and questions.  With the news flow being lighter, we are running fewer ‘Bits’ articles.

The comments under this article are where you should post questions about travel and, indeed, anything else on your mind.  At this tricky time, and given that many of you are at home, we want the HfP community to have a place to chat.

Please only comment under the main articles on the site if your comment is directly related to the topic of the article.  This has long-term benefits as it keeps the commentary relevant for people who read those articles in the future.

Old chat threads are hidden from the HfP home page.  If you want to look for something in an old thread, click here.  This brings up all the articles in our ‘General’ category which includes the chat threads.

Category

General

Comments (249)

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

  • JM says:
    23 Dec23 December 12:16

    How does BA confidence guarantee work with the return leg?

    Once abroad, would it be free to change return flight to a later one? (If we decided it was better to stay abroad than come back to the bleak picture in U.K.)

    • Jonathan says:
      23 Dec23 December 12:32

      No change fee but fare difference will apply. If you’ve flown the outbound leg then the new fare will be calculated using the fares available at the time you booked the ticket so may be nothing (you will need availability in the same fare bucket though).

  • 747_Brat says:
    23 Dec23 December 12:28

    Got stung with £200 worth of cash advance charges for paying Seagulls via Bendy & Button-shaped chocolates! Some were paid directly earlier without Bendy involved, but were treated the same.

    Have been doing this since a very long time, but this was the first time I was charged a cash advance fee. Another MS avenue got shut! 🙁

    • Koi says:
      23 Dec23 December 12:29

      Because you don’t follow the first rule of fight club…

    • TGLoyalty says:
      23 Dec23 December 12:41

      If you used curve you might be able to go back in time and the reversed transactions will reverse the fees.

      • Not Angry says:
        23 Dec23 December 13:32

        You can, but first you need to add a debit card to your wallet.

        You can’t take an M&M back in time to a regular credit card without enabling fronted and paying the fee.

    • Nick_C says:
      23 Dec23 December 12:54

      Nick (747_Brat). Did you get your sign up bonus from Metro Bank? (I haven’t had a referral bonus yet, but I know from the MSE thread that they are taking a long time)

    • Benilyn says:
      23 Dec23 December 13:50

      Where you using bendy fronting?

      • TGLoyalty says:
        23 Dec23 December 14:01

        Fronting doesn’t change anything. Still passes through the MCC.

      • 747_Brat says:
        23 Dec23 December 15:17

        No, wasn’t using the fronting option. Does fronting results in Bendy adding a charge on top of transaction?

        • Benilyn says:
          23 Dec23 December 15:22

          No I was just curious. I have been out the bendy game for about 11 months due to fronting fee & limits, but looking to get back in given the £1m+ limits now. FWIW, in Dec-19/Jan-20 people including me started to get charged for making seagull payments via bendy & beardy, and so I stopped. But it was random, others reported it being fine, others were getting charged…

          • 747_Brat says:
            23 Dec23 December 15:46

            Thanks mate. Looks like I am also going to sit out of the game for a while!

        • TGLoyalty says:
          23 Dec23 December 16:07

          Bendy adds 1.5% to seagulls HMRC and a few others if backed by a credit card. Fee is waived for metal users.

  • thehornets says:
    23 Dec23 December 12:44

    It’s that true? ARCC doesn’t activate a bonus? That’s upset my plans!

  • Greg says:
    23 Dec23 December 12:56

    There is ton of discussion about manufactured spending all over various public forums. People here think that they have cracked Enigma.

    • TGLoyalty says:
      23 Dec23 December 13:53

      No one thinks they’ve cracked anything.

      Just because there’s tons of discussion elsewhere doesn’t mean it has to continue here.

      Let people find those other forums/blogs etc where tons of discussion is happening.

      My only advice is try a small transaction and see if it works if it doesn’t then ah well chalk that up as experience.

  • Anna says:
    23 Dec23 December 12:58

    I’m not a huge fan of Nicols Sturgeon but her public apology for foregtting to put on her mask is in a different universe from the rose garden-style shennanigans of Cummings etc.

    • Nick_C says:
      23 Dec23 December 13:06

      I think the two incidents were very different. Anyone can make a mistake. But its a rare change for a politician to quickly admit to one and apologise for it. Good on her.

