The HfP chat thread – Thursday 2nd December

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• ianM says:

  2 Dec2 December 03:42

  Record highs in Atlanta this week, great weather for December.

  • David says:

    2 Dec2 December 05:26

    Been great in LAS and SFO too

  • Andrew H says:

    2 Dec2 December 07:19

    Not sure record highs in December really count as being “great” though.

    • ianM says:

      3 Dec3 December 03:53

      75F and clear skies is great for me. Not sure what your expectation is?

  • Jen T says:

    2 Dec2 December 13:52

    It’s been glorious across much of the US – very little cloud cover so much more sunshine than usual.

• TimM says:

  2 Dec2 December 04:52

  Mumblings on the BBC World Service about pre-flight tests and days 2 & 8 tests to return to the UK being re-introduced. Boris is so far resisting. We know how that usually ends.

  • Track says:

    2 Dec2 December 05:38

    This time is different.

    Mortality in 100s not in 1000s.

    https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/details/deaths?areaType=overview&areaName=United%20Kingdom

    • BJ says:

      2 Dec2 December 06:38

      Hundreds/day without the ‘s’ is already 36,500 deaths/year not to mention hundreds of thousands of devastated family, friends and dependents with the ‘s’ included for sure. Don’t you think reducing that toll (not to mention reducing risks to your own personal health) is worth your comparably minor discomfort and inconvenience?

      • Freddy says:

        2 Dec2 December 07:20

        I’ve been promised the freedom land after being jabbed 2 shortly 3 jabs. Don’t be rowing back that in addition I also need a mask strapped to my face along with 3 tests to cross a border

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 08:12

          Who promised you that – the Daily Express?

        • Super Secret Stuff says:

          2 Dec2 December 09:19

          @Freddy I hope you realise how self entitled that comes across. Also warnings have been there for ages that it could go backwards.

          Finally, many countries trending towards no vaccine, no entry mentality / policy . If you WANT to cross a border, you need to comply

        • KK says:

          2 Dec2 December 16:11

          i wouldnt get jabbed unless it guarantees travelling.

          having a jab so that you can not wear a mask is rather naive.

      • Ian says:

        2 Dec2 December 07:51

        Here we go again.
        Twice as many people died in October from Alzheimer’s and Dementia. The same number, 2x COVID died from heart disease. The same number of people died of many other things.
        Why do we continue to highlight covid deaths and ignore everything else.
        Also, my mother in law died two weeks ago and we had to get covid removed from her death certificate as the doctors hadn’t spotted that it was last year not this year when she had tested positive.
        How many other death certificates have been completed in error.
        Those of us who have been double/triple jabbed should be allowed to get on with our lives.
        It’s up to me what risks I want to take.
        Every day I risk my life with things that might, but are unlikely to happen.

        • ChrisBCN says:

          2 Dec2 December 08:22

          Come on Ian, think this through a little more! If you take an action today, how many deaths of alzheimer’s, dementia, heart disease will you prevent next month? None. If you take a really inconsequential action today like wearing a mask, how many COVID deaths could you prevent? Many.

          We could argue about how useful travel restrictions are of course, because some rules are plain daft mixed with a side of government corruption.

          And don’t forget, you are not wearing the mask to prevent risks to yourself – you are wearing it to prevent risks to others, who may be more vulnerable than you. Each time you go past an elderly person wearing your mask, think about what a lifesaver you are, rather than me me me.

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 08:24

          Much has be done, and continues to be done to combat heart disease and the many other causes of death you refer to. Are you suggesting that covid does not merit similar efforts despite it being a viral infection classed as a pandemic while many of the other health problems you refer to are in large part the result of lifestyle choices that should be for the most part the responsibility of individuals and not communities of central governments?

        • Spurs drive me mad says:

          2 Dec2 December 09:01

          Well said Ian. My Mum died last Christmas and I made sure Covid wasn’t on the death certificate.

        • joe Jordan says:

          2 Dec2 December 09:37

          unless something has changed, neither alzheimers nor heart disease are known communicatible disease the daily rate of which can be reduced by mask wearing.

        • Damian says:

          2 Dec2 December 10:02

          Probably because Alzheimer’s and dementia are not a virus and spread by transmission!

        • Char Char says:

          2 Dec2 December 13:05

          Well said Ian.

          @ChrisBCN
          The answer to how many deaths you will prevent while attempting to slow the spread by wearing a mask (that may at most slow transmission by 25%) whilst a vaccine is being developed so the vulnerable can be jabbed is now going to be close to ZERO since the vulnerable in this country have had the chance to get the vaccines and boosters.

      • Travel Strong says:

        2 Dec2 December 07:56

        If it’s mortality that needs combating, probably better off targeting health/fitness/wellbeing overall and not border politics.

