The HfP chat thread – Thursday 31st December

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• Yuff says:

  31 Dec31 December 08:23

  Has anyone used the Sofitel stay and test package recently?
  Any reports. Any others doing a similar service close to Heathrow?
  I need to use the service next week as Mallorca now require a negative test on arrival.

  • Anna says:

    31 Dec31 December 08:33

    I haven’t heard of any other hotels doing it but wasn’t there a test provider actually at LHR somewhere?
    https://www.heathrow.com/at-the-airport/fly-safe/covid-19-test
    What’s the rule for hotels in Tier 4, are they still allowed to accept buisness travellers etc?

    • Tariq says:

      31 Dec31 December 09:02

      Yes, you can stay in a hotel in Tier 4 as long as it is necessary for work purposes or because you ‘cannot return home’.

    • Yuff says:

      31 Dec31 December 10:14

      Thanks Anna, the Sofitel one looks appealing but it is self administered and I rather have a professional do the test, although I think there might be a check in the test to notify someone that the test has been done correctly.
      The PCR Heathrow test is 48hr turnaround which isn’t that convenient unfortunately

  • Martin Short says:

    31 Dec31 December 19:18

    I used Gatwick north sofitel at 4pm 29th dec.
    Test result came back at 1am , so just a few hours after via email.
    Reception printed it off. Then straight to Dubai via Heathrow.
    Sofitel heathrow probably the same

• Green Plastic says:

  31 Dec31 December 08:23

  Morning all – booked my Amex 2-4-1 back in April for a trip in January but going to be cancelling the booking shortly. I no longer have the BAPP which I used to make the booking. Will this pose any issues with my refund?

  • BJ says:

    31 Dec31 December 08:33

    No, it will be refunded to BAPP, you then call amex and request they transfer the balance to another card or your bank accouht, cheque if you prefer.

  • Anna says:

    31 Dec31 December 08:36

    You may have to upload bank documents for the refund (easiest to do this on an ipad or phone as you can upload a photo). Might depend on the amount of the refund, though I didn’t get asked to do this for my most recent refund and did wonder if it was because the cancelled card is still attached to the Amex account I have my other cards linked to.

    • BJ says:

      31 Dec31 December 09:01

      Never had that, first I heard of it too.

      • TGLoyalty says:

        31 Dec31 December 09:19

        Only If you had no DD set up I just requested a cheque.

        • MattB says:

          31 Dec31 December 09:46

          I had a similar issue when I had a large refund earlier in the year. As my cards was still open it was obviously easier to set up a direct debit there and then rather than uploading docs and waiting.

    • Simon says:

      1 Jan1 January 20:45

      Documents only required > £500.00 (datapoint)

• Tim J says:

  31 Dec31 December 09:03

  Morning. We had to cancel a last minute booking to St
  Lucia when London was put into tier 4. Flights and hotel refunds were both simple directly from the airline (Tui) and hotel (Windjammer) that we had just booked with.
  However we had also paid and taken 4 PCR tests with a local private doc at a cost of £600.
  I tried to claim the cost on my travel insurance (HSBC premier/ tun by Aviva) and was met a polite but firm phone call rejecting it on the basis that they have no terms allowing test results to be refunded.
  Anyone else had the same issue and is it worth fighting?
  Thanks

  • Tracey says:

    31 Dec31 December 09:12

    I don’t think you will get anywhere with this. The clinic provided the service you booked. You got the test results you had asked for. In the same way that the cost of renewing passports and visas wouldn’t be refunded if you didn’t travel, I can’t see who would be liable to cover you. It’s a bit like buying new holiday clothes, if you don’t go on holiday you still have the clothes, even if they are of no use to you.

    • KC says:

      31 Dec31 December 09:32

      Personal experience with HSBC premier: when I had to cancel a trip at the start of the pandemic, and claim a bunch of nonrefundable costs, I put several visa costs (multiple countries) in, which were approved without any issue. I think I did mention the visa costs over the phone as well when the agent asked me what items I was claiming for, and they didn’t reject it.