      • Anna says:
        23 Dec23 December 13:17

        That was my point! She has taken far greater responsibility for making a mistake than other public figures have done for much more serious infringements. Maybe our royals should follow suit …

      • Peter M says:
        23 Dec23 December 14:43

        That doesn’t explain her super injunction though

    • the_real_a says:
      23 Dec23 December 13:32

      Whatever happened to her SNP cohort that after a positive covid test then rode public transport for 5 hours spreading her disease to goodness knows how many other people? Is she still an MP?

      • E says:
        23 Dec23 December 13:37

        That MP is still an MP, but is now an independent. She’s been suspended from the SNP and they started legal proceedings to expel her. She is therefore no longer an MP for SNP but the SNP can’t force her to give up her seat as only the constituents can do that I think.

        • Andrew says:
          23 Dec23 December 13:55

          Or the Parliamentary Commissioner for Standards

          • Jill ( Kinkell) says:
            23 Dec23 December 16:19

            Probably didn’t want to give up her £82k salary.!

          • TGLoyalty says:
            23 Dec23 December 16:33

            Tbf I know in the past she pledged to give her pay rise to charity.

            Good People do stupid things sometimes doesn’t make them a terrible person only in it for the money etc.

        • Nick_C says:
          23 Dec23 December 14:20

          AIUI, the constituents can only recall her if she receives a prison sentence (which cannot happen for this offence) or if the Standards Committee gives her a long suspension.

          The local authority would need to open up a facilities for signing the petition, and keep those facilities open for six weeks. There is no formal tallying of the petition until the six weeks has elapsed, so even if 10% of constituents called for a recall within the first week, the petition would need to remain open for a further five weeks. This strikes me as a ridiculous waste of money, and something that needs to be reformed.

          Finally, if the recall petition is successful, a by election would be called.

          I don’t think anyone particularly wants to have to run a petition or a by election right now, but I hope this may happen once it becomes safe to run elections once more.

          London (GLA and the Mayor) elections were postponed from May 2020 to May 2021, and staffing them could be problematic, as a sizeable proportion of elections staff will be concerned about catching or transmitting Covid unless the situation drastically improves before May.

          • Nick says:
            23 Dec23 December 17:21

            I don’t think suppressing democracy is a good idea, even in the middle of a pandemic. That’s a very slippery road. I would rather we found an (any) alternative way to hold elections safely.

          • TGLoyalty says:
            23 Dec23 December 21:03

            Unfortunately democracy has been suppressed all the way through this pandemic.

  • Maciek says:
    23 Dec23 December 13:31

    I’ve just received a call from a manager at AmEx to discuss my complaint regarding lack of new offers since October across all my cards and all holders – “sir, you’re not eligible for any, these are targeted and not part of the core benefits”. Asked to escalate further and I am not one step closer cancelling both Platinum and Gold cards.

    • TGLoyalty says:
      23 Dec23 December 13:49

      Somethings obviously been flagged did you question why you didn’t get small shop or the free £100 every platinum member got?

      • Guernsey Globetrotter says:
        23 Dec23 December 13:52

        Was the ‘free £100’ the Waitrose offer on personal platinum cards? We have plat business and not a sniff of anything as useful as that 🙁

      • Maciek says:
        23 Dec23 December 13:58

        I did previously, forgot to mention it today (facepalm). Oh well, I’ll wait for the response from the complaints departent.

    • Josh says:
      23 Dec23 December 14:17

      All holders? Did you split the cost of your Plat with someone else and give them a Supp Plat?

      • Maciek says:
        23 Dec23 December 14:36

        no, my family members are supplementary cardholders.

        • KBuffett says:
          23 Dec23 December 20:06

          How many supplementary cards do you have and which types?

          • TGLoyalty says:
            23 Dec23 December 21:04

            You can have 1 Plat and 5 gold/green.

            I have 1 plat and 2 gold. In the majority of cases all cards get the same offers.

            I have atleast 1 of not 2 for all our other cards.

  • James says:
    23 Dec23 December 14:31

    Currently have WT ‘O’ tickets from LHR-DXB which means I can only upgrade to WTP with cash. If I do this, can I then upgrade to CW with Avios. If so, how many would it take, or does it vary?

  • OP says:
    23 Dec23 December 15:02

    Creation appear to be blocking any and all Curve transactions from my account as of a few days ago… does anybody know if this is common and will they rectify it?

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

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