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 08:31

          I agree, but this is about mortality from, and impacts of covid, not mortality in general.

      • Track says:

        2 Dec2 December 08:40

        @BJ It is very clear to me that by reducing COVID toll we are at a juncture when excessive mortality and morbidity is now driven by the drop and delays in other medical procedures and care.

        Simply put, hospitals hardly scheduling other procedures (depends on your area), waiting times for referrals are up. At the same time, deaths from COVID specifically cited on certificate are under 100/day. For the nearly 70-million strong population. There are no “hundreds of thousands of devastated family members” that is just not the situation.

        What “minor discomfort and inconvenience” you are talking about if health services, essential care services, transport and policing are being cut. The continuing economic damage means the Government will have less revenue collected at the time it needs to build hospitals and invest in doctors training.

        Followed by inflation and drop in pound, after which the remaining trained doctors in other countries will think even more before accepting an invitation to work.

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 09:13

          I get the big picture, I was not asking about the wider implications of national and global strategy to combat covid. My question was simply whether you think the minor discomfort and inconvenience of arranging tests and getting a swab stuck up your nose when travelling was worth it to reduce the toll of deaths and devastation from covid?

        • J says:

          2 Dec2 December 10:33

          @BJ: It’s not a minor inconvenience, it’s a huge additional expense that prevents many families from visiting close relatives abroad.

      • TGLoyalty says:

        2 Dec2 December 08:56

        How many excess deaths vs the past 5yr average over the last 4 months @ BJ?

        • TGLoyalty says:

          2 Dec2 December 09:00

          And how many actually mentioned covid-19 on the death cert? You’ll find one is bigger than the other.

          People die it’s a fact of life. If they are jabbed but died anyway it’s unfortunate if they didn’t get the jab and died then that unfortunate but perhaps they had the opportunity to change that.

          C19 is never going away.

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 09:14

          See my preceeding comment.

        • Lady London says:

          2 Dec2 December 11:34

          Will be interesting if it’s like the final version of Spanish flu that Rob mentioned. Milder, but even more contagious so killed off the earlier more dangerous version.

          Our family had at least one death from Spanish flu whose effects were devastating on her children and the damage went down 2 generations as well.

          I’m like Chrisasaurus. Even though I know a lot of the government’s are inept etc, I’m proud to wear a mask and had vaccinations reluctantly, just in case I can help save some more vulnerable person.

      • Harry Holden says:

        2 Dec2 December 14:35

        No I don’t. In an average winter, 20,000 die of flu. I didn’t notice the world ending because of that. We will all die of something and living is a risky business.

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 15:56

          Just as an example, in an average year in the UK roughly three times as many women die from lung cancer than from breast cancer. Do the readers that have a problem with measures to combat covid on the basis of their amateur efforts at comparative risk assessment also believe we should just halt all breast cancer education and screening initiatives?

      • Tariq says:

        2 Dec2 December 17:47

        No I don’t, those figures against the context of a population of 67,000,000+ are inconsequential.

        • BJ says:

          2 Dec2 December 18:35

          About 12000 women and about 100 men die from breast cancer in the UK every year, do you consider those lives inconsequential? …beecause they’re lives before they are death stats! … and how does that compare to the number that will die from covid in the full year following say 80% of the population has been fully vaccinated and despite the restrictions in place? More will die from covid so would we be right to afford a higher priority to prevention, treatment and care of breast cancer? Whether you consider the numbers as being of consequence or not is up to you, but it’s quite obvious that the majority of people expect efforts to be made to combat disease and ill health in general. They understand too that in this regard priorities need to be set and that difficult choices need to be made. Covid is no different but much of the comments on this subject that have been rolled out here in chat day after day for months is simply nonsense. If people just don’t like the combat measures and would rather just see more people die so that they can continue to enjoy the lifestyle they were accustomed to pre-covid then they should just say so instead of resorting to nonsense in an effort to fool themselves and/or others. I disagree with you but respect you for just saying it like you see it.

    • KK says:

      2 Dec2 December 16:15

      not many people die because of seatbelts. maybe you should get the government to get rid of the seatbelt first

  • Paul Pogba says:

    2 Dec2 December 06:29

    The BBC, yesterdays news, today!

    • Ben says:

      2 Dec2 December 08:36

      You can really tell who is and who is NOT affected by lock downs and restrictions coming in.

