The HfP chat thread – Wednesday 21st April

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• Super Secret Stuff says:

  21 Apr21 April 09:37

  Let’s change the topic, I hate football regardless of league or team (except the seagulls every now and again) 😉

  • ChrisC says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:14

    The seaguls the only team to be given a parade for coming second!

    • The cyclist says:

      21 Apr21 April 16:23

      So you live in Brighton then, makes sense.

  • The uncivil servant says:

    21 Apr21 April 17:15

    flower

• Pete M says:

  21 Apr21 April 09:45

  Intriguing statement in the MSE email this week for meeting minimum salary requirements for current accounts: “A trick to ‘jemmy’ the minimum pay-ins. The rules usually say you need to pay in a set amount from external sources. So let’s say you’re required to pay in £1,500 but only have £1,000 coming in. Get that paid in, then withdraw £500 as cash or to another bank, then pay it back in, and BINGO, you’ve qualified.”

  Considering the trouble some people on here have been getting into by doing that, I am not sure it’s the best advice…?

  • Rhys says:

    21 Apr21 April 09:55

    It’s different. Most accounts have minimum pay in rules to qualify for the sign-up bonus, NOT a minimum salary requirement, hence you can recycle the same money to hit the target.

    This is not true of Barclays Premier, which has a minimum salary requirement – fudging the payments doesn’t help in that case.

    • TGLoyalty says:

      21 Apr21 April 10:00

      The ‘minimum yearly salary’ includes bonus and other 1 off dividends etc

      not sure why there is such a hurry to ‘game’ it

    • Pete M says:

      21 Apr21 April 10:06

      Good point Rhys – didn’t note that distinction!

  • Andrew says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:59

    I’d say be careful. There seems to be quite a lot of people out there who are underestimating the bank’s analysis of metadata.

    My “Annual Review” brochure from BoS was a bit of an eye opener. “You received £x.xx income from your employer Xxxx Xxxx Xxxx”. “You spent £x.xx servicing credit cards”, “You spent £x.xx” on a Utilities”, “You spent £x.xx on a car loan with Xxx”.

    It made me want to find my cheque book – although they are all machine read and interchanged electronically now too.

    • CH says:

      21 Apr21 April 11:07

      Agree re wanting to go to cheques, especially now that clearing is much faster.
      If cash wasn’t so cumbersome in anything more than tiny quantities, I’d be tempted to use that! (and no doubt raise a few hairs with the banks’ fraud/AML teams…)

      • The real John says:

        21 Apr21 April 13:04

        Never heard of anyone triggering fraud/AML alert for *withdrawing* lots of cash

• Gothbe says:

  21 Apr21 April 10:03

  I need to make a payment to Amex for the icc dollar card of $100. I used Wise in the past for overseas payments but Amex only provide an ABA code and not an ACH code. Wise requires an ACH code. Any suggestions on a low cost and fast option to make the payment

  • Babyg says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:34

    Id be interested in this also, about to start remotely working in Portugal and was looking to use the AMEX ICC dollar card and was wondering how to efficiently pay it off.

  • Benilyn says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:37

    Have you tried Amex chat?

    Would be interested in this too.

    Rob how do you pay?

    • Matt says:

      21 Apr21 April 10:47

      No experience of this myself, but fairly sure I’ve seen in the comments here that Amex can provide the required account numbers

    • Rob says:

      21 Apr21 April 11:13

      From my HSBC current account.

      Rubbish FX rate but as I rarely use the card I’m happy lose literally £2 per year on bad FX rates for the convenience.

      • Benilyn says:

        21 Apr21 April 11:58

        Thanks! I have that. and yes HSBC rates are horrendous!

      • Froggee says:

        21 Apr21 April 14:31

        I use Revolut for FX with my HSBC USD account. I was expecting HSBC would want 0.5%, maybe 1% at a push so when the price quoted worked out at 2.5% on a sizeable amount, I refused. So I have HSBC USD account but pay no FX charges on it. Transfer from Revolut was near instant.

  • Jamie says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:14

    Azimo should work for this as they let you input a routing number (ABA code) for US payments. I plan on using them to pay my IDC bill next month – rates seem reasonable, you can pay via VISA/MC or bank transfer and your first two transfers are fee free.

    Not sure if this is allowed but if you sign up using my link you’ll get £10 off your first transfer of £100 or more:

    https://azimo.app.link/invite?code=JAMIEB43

    (Rob/Rhys please delete if inappropriate!)

  • Guernsey Globetrotter says:

    21 Apr21 April 13:13

    Try Revolut – works fine with ICC payments

  • Gothbe says:

    22 Apr22 April 08:40

    Thanks fo advice. I ended up using my Monese account

  • Morris says:

    2 May2 May 12:54

    Just an FYI that while the numbers may not necessarily be identical (although both are 9 digits), the terms tend to be used interchangeably. Obviously makes sense to verify, but if it was an urgent matter, chances are your funds would arrive safe and sound.

