The HfP chat thread – Monday 14th June

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Chris says:

14 Jun14 June 10:03

Virgin Atlantic Reward+ Credit Card query.

I have recently exceeded the £10k of spending required to trigger the upgrade voucher but have not received an email or any communication from Virgin. How long does this typically take to show in your Virgin Atlantic account?
- Benilyn says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 10:05
  
  Your Flying Club, check your account activity.
  - Chris says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 10:35
    
    Thanks, nothing is showing yet. I wanted to understand how long it typically takes to show.
- Yvo says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 10:52
  
  For me it was after the statement for the month I qualified plus a couple of days. Showed in the Flying Club account
Benilyn says:

14 Jun14 June 10:05

Got offered that last year on my “Platinum” Lloyds card, took it up happily, now 1Y over, no deals so cancelled 🙁
Yorkshirerich says:

14 Jun14 June 10:20

Currently in the Hilton Cardiff. Very nice hotel, but I did encounter a smalll issue. It showed up on my app as king executive room with castle view on my app at check in. I foolishly went to the desk to check in, and was given a room (most certainly without a view). They said it was because my room wasn’t ready so they said the lad at check in tried to give me a room available at the time. I took my cases down put them in the lobby, then five minutes later they text me to say my new room was ready.
I decided I’ll definitely just check in on the app next time.

Anyway, one quick question. I originally had 3 nights at HGI at snowdonia booked, but after some advice on here I decided to cancel it and have just booked one night now on my way home. What was the name of the pub that is close by, as I’ve never been keen on eating food in a hotel and the reviews are most certainly not great.
- Karl says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 11:26
  
  Y Bedol – turn right from the top of the hotel driveway and walk for about 15 minutes. You can’t miss it.
  There’s also another pub just behind it up the hill which has a garden with fantastic views.
  - Barry says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 14:49
    
    What’s the other pub called?
    Can’t find it on google maps.
    - Travel Strong says:
      
      14 Jun14 June 18:31
      
      Ye Old Bull in Llanbedr-y-Cennin
Tical says:

14 Jun14 June 10:22

Datapoint on Amex Plat retention offers: had 20k MR last June and just called to cancel as “cannot use benefits” and was offered 50k MR to stay – pleased with that
- Jonathan says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 10:30
  
  Thanks for that. I tried last week, overseas agent seemed willing but “system was down” so transferred me to a lady in Brighton who was a real tough nut to crack. When I said fee too high for benefits at present she said she’d see about monthly fee & call me back later (but didn’t). Will try again this afternoon.
  - TGLoyalty says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 10:41
    
    Paying monthly doesn’t mean you can’t get a retention bonus. I pay monthly and got 50k two months ago.
    - Tom says:
      
      14 Jun14 June 12:28
      
      Has anyone who received a retention bonus in October/November time got another bonus to stay recently?
      - MD says:
        
        14 Jun14 June 13:49
        
        @Tom One data point anyway – I got both 30K and then 50K retention bonuses last year, tried my luck again a couple of weeks ago and got offered nothing. The guy in Brighton was perfectly pleasant but couldn’t get the card cancelled fast enough basically, so I finally pulled the trigger this time. Happy to save a few months fee at least, and did very well out of it last year.
- Rob says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 10:38
  
  One ‘benefit’ of losing my grandfathered free BAPP card is that I can now ring up and make a realistic case for wanting to cancel!
  - Andrew says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 14:50
    
    I got the 50K a couple of months ago (before the BAPP changes) so I plan to wait until my BAPP anniversary is approaching at the end of this year and then call again and at that time use the loss of the grandfathered annual fee as the reason I’m considering leaving Platinum and see what happens.
GJB says:

14 Jun14 June 10:48

Hi everyone, I’ve just received my very first Centurion card. It’s all new to me – i’ve not even spoken to the relationship manager yet. I was Platinum previously. Are there any tips or advice that other Centurion members want to advise me on? The hotel bonuses are a bit of a let down – I was expecting Spire Elite but Centurion only gives me the tier below (I don’t suppose you can status match using, say, the platinum Melia status?)
- Rhys says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 11:01
  
  You might find some interesting responses in the comments of our Centurion article: https://hfp2022.headforpoints.blog/2021/02/22/american-express-centurion-card-review/
- Sloth says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 12:18
  
  Only advise I can give is to make sure you keep mentioning in the comments at various intervals that you have a Centurion card. That seems to be the main rule…😁
  - mark2 says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 12:23
    
    Isn’t that the main benefit?
    - TGLoyalty says:
      