• Amy C says:

  2 Dec2 December 05:10

  I’ve got a problem that I’ve not seen anyone else on here have.
  I have a Virgin rewards + card and my card year ended on Oct 3rd. I spent over the required 10k for an upgrade voucher to be issued. No voucher appeared. I complained. They told me they had 8 weeks from the date I complained to investigate.
  That 8 weeks expires today and there are no updates on my case (CR told me on Tuesday). They said if I haven’t heard by end of today I can approach the financial ombudsman. I’ve just done some digging and that service takes many weeks currently.
  Has anyone else been through this with Virgin? It’s totally outrageous. I pay £160pa for this card and they expect me to firstly spend hours on the phone asking where it is, then make a written complaint, wait 8 weeks for them to do absolutely nothing, then write to ombudsman and wait more weeks!

  • Jenny says:

    2 Dec2 December 05:36

    raise a complaint using resolver website

  • Anna says:

    2 Dec2 December 06:32

    It does sound odd as surely they know how to issue the voucher? How closely linked are they to the airline? I’ve recently taken out this card so hope they are not in trouble (or doing a Creation)!

  • ChrisC says:

    2 Dec2 December 06:42

    Going back to basics but have you checked your flying club count for the voucher as that’s where they appear. It will be an innocuous looking line that says something like “upgrade voucher”.

    Lots of people ask where their voucher is having expecting some sort of notification letter or email but they simply haven’t checked their FC accounts.

    • Bigmaggot says:

      2 Dec2 December 06:58

      Virgin Red says ‘credit card reward voucher’

    • Jonathan says:

      2 Dec2 December 07:01

      Log in to Virgin Atlantic website or Virgin Red App & go to the My Activity section under My Account. Look for a statement entry saying “ You have qualified for a credit card reward voucher”. That’s it. There’s no ability to use online, all has to be done through call centre.

      It’s different to BA Amex voucher that appears in a separate section of your account with issue & expiry dates visible & online functionality.

      If you’ve looked & it’s not there then did you try & spend exactly £10k? Often annual fees & interest don’t count towards bonuses so it’s not as simple as just adding up statement balances.

      • Amy C says:

        2 Dec2 December 07:15

        I’ve done all that and yes familiar with where they appear as qualified for two previously. I’ve contacted Flying Club who blame Virgin Money and VM tell me to speak to flying club! It’s the credit card I’ve complained to as far as I can see they haven’t informed flying club I’ve spent the right amount. Just a ton of aggro that I don’t need and shouldn’t happen, especially with a card I’m paying £160 for the privilege of having.

        • andyT says:

          2 Dec2 December 10:13

          Everyone makes mistakes, even large organisations. Have you never made a mistake?

        • Gary says:

          2 Dec2 December 11:38

          Quite an anomaly. We have two cards
          since the card started and vouchers arrive like clockwork. If not received already, request from VM your yearly card summary report which usually gets posted automatically (at least for those still receiving paper statements, not available in app). This would be a nice one page proof of spend/charges/fees etc if you need to take things further. Hope issue resolves soon.

        • Lady London says:

          2 Dec2 December 11:45

          JDB will know better about this but since you’vr had no reply for 8 weeks you are now free to complain to FOS. That will cost them £750.

          Would anyone now try to cc their Compliance Department on an email to the card CEO giving them 14 days to provide the upgrade voucher otherwise you will raise a FOS complaint with its associated cost on both sides? [your cost being in stress and theirs in cash, of course :-)]

          As I don’t have much faith in the efficiency of the FOS my personal inclination would, if course, be to MCOL them the fare difference (in which case LBA to their Legal Dept 14 days first instead) and not waste time with the FOS. But others may say have to waste time first with FOS.

        • Lady London says:

          2 Dec2 December 11:47

          PS LBA then MCOL both parties. FOS the card only, I think.

      • Amy C says:

        2 Dec2 December 07:17

        And no, spent a good £500-700 over 10k and never pay interest.

        • BuildBackBetter says:

          2 Dec2 December 07:28

          What about refunds? Any large refunds during this he year?

• Justin says:

  2 Dec2 December 06:13

  I took out a 1 year Economist digital subscription in June. Last week my subscription was mysteriously cancelled. In my account details I can see that my home address has been changed to “Melita North Orbital road, St Albans, United Kingdom, AL2 2DW” (which is not my address!) and a refund was processed to an entirely different card, which of course should not be possible!
  i spoke on Live Chat to someone who was polite but had no idea what was going on. They promised a response in “24-48” hours but I’ve heard nothing back yet.
  I assume either my account was hacked or maybe they had some kind of database corruption resulting in my account details getting mixed up with someone else’s. I guess plenty of people here will have Economist subscriptions, has anyone had anything similar happen?

• MT says:

  2 Dec2 December 06:41

  Anybody heard any news about this initiative? https://www.nhsx.nhs.uk/covid-19-response/recording-covid-19-vaccinations-administered-overseas/ Without it i’ll be considered unvaccinated when travelling to Europe which is a bit of PITA. (I was vaccinated in Australia).