• John says:

  21 Apr21 April 10:15

  Sure seen the advice on this on the past but can’t find at moment.
  Booked 2 avios First return LHR to Dubai : departing 8.6.21 and returning 21.6.21. (Using a 241)
  BA now cancelled al their BA flights to Dubai until 23.6.21.
  Rang last night : offered cash /avios refund or booking on Qatar in business ( 2 flights at awful flight times). Told them I want to fly First as that is what I booked. First availability pulling a revenue First is 1.7.21, which they will happily move to. Unfortunately my hotel has been booked 12 months ago – new pricing if booking moved /reprised is £3000 more.
  I want to fly in First on my original dates: only Emirates are doing a direct flight.
  How do I achieve an Emirates flight?
  Taxes etc. Paid on BA Amex.
  Thanks for help advice.
  Been going to Dubai for 20 years thus know the weather at this time 😉

  • Anna says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:13

    Have a look at some of the many threads on EU261 rights for cancellations. My feeling is that you would be justified in asking for a F flight on your original travel date if you can make a case that that’s the only time you can travel. I don’t think BA would have any liability for your hotel arrangements if you voluntarily changed your travel dates – would your insurance cover this?

    • Lady London says:

      21 Apr21 April 13:18

      +1
      This exact case discussed yesterday.

• Jonathan says:

  21 Apr21 April 10:16

  Does anyone have any recent experiences of using beardy cards for Euro spending that isn’t done in person ?

  I know there aren’t any FX fees if an in person transaction is done, but there are fees if you do say internet shopping.

  I’m looking at booking a holiday / trip experience and the price is quoted in Euros.

  Thanks to anyone who can help

  • Bob says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:14

    New strategy along with giving a weeks notice it appears. The other 3 countries announced with Pakistan don’t have direct flight bans either.

• Mco says:

  21 Apr21 April 10:19

  Thought Red list countries weren’t allowed inbound pax’s on direct flights? BA seems to be selling outbound and return tickets to India for next week onwards still.

  • Matt says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:48

    Not banned for India for some reason

    • Pete M says:

      21 Apr21 April 11:08

      Direct flights to Pakistan are not banned either, I believe that was a deliberate decision when more countries were added to the red list recently. I don’t think there is much reason/value in banning direct flights, frankly – only makes people’s lives even more difficult and expensive on top of the hotel quarantine.

      • Mco says:

        21 Apr21 April 11:16

        UAE and Qatar seemed to be banned still. I wonder why?

        • Pete M says:

          21 Apr21 April 15:17

          From The Telegraph: The real reason why Dubai is on the ‘red list’
          The Transport Secretary had plenty to say about holidays at last night’s ConservativeHome webinar.
          In addition to his comments about lateral flow testing, the ‘green watchlist’ and the appetite for a UK-US travel corridor (see below), he also revealed why the UAE is currently on our red list.
          It’s because Dubai and Abu Dhabi are global transport hubs – not because the country itself has a high case rate. He explained:
          We are not restricting UAE because of levels of coronavirus in the UAE. The specific issue in the UAE is one of transit. It’s because they are a major transit hub.

The Joint Biosecurity Centre can work wonders studying all this detail, but eventually you get to the point where they are having to make too many assumptions about where people are travelling to/from.

And that is specific issue we have with the UAE as opposed to prevalence or some other reason.
          As such, it looks unlikely that the UAE will be removed from the list of banned countries, despite its high vaccination rate and low number of cases. 

  • Bob says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:15

    New strategy along with giving a weeks notice it appears. The other 3 countries announced with Pakistan don’t have direct flight bans either.

  • The real John says:

    21 Apr21 April 13:06

    There are two sublists of the red list – 1) countries with direct flight bans and 2) countries where one’s recent presence requires hotel quarantine; all of 1 is in 2.

    • Sam G says:

      21 Apr21 April 13:30

      Makes far more sense to me to allow the direct flights – less risk of people being tempted to avoid quarantine if they’re routing through a Euro hub etc. I read that the govt has apparently approached Heathrow to reactivate T4 to handle red list arrivals so they are segregated from green/amber

      • kitten says:

        21 Apr21 April 18:18

        makes a lot of sense.
        never been keen on T4 anyway.

        Will they pay danger money to staff who work at T4 or with planes landing at T4 if it’s the “Red” terminal?