      14 Jun14 June 13:06
      
      The only benefit.
      - Mco says:
        
        14 Jun14 June 17:53
        
        😂
- AY says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 16:10
  
  Would be good to get some data points on how you got it? Without being too nosy obviously
- KBuffett says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 19:48
  
  Congratulations. May I ask what prompted you today take the plunge? The sign up fee puts me off, the annual fee alone may have been OK. From what I know from others, the relationship managers are only really there if you contact them for travel etc. They aren’t of much use otherwise.
  Best of luck, enjoy the experiences!
WS says:

14 Jun14 June 10:53

Questions on Solihull and Rev – I’ve been topping up directly using Solihull for the past few months (2-3k per month) but this past week have been getting card declines on my attempted top ups. I managed to get it to work twice earlier today on smaller amounts (£500 and £1000) but now I can’t even do another £500 top up – it says top up declined, please contact the card payment services division of your bank.

Any idea what the issue might be here? Has anyone had experience with calling up Solihull to resolve issues with Rev and knows what attitude they have towards using their card for Rev topups?
- Harry T says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 11:03
  
  Lol don’t call Solihull and tell them about your manufactured spend with their credit card😊
  - Anna says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 11:09
    
    +1. You might just be hitting the limits that some people still seem to have so tone it down a bit and see what happens. Rev will also take action if it thinks you are doing too many top ups. Don’t draw attention to it.
  - Ben says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 14:11
    
    What is this Solihull and Bendy I see talked about every day here?
  - Yorkie Aid says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 15:17
    
    Solihull just see Che as high risk. I’ve had this. You just call them up and confirm it was you and it’s all hunky dory. They will call you if you don’t call them IME
    - WS says:
      
      14 Jun14 June 15:36
      
      Thanks all for your comments! Thought it might be better not to call but recalled seeing earlier comments about people having called Solihull and them being fine with it (like Yorkie’s comment above). Will leave it for a couple of days and try again before considering calling I guess!
- Reney says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 17:37
  
  Hi I have had similar problem. Did your 2 factor authentication pop up? Mine used to pop up for anything more than 300, in the last week that has stopped popping up and I think that is why it is being declined. I did manage 2 top up without 2FA then it stopped working again. Not sure whose side is the problem.
Chrisasaurus says:

14 Jun14 June 11:21

So, noob question on Virgin upgrade voucher. Looking at upgrading a cash booking from premium to UC. Understand there needs to be reward availability in UC for that to be possible – does the ticket then keep the restrictions of the underlying fare? I can’t see the list of fare buckets you can upgrade from and even the Virgin T&Cs essentially just says ‘it varies’ so does anyone have relevant experience on it?
Boon says:

14 Jun14 June 11:27

Any guesses? Chance of cancellation of BA flights DBV>LHR!

Am out in Croatia at the moment, trying to plan a flight back to the UK in early July. Had my original Easyjet booking cancelled. Looking now at DBV (Dubrovnik) to LHR on BA.

Looks like BA only starting DBV-LHR service on the 1st July. I’m looking at a flight on the 6th July.

Croatia currently still on Amber list, and I’m guessing fat chance of making Green List on the 24-28th, given the government’s strategy now to tighten restrictions for another month to battle the Delta variant.

What are thoughts on the risk that BA will just cancel this route for early July? Does anyone know if the the BA flight on the 6th from DBV is quite fully booked (the price has gone up!)?
- meta says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 11:48
  
  High. They haven’t flown on any route to Croatia since last year.
- Sam G says:
  
  14 Jun14 June 12:20
  
  I’m quite surprised they haven’t been operating this for US connections already, though it’s difficult to get limited transatlantic schedules to line up to longer euro flights both ways to put together a decent schedule without an overnight connection in one direction
  
  Looking on expertflyer seat maps the outbound flights look quite busy (in Club at least ) with the inbounds less busy as you’d expect for the first few days. But I imagine a lot of people could change / cancel / voucher over the next few days/weeks if Croatia stays amber.
  
  If I was a gambling man I’d say BA will run a limited schedule and consolidate flights (in which case you could switch to whichever date was still running or get a refund if yours is cancelled)
  
  I was surprised how many BA Greek & Spain flights are currently running when I was looking this weekend, seems like enough people are willing to travel & quarantine + connecting traffic to keep some leisure services running
  - meta says:
    
    14 Jun14 June 15:07
    
    They have already consolidated from 2 flights a day to one flight a day, then from daily flights to three times a week. It will either stay that way or they’ll cancel them all together. They have been consistently cancelling less than 2 weeks out on routes to Croatia.