The HfP chat thread – Thursday 11th March

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• Ste Cox says:

  11 Mar11 March 11:53

  Question about Amex business cards. My other half has a business but no Amex cards for it, if i refer them for the gold card would there be any implications if it was just used for personal spending (paying off our wedding) to get the referral bonus, clear the MR out and then close the account?

  • Rob says:

    11 Mar11 March 11:55

    Referrals from personal to business tend not to work, note.

    In theory it’s a problem, in reality, probably not, given that Amex floods my Bus Plat with discount codes for biscuit companies and the like.

    • Ste Cox says:

      11 Mar11 March 11:56

      Thanks, it was mainly for the 50,000 on their side I was looking at.

    • whiskerxx says:

      11 Mar11 March 11:58

      referred my wife for Bus Amex from BA prem a couple of weeks ago. Card and points arrived next day!!!

    • Benilyn says:

      11 Mar11 March 12:08

      Referred by my wife’s PRG to a biz gold for me, she got the points pretty quick.

      • Ben says:

        11 Mar11 March 13:43

        Also refered from Amex Gold to Business Gold (wife) and points arrived no problem

    • Tarmohamed says:

      11 Mar11 March 13:56

      Referred wife from my personal plat and she applied for business plat. Points arrived without issue.

  • Jay says:

    11 Mar11 March 20:03

    Personal to Business referrals works no problems and 12k points for referral from PRG posted within 48 hours.

• J says:

  11 Mar11 March 12:01

  Amex Business Cards: How long has it taken for Dell £50/£75 credits to be applied? My purchase hit my bill today, and I have a 10% (£9) credit from a saved offer (that I had forgotten about), but the £50 has not yet added (I am enrolled for it). A little worried the 10% could have overridden the £50.

  • Ryan says:

    11 Mar11 March 12:22

    CS told me it takes 5 business days but my transaction from 02/03 still has no credit posted yet. Will have to chase them

    • Tarmohamed says:

      11 Mar11 March 13:59

      Similar dates. I’m waiting for the credit to post.

  • Rob says:

    11 Mar11 March 12:44

    Not usually an issue – you would get two credits in a situation like this.

    • J says:

      12 Mar12 March 10:34

      Thanks for the replies. My credit listed today. Best of luck chasing yours up.

• ao40 says:

  11 Mar11 March 12:23

  This may be of interest to some – BA have just sent out an email saying they are withdrawing the use of Flight Pass (the product for bulk buying flights at a fixed price from the agent Option Town).

  They are offering refunds for unused credits.

  This could have a big impact on someone like myself who used it to travel to work every week. Now hoping the future really does mean less time in the office!

  • memesweeper says:

    11 Mar11 March 13:12

    That’s a shame for people who need to earn TPs in economy in Europe — you never got lumbered with a low bucket even if you had a cheap fare.

• MinR says:

  11 Mar11 March 12:34

  Just got shut down by BA when putting in a claim for 75% reimbursement on a downgrade LHR-DXB in January.

  Their argument – 75% refund doesn’t apply on Avios redemption bookings. There was no difference in taxes between F and J so it doesn’t apply to cash paid either. And BA notified me more than 14 days in advance, so the downgrade compensation isn’t applicable.

  I did mention to them that the ‘more than 14 days’ isn’t relevant, and that Avios redemption bookings do qualify. Also cited EC261 but they pushed back with the same arguments.

  MCOL it is but appreciate any additional tips.

  • Jonathan says:

    11 Mar11 March 12:43

    Respond with another letter/e-mail headed “Letter Before Action” restating your position that you are entitled to downgrade compensation on Avios tickets & this includes the carrier fees/surcharges under EU 261 (or whatever it’s called now post Brexit).

    Include a calculation of 75% Avios for each passenger for the leg that was downgraded plus 75% of the YQ for that leg. Turn the Avios into a monetary value based on whatever BA are selling Avios for at the moment (usually 1.6p/Avios).

    Give them 14 days to respond & state you will initiate legal proceedings if they don’t.

    Wait 28 days to give them some slack & then start MCOL process.

    They’ll pay up before the hearing (but maybe only at the last minute).

    • Sean says:

      11 Mar11 March 13:02

      Not Compensation – it is reimbursement

  • Lady London says:

    11 Mar11 March 13:22

    This is just tiresome this continual lies BA abuses inmocent customers with.

    Do what @Jonathan says. I take it you actually have flown it? needed in order to claim.

    Go for it and hit them hard for all those other passengers they get away with stonewalling and lying to.

    Add 8% statutory interest not sure from when -maybe from 7 days after your request date that was refused.

    Please keep us infomed.

    Cheap, cheap and nasty from BA.

    • MinR says:

      11 Mar11 March 16:16

      I will! I’ve just sent them a response detailing what @Jonathan advised.

      Strangely enough, I’ve noticed 10K Avios deposited yesterday onto my account for some reason. I see a redemption transaction of 54K, followed by a redeposit of 64K (Avios cost of my booking) 😀

      I had put in an additional complaint regarding the worn out leather edges on the 787 F return journey. I had phrased it to sound more like feedback than anything else, and they acknowledged it in response. Not sure if the 10K is to do with that.

• peter says:

  11 Mar11 March 12:38

  Just received 500 Avios bonus for the Nectar points transfer.