  • The Original Nick. says:

    2 Dec2 December 07:01

    Yep, a similar problem if you;’ve been jabbed in the Middle East. Ask those on here who live in the Middle East and they should be able to help.

    • Blenz101 says:

      2 Dec2 December 11:20

      You can bring overseas proof of vaccination to your U.K. GP who will be able to update your medical records. What this doesn’t do is allow you to use the NHS app to generate a covid pass as that is apparently a completely different system.

      The link provided as mentioned has supposed to have been coming for months. No idea why the government won’t just accept proof via to official apps of other countries but instead wants to verify a document in person and hold their own separate record and produce their own pass.

  • Chrisasaurus says:

    2 Dec2 December 07:18

    And indeed friends of ours have come back from Spain, double jabbed but have had to quarantine and having been pinged have had to isolate as though unvaccinated

  • Louie says:

    2 Dec2 December 09:25

    Actually without it, you’ll be considered unvaccinated by the UK whether or not you travel to Europe. As Chrisasaurus says, if you get pinged after your flight to the UK, that means 10 days compulsory home quarantine.

    All this was promised by the end of July in mid-July – https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/air/uk-set-to-recognise-vaccinations-given-to-brits-overseas – so don’t hold your breath that this will be sorted this month.

• Michael C says:

  2 Dec2 December 07:10

  I rang the 119 number yesterday to point out that my brand new NHS covid pass letter did not in fact include by booster, whereas the app does.
  The answer from the lovely lady on the other end was “Yes, it’s weird, isn’t it?”…

  • Andrew says:

    2 Dec2 December 07:52

    Just print out the PDF from the app

• Paul Pogba says:

  2 Dec2 December 07:10

  City AM reporting Japan is reversing its recently imposed travel restrictions “as Omicron variant increasingly appears to be ‘mild‘ mutation”: https://www.cityam.com/coronavirus-u-turn-japan-reverses-covid-travel-ban-as-omicron-variant-increasingly-appears-to-be-mild-variant/

  • John says:

    2 Dec2 December 08:03

    That’s not what it says, it says they have told airlines they can accept flight bookings for later in December, but no details on who may fly to Japan

    • meta says:

      2 Dec2 December 09:06

      Yes, that’s particularly badly reproduction of Japanese language versions. They have reversed the decision on flight ban allowing Japanese nationals and foreign residents to come back within quota. The whole travel ban is only till 30 Dec. Japanese transport secretary said they’ll follow WHO guidelines thereafter.

    • Paul Pogba says:

      2 Dec2 December 13:15

      It’s not a reopening but it implies that their initial assessment is that this new variant isn’t a huge threat and they can continue the path they were on.

• Nathan says:

  2 Dec2 December 07:28

  Would anyone please have any idea what kind of test is required to enter France from the U.K. I can’t seem to find any information to say if it is a lateral flow test or PCR ?

  Many thanks

  • Mjshort says:

    2 Dec2 December 07:33

    I went there Friday, did not need a test as was fully vaccinated.

    • ChrisC says:

      2 Dec2 December 08:03

      That was Friday. This is now.

      A lot of things changed in the last few days

  • Sandgrounder says:

    2 Dec2 December 07:51

    It’s been widely reported in the press that this is coming, but it doesn’t appear to be on any of the official sites just yet.

  • Rich says:

    2 Dec2 December 08:07

    Test required from Saturday, even if fully vaccinated, but not yet clear what type.

    Follow Simon Calder on Twitter and check the FCO website (not updated yet). Usually the quickest way to find out

    • Harry T says:

      2 Dec2 December 08:33

      Of course, it’s Saturday when I’m passing through…

    • Rich says:

      2 Dec2 December 09:45

      Are you departing UK? This only applies (currently) to non-EU arrivals into FR, I think.

      • Lady London says:

        2 Dec2 December 11:51

        …and the UK is non-EU, Rich 🙂

      • Rich says:

        2 Dec2 December 14:03

        Yes – my point was if Harry T was passing through France *to* the UK from an EU origin, then no need to worry.

  • James says:

    2 Dec2 December 13:44

    I am also quite annoyed by the lack of communication on this, will be travelling to France next week Saturday and am unsure of what kind of test I need to buy to go (I will require a PCR when arriving back). Definitely not in the same rush as you, but still stressed nonetheless.

    Would have thought at the same time as the announcement (or hours later) they would have information available, especially since it comes in from Saturday — that’s not much time to organise a test!

  • Rich says:

    2 Dec2 December 14:05

    Euronews is now reporting that it’s PCR or antigen, within 48 hours of travel. So not too onerous.

    https://www.euronews.com/travel/2021/12/02/france-travel-restrictions-covid-test-required-for-uk-travellers-from-saturday

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