The HfP chat thread – Sunday 25th July

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• AL says:

  25 Jul25 July 12:43

  If you’re the BA lurker who, following my comments last week, has magically fixed the BA check-in experience at MAN, I want to thank you. Today was a marked improvement – plenty of signage, easily visible Club Europe desks, bag tags and friendly staff. In all, now upholding the BA standards properly. Thanks!

  • The Lord says:

    25 Jul25 July 13:07

    We must be on the same plane…. Wish someone would shut that baby up!

    • AL says:

      25 Jul25 July 14:53

      Hello from 10A! 👋 I had a prime view of the engineering fix. A good bit of head scratching, a sandwich bag and some plastic clips and we’re away…

• AFKAE says:

  25 Jul25 July 13:27

  Some Madeira travel experiences for anyone planning to go there.
  Register on MadeiraSafe, it’s dead easy . And if you are double jabbed/do a PCR before you go/recovered from Covid you get a free test for your return. Upload your proof and it will get validated in the day before you travel. Then your QR code goes from light green to dark green! This helps slightly as you get triaged after passport control and luggage collection. The triage sends you down the dark green lane which at the end someone just confirms all your details and off you go. We were in the middle of the plane and not far from last off, but were in the taxi about 40 mins after landing.
  The Madeira Safe site suggests you book your test with 4 days notice and it’s true that the farmacia’s can’t always do them at short notice. If it all goes wrong you can go to a walk in test centre at a private hospital and they do it 24H and accept the Madeira Safe voucher.
  Pre departure we had uploaded all the stuff BA wanted pre check in, but that had no value as we had to go to a desk anyway.
  On return it’s definitely the case that pre check-in documentation checks responsibility has been passed to the carriers. They fairly carefully check your Covid status document and your PLF, which obviously slows down check in a bit. On arrival at T5 all egates open (5.30pm last night) had to wait about 5 seconds for a free gate and that was it. Baggage reclaim was slow.
  On the Island it seems pretty much everything is open. Mask wearing rules are similar to UK pre freedom day. (i.e. in shops/hotels, but not required walking around outside or when seated in a bar or restaurant.) They are quite good on their mask-wearing discipline.
  Great destination with its Green list status.

  • Pete M says:

    25 Jul25 July 15:52

    That’s helpful, thanks! How was the weather?

    • AFKAE says:

      25 Jul25 July 18:33

      Perfect! Typically 24/25/26 and sunny during the day and only going down to 18 over night. Although the week we were there the UK was hotter.

• Second vaxxes says:

  25 Jul25 July 13:40

  England: GPs have been told that they can book covid vaccines for those age 17 yrs 9 mths. I would expect that the national booking website will change to reflect this in the coming days.

• s879 says:

  25 Jul25 July 13:56

  Anyone had an issue with Chronomics? Covid tests total was £40 after the BA code but I got charged £100! No phone number on their website or perhaps I can’t see one. Have emailed them but wondering if I should wait for them to fix it. How is their customer service?

  • AL says:

    25 Jul25 July 15:12

    Call them on 0208 016 2620. I’ve not used them directly but others I know who have have been pleased.

  • Dej says:

    25 Jul25 July 16:36

    Yes I had the same the same issue. Was able to cancel the order and reorder..had to reorder each test separately.

    It seems as though the discount code shows the correct figure during checkout when ordering more than one test. But n you are charged the full amount -£20 by your card.

    You can cancel the order via logging in,

    • s879 says:

      25 Jul25 July 16:58

      Thanks. If ordered individually, was the billing okay?

      • Dej says:

        25 Jul25 July 17:06

        Yep. We only needed two return tests ordered one for my self and another one for the wife but ordered it under her email address.

• Rupert says:

  25 Jul25 July 14:45

  Any quick way to cancel a flight on BA within 24 hours of booking? Links pushes to go for the voucher

  • Nick says:

    25 Jul25 July 15:00

    You always have to call for this. It’s a very quick job though.

    • Pete M says:

      25 Jul25 July 15:53

      If you can’t get through on the phone, send a Twitter DM and I would argue that if they don’t reply to it within 24hrs you have still done your bit – especially if you mention you’ve tried calling and couldn’t get through.

      • Rupert says:

        25 Jul25 July 16:51

        Thanks all

      • Anna says:

        25 Jul25 July 16:57

        I’ve done this today – I called at 8.04 am, got a message that they were too busy to take my call and was cut off. I wonder if they are making money from people simply being unable to cancel bookings?!

• Peter says:

  25 Jul25 July 15:34

  HI, does anyone have NOW tv sports discount vouchers? Thanks.

  • Sandra says:

    25 Jul25 July 16:13

    I don’t sorry, but did try several codes yesterday when buying a month pass for the Lions matches but not one of them worked (one was Go5050 which was suggested on here a few weeks ago). In the end had to bite the bullet & pay full price then stump up another £5 so that our son, who is a student elsewhere, could access at the same time. Still worth it when they won the first test I suppose 😬

    • Peter says:

      25 Jul25 July 18:05

      Thanks, Yes i tried but the cold was not working…

  • AFKAE says:

    25 Jul25 July 18:36

    Not really answering your question, but once you have signed up for a month, just before expiry go on to the website and cancel. Give the reason that you can’t afford it – you have to confirm this a couple more times then you will be given an offer. The offers seems to vary both in the amount of discount and the discount period.

• Tracey says:

  25 Jul25 July 15:49

  If you know anyone slightly under 18, I have heard that soon they will be able to book their vaccine.

• Celia Green says:

  25 Jul25 July 16:29

  BA cancelled my son’s flight from Prague BA 0861 into LHR T3 on Tuesday 10 August but we managed to rebook for Thursday on the same flight. On checking, we discovered that there are now only two flights from Prague per week. How likely is it that his return flight BA 0860 to Prague on Thursday 26 August will be cancelled? At time of writing, it is still bookable. As this is just prior the Bank Hol weekend, we are concerned that there may be low or no availability for rebooking to get him back to work on the Monday following. Any advice or knowledge would be much appreciated.

  • Anna says:

    25 Jul25 July 17:00

    If they do cancel the flight your son has the right to be re-routed under EU261. If BA refuses to find him an alternative flight, he can arrange his own and then claim the costs back – though he might have to go to CEDR or MCOL for this.
    What are the restrictions currently on entering Czechia from the UK?

    • Celia Green says:

      25 Jul25 July 17:33

      FCO advises against except for essential travel. He would be returning for work. He is resident and will have been double-vaccinated in Czech. It’s a matter of what changes between now and his inbound flight. It is likely the restrictions and advice will prevent his visit but we are hoping it will happen. Only if it is sensible though, which it doesn’t seem to be at present. The booking has been in place for months.

      • Anna says:

        25 Jul25 July 18:07

        I can’t see it being any riskier than coming from any other European country, I hope you get to see him. Are the LCCs still flying to Prague if he needs to find an alternative? Obviously it’s a hugely popular EasyJet/Ryanair route in normal times.
        Does he have to self-isolate when he gets here due to not being vaccinated in the UK?

        • Celia says:

          26 Jul26 July 04:04

          Haven’t checked other airlines yet, but it’s a possibility. Yes, at present, his Czech vaccinations don’t exempt him from isolation here so there are all the multiple hoops to jump through. Thanks so much for your thoughts and info.

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