• Simon says:

  31 Dec31 December 09:11

  Happy new year to all!!

  • Andrew Mc says:

    31 Dec31 December 10:05

    Come back tomorrow 🙂

    • Pangolin says:

      31 Dec31 December 12:12

      The Kiwis are already there. Aussies have to wait another 50 minutes.

      • Pangolin says:

        31 Dec31 December 12:15

        That’s the Aussies in Sydney/Melbourne. A wee bit longer to wait if they live in Adelaide, Darwin, Perth..

        • Louie says:

          1 Jan1 January 02:27

          and Brisbane. Dopey Queensland doesn’t do daylight saving.

• Dan says:

  31 Dec31 December 09:14

  Does anyone have any idea on when the TAP Status Match Promotion will end? I’d like to take advantage given the easy requirements but want to wait until the last moment to pull the trigger to really use the A* Gold benefits. Equally, don’t want to wait until it’s pulled to do so! They have used 1st Jan 2020 as when you need to be a customer to do this, does anyone reckon that today 31st Dec 2020 will be last day for it?

  • Rhys says:

    31 Dec31 December 09:18

    They haven’t given an end date so we have no idea

    • Dan says:

      31 Dec31 December 10:45

      I thought so – thanks Rhys!

• Jane says:

  31 Dec31 December 09:23

  Thanks @Grant for the igloo referral the other day have just signed up.

  • Grant says:

    31 Dec31 December 10:54

    Many thanks, Jane 👍🏻

    • 747_Brat says:

      31 Dec31 December 13:26

      I also used your referral link Grant. 🙂
      Thanks.

• jil says:

  31 Dec31 December 09:25

  IHG premier card is closed for new application, any idea what will happen for existing card approaching expire date?

  • TGLoyalty says:

    31 Dec31 December 09:49

    It’ll be replaced?

  • David says:

    31 Dec31 December 12:52

    Expect to get your renewal card as normal.
    Many cards closed to new applicants have lived long beyond their original dates (ah the bmi diamond club cards… tesco original cards, etc).

    Remember everyone will have different card expiry dates, and the issuer is under no obligation to continue to provide the credit line until your card expiry.

    Never expect anything in this situation to be in any way aligned to your own card expiry date. They could renew it, then end the product 2 months later, or they could have ended it 2 months ago … or, in this situation, I would expect it to continue.

    When it gets interesting is when they run out of card blanks, or a EMV chip profile expires on the existing stock, then you start getting letters through reassuring you that … although your card has a different design… it is exactly the same as it was.

    Annual fees are the only interesting bit, but again, we have had products end and people be giving pro-rate refunds. So again, don’t expect anything to be tied into any dates.

• AndyGWP says:

  31 Dec31 December 09:40

  FAO: 747_Brat

  Bit of a starter for 10, re: setting up your own VPN server using a raspberry Pi and PiVPN

  So you need a raspberry pi (just a v1b does the job), a 4gb SD card (you may get away with less – aim for a class 10 tho) a micro usb cable to power it, and a short network cable

  You will also need a broadband router that supports Dynamic DNS – this means that you can register for a URL with: noip DOT com (meaning you don’t have to worry about your home IP address ever changing – it’s a free service). My 3 year old BT router supports this. In fact, my 12 year old Sky router does!

  My BT broadband router has a USB port on the back of it, so my micro USB plugs in here to power the Pi – this means no extra power sockets needed. The install is all headless, so you shouldn’t need a monitor, keyboard or mouse – just a machine that can run:
  – Putty (portable app version is fine)
  – WINSCPPortable

  I then downloaded the latest Raspbian Buster Lite image

  Use Etcher (free to download, and can be a non-installable portable app) to burn it to SD card

  Then create a blank file on there called SSH (by default, SSH is disabled)

  Connect Pi to network, and power it up

  Find Pi IP address (login to Router to do this)

  Use Putty to connect to the Pi (Google the default SSH Pi credentials)

  For security, change your default Pi password by typing passwd and follow prompts