  • Toby says:

    11 Mar11 March 12:41

    Me too

    • peter says:

      11 Mar11 March 12:51

      But when trying to convert it to Nectar:

      “We are sorry, Avios to Nectar conversion isn’t currently available online.

      If you want to convert your Avios to Nectar points please call us on 0344 49 333 03 between 9 am – 5 pm (Monday to Friday)”

      • peter says:

        11 Mar11 March 13:01

        Ok, I’ve called, short wait up to 5 minutes, confirmed all my details, transferred 30k Avios but.. they said it will go through manual processing that may take up to 10 working days 🙂

• idontfly says:

  11 Mar11 March 12:42

  Can anyone foresee issues in travelling to Albania to visit property after the 29th of March? Currently on the site: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-response-spring-2021/covid-19-response-spring-2021-summary#step-1—8-and-29-march it reports travel will be prohibited but is there law in place to prevent this? Seems like Albania has no restrictions on entry and has a 8pm curfew. Will just need to get a test their to return home. Thank you

  • The real John says:

    11 Mar11 March 12:55

    If you are genuinely going for the purposes of transacting in or managing residential property, it is legal to do so today, and was legal in January and November.

    It could actually potentially become illegal on 29 March if the government introduces new legislation.

    You will need to fill in the declaration form for international travel.

• Rob says:

  11 Mar11 March 12:50

  I see that Mark Drakeford is in the ‘i’ newspaper today effectively saying that he will do whatever he can to stop Welsh residents going abroad after 17th May. He also wants to stop the relaxation of all restrictions on 21st June, preferring to keep them for all of 2021. Could be a fun time to live in Wales, and I wouldn’t be making those Hilton Snowdonia bookings a priority.

  • stevenhp1987 says:

    11 Mar11 March 12:59

    What justification can he use if, in the UK at least, the pandemic is effectively over by 21st June?

  • Travel Strong says:

    11 Mar11 March 13:15

    Still no cancellation notification from HGI Snowdonia for my April bookings since app changed to only show availability from 17th May. There’s strange rhetoric in wales at the moment regarding keeping everything restricted ‘because the vaccine doesn’t stop transmission’ – totally ignoring the impact on serious illness and all notion of proportional response.

  • Andrew says:

    11 Mar11 March 13:32

    Doesn’t the Labour Party have to win the Senedd Election on the 6th May first?

  • Aston100 says:

    11 Mar11 March 14:06

    Oh bum.
    I had a decent redemption at the St Davids in Cardiff.
    Might have to go Scotland instead.
    Assuming Nicola lets us in in July.

    • Andrew says:

      11 Mar11 March 14:36

      Scottish Elections on the 6th May too, who knows who the First Minister will be.

      • Jill (Kinkell) says:

        11 Mar11 March 17:29

        Hopefully not wee Nicky!

        • David D says:

          11 Mar11 March 21:53

          Sorry @Jill (Kinkell), I can’t see any way it won’t be that way with the way the polls are looking. Especially when you add in the guaranteed alliance with the Greens. May be a tiny majority or a minority government with the Greens. Either way, Manchester or Newcastle will possibly be the options to avoid the pseudo-border (quarantine) in place.

• Andrew says:

  11 Mar11 March 13:27

  Arg – pointless call with BA. Flights LHR>GOT>LHR cancelled for early May (having been rebooked from November 2020, to March 2021 and then to May).

  Called the call centre and got through within 2 minutes – unfortunately they cannot help with rebooking to the dates I chose because the ticket is out of validity (expired 09 Jan 2021 – nearly 5 months before the flights they’ve just cancelled). Only options are voucher or refund.

  Flights on the dates I now want (Dec 2021) are – unsurprisingly higher. ba.com will let me book to earlier in December or Jan 2022 but they seem to have blocked the Christmas period.

  Asked to be connected to a manager as clearly BA were not adhering to EU261 requirements of rebooking to a date of my convenience, but was put on hold whilst they went to the manager’s desk, but my lunchbreak timed out.

  Will try again and hope I get better luck next time.

  • Josh says:

    11 Mar11 March 14:03

    Please let me know how you get on with this! I have my LHR to Tokyo cancelled with 50% avios offer in J. They had the “rebook” option but no dates were coming up with availability. Now it’s only giving me the voucher option on the site.

    Am yet to call but I cant fly to Tokyo this year and we only want to go in April/May which is our anniversary/birthdays.

  • Lady London says:

    11 Mar11 March 18:43

    Maybe give it 3 days and try to do it on the app yourself as @meta have suggested is working for some today.

    And BA saying they won’t rebook you to a 3-week period in December? [when they think they might be selling tickets for cash, presumably so they’re only willing to rebook you onto the dregs?]

    BA gets ridiculouser and ridiculouser. Have they forgotten that it’s *them* that cancelled your flight, and so regardless of actually being required to give you your choice of a later date convenient to you, it’s disappointing that they think they can cancel you and then apparently only want to allow you to rebook onto dregs.

  • Andrew says:

    12 Mar12 March 10:33

    (will also post this to Friday’s chat thread)…
    The age-old advice of HUACA has worked.

    The website is still blocking rebooking to flights over Christmas (“No flights available on this date”) but the BA call centre has managed to re-book onto the dates I wanted (18 Dec) with no issues.

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