• rams1981 says:

  21 Apr21 April 10:26

  Hilton – cancelled points redemption. Has anyone found the points not automatically return to their account once a booking is cancelled? Is there an email to chase (I’m gold if that helps)

  • Anna says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:16

    Whenever I’ve cancelled a booking the points show as soon as I log out and log back again, if not immediately. Have you left enough time before cancelling? (some points bookings now require e.g. 2 weeks’ notice for a cancellation). There’s a contact form on the HH website for enquiries, they generally get back to you in a couple of days if not sooner. No separate email for golds AFAIK.

  • Travel Strong says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:28

    Happened to me once and I called up to speak to an agent to resolve it.
    It is a rare occurrence, but a pain when it happens (suddenly something that is usually instant takes days to resolve, removing your ability to use the points for that time too).

    • rams1981 says:

      21 Apr21 April 12:59

      Thanks both. Was for an end of May booking and well within time. Sounds like I need to call them

  • The real John says:

    21 Apr21 April 13:08

    They should return instantly, but once in a while they don’t. Email doesn’t work as they will just tell you to wait. If you call they can do it, what happens behind the scenes is that they “loan” you the points until the original points are refunded (which for some reason takes 4-6 weeks and they have never been able to explain why)

• Babyg says:

  21 Apr21 April 10:32

  For those that booked the discounted Grand Suite 1 Bedroom Suite @ the Sheraton, my booking for April has been charged to my Credit Card (24hours ago) at the discounted rate. Also I have noted the discounted rate is no longer available on their website.

  • BSI1978 says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:36

    Are you certain you’ve been ‘charged’?

    Mine remains pending as it has been since midday Monday……

    • Babyg says:

      21 Apr21 April 11:03

      hmm true, it popped up on my phone (so i assumed charged)- but its pending on the amex website..

  • Tracy says:

    21 Apr21 April 10:38

    Pending here too but have noticed the anomaly seemed to have been fixed…

    • Babyg says:

      21 Apr21 April 11:07

      IMHO it was a heavily discounted rate to encourage bookings, not an anomaly. They have simply reduced the level of discounting now. It should be noted that the slightly smaller suite can be had for around £500 ATM so its not unreasonable to think the grand suite could be heavily discounted to £200-300.

      • BSI1978 says:

        21 Apr21 April 11:16

        I’m reasonably relaxed about this tbh, if they cancel then so be it. What would annoy me however is if they do nothing now but process the payment, but on the day of arrival (I have 2 separate bookings pending) seek to move/downgrade us then and spin the line “it was obviously a mistake, Grand Suite unavailable”….etc.

        Would hope they resolve from the outset if indeed it was an online pricing error.

        • meta says:

          21 Apr21 April 12:50

          Mine is still pending. Pending payments will be removed as a charge from your card after 7 days. If the payment is taken then they formed a contract and it will be binding and they have to give you booked room otherwise it’s failure to fulfil the contract.

      • Lady London says:

        21 Apr21 April 13:23

        +1
        That pricing was not indicative of an error but incentive pricing to get bookings.

        If the hotel later tried to say it was an error later then I honestly think they’d be lying. I wouldn’t expect it of them but based on reports here, if a certain hotel near Slough tried that on I would not be surprised.

        • Rob says:

          21 Apr21 April 13:37

          Are they too bothered? Chances of selling that suite for a typical premiumc cash rate are slim at the moment. They may prefer to bank your cash now and live with it.

        • APB says:

          21 Apr21 April 13:45

          I really hope you are right but the fact that it was available as far as you could book – until April next year – was suspicious. It was also the only reduction of that magnitude. As I say I really hope you’re right

  • Harry T says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:00

    I actually cancelled in the end. Decided I’d rather have the flexibility of my HJH rate (£149 a night for the base room king). Can take my chances with an upgrade as Titanium without having to tie up money in a non refundable rate. They upgraded me to the suite below this one the last time I stayed, and I was platinum.

  • APB says:

    21 Apr21 April 12:05

    Yes mine is still pending from Monday – and I noticed that the rate had increased. That was only overnight/this morning as it was still available late evening yesterday. If they do cancel on us I’d want to try and use it as leverage to secure a good rate in another room at the very least and that’s only after trying to keep the booking in the first instance. Most of the people who jumped on it here will have status I would imagine which may discourage mass cancellations on their part.

    • Si says:

      21 Apr21 April 19:25

      We may never have a formal answer of what happened but I think it was a big pricing error by hotel.

      After booking on phone app, I later looked on desktop to try get a 2nd booking.

      I noticed all rooms where discounted by circa 15% up to a year out, apart from the grand suite that was discounted by circa 85%. That has now been changed to circa 15% discount in line with all other rooms…

      I think someone basically put the numbers into the formula the wrong way around and took them a few days to realised.

      Hoping the transation progresses from pending and they honour it.

      According to my future booking on the app in all locked in 🙂

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