  I then used the instructions here to install the VPN server:
  http://kamilslab.com/2017/01/22/how-to-turn-your-raspberry-pi-into-a-home-vpn-server-using-pivpn/

  (They may be slightly out of date – follows the correct theme tho…. Whatever port you setup / specify will be the one you need to setup port forwarding on your broadband router for later. Make sure you use the URL you registered as part of your noip dynamic dns during the setup, rather than your home IP address to get the benefits mentioned earlier)

  If you get that far, and are comfortable, you will need to then:
  – Setup port forwarding on your router (so that you can get to your PI from the outside world)
  – Disable VPN compression (due to voracle vulnerability)
  – Set IP forwarding on the Pi (an update disabled this by default, so needs setting else you will connect to your VPN, but the internet won’t work)
  – set CRL expiry to greater than 6 months (else 6 months down the line, it’ll stop working)
  – Schedule (in your diary) regular updates of the OS

  TBC

  • ChrisBCN says:

    31 Dec31 December 10:08

    That’s a bit of a project! But congrats if you got it all working. Do you think it’s better than paying for a VPN like Nord?

    • AndyGWP says:

      31 Dec31 December 10:32

      I think it depends what you plan to use it for – if you need hassle free (apart from the setup of it!) access to things like iPlayer etc, it’s perfect (and the really cheap initial outlay for the kit, and the cheap ongoing running costs of a Pi means it’s you can take a bit of a fire and forget approach, apart from maintaining patching etc)

      The follow on post (I assume) got blocked, but basically suggested if people need more info, I’m happy to explain further (if there’s a lot of demand, I might knock up a website with better instructions to be honest)

    • the_real_a says:

      31 Dec31 December 15:10

      I have used Nord for years. The problem is server`s getting listed on VPN lists which are seen as high risk by, for example financial services providers. They then block the transaction. The workaround is to always use “new” servers – but of course its quite difficult manage and you must use a static server when setting up on a Now TV or Chromecast (you cannot set to dynamically choose a new server)

      The disadvantage (as in my home CCTV) is that it will often crash and you need to reset it. I managed to solve this somewhat with a timer plug that kills the electric every couple of days and forces a reboot. Its on a UPS so will initiate a shutdown.

      I would be worried about latency on a home VPN – i think my uplink is only 1mbs

  • old bob says:

    31 Dec31 December 11:12

    Alternatively, sit down, crack open a beer or three, it’s News Years Eve! Then order Surfshack or Nord when you recover

  • 747_Brat says:

    31 Dec31 December 13:12

    Thank you very much Andy. This was very helpful. 🙂 I am off work next week, and will give it a try.

    Looking forward to the TBC post!

    • AndyGWP says:

      31 Dec31 December 14:21

      No worries – it was just a few more prompts of things to be done, but it doesn’t seem to want to post. Maybe it contains a naughty word 🤔

      • Tocsin says:

        31 Dec31 December 15:08

        ISTR that another likely block is having >1 web links in a post?

  • Sam says:

    31 Dec31 December 13:48

    Alternatively, order a router/modem which supports a VPN (like Nord) and use that. Might need to install upgraded firmware (if people are interested, I’ll report back this evening) but in my opinion, far less effort.

    The ASUS rt-ax56u seems good value and has dropped in price on Currys and Amazon to £99. Another option seems to be is TP-LINK Archer AX10 £69 but I have no experience with TP-LINK

    • AndyGWP says:

      31 Dec31 December 14:19

      Ah. I was aware that there were routers whereby you could configure VPN (for all outbound connections from within the home), but didn’t realise you could also configure them into servers (for inbound connections from your own devices from outside the home)

      Agreed, that sounds easier tho – depends how much you want to get your geek on I guess! 😀

      • Sam says:

        31 Dec31 December 14:23

        Geeking is reserved for working hours. I want/need an easy life at home!

    • Charlieface says:

      31 Dec31 December 15:05

      Yeah I would do this instead, and I’m a sysadmin and developer

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