The HfP chat thread – Saturday 4th December

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• Ming the Merciless says:

  4 Dec4 December 07:02

  I made good use of 2 ba companion vouchers yesterday (one on my account and one on Player 2’s)

  Out of Amsterdam, LHR then San Francisco, return direct from LA to LHR. In J.

  There was a glitch on the system so that when one account booked tickets into I class it removed all available seats so the 2nd account couldn’t book it. After 2 hrs on the phone (plus 30min wait) the agent managed to solve the problem- really competent performance from them and made up for the first agent not being able to get his head around the fact that I could use a single companion voucher for both the outbound and return….

  But the point of the post- AMS-LHR-SFO, LAX-LHR 159750 Avios plus £613 in fees for TWO. Great to save some cash on a USA trip.

  • meta says:

    4 Dec4 December 07:55

    Excellent! Thanks for confirming that it works with open-jaw tickets. Can’t wait to get rid of old vouchers and start saving massively.

  • AJA says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:06

    I’m a bit confused why didn’t you just book using one voucher? Looks like you used two vouchers to book two one way tickets. Or have you booked for 4 passengers? Well done anyway for managing to book what you wanted.

    • Polly says:

      4 Dec4 December 08:42

      Yep 2 x 1 way tkts, open jaw, with the new BA 241 vouchers. Amazing price and using so few avios…

  • Harry T says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:07

    Good work, thanks for the data point.

  • Ming the Merciless says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:44

    Just to clarify- 4 people traveling.

    • AJA says:

      4 Dec4 December 09:46

      Thanks for clarifying. 😀

  • Anna says:

    4 Dec4 December 10:20

    I’d be interested to try this from DUB at some point – easy and cheap from LPL and also somewhere I would genuinely like to visit!

  • Gianfranco says:

    4 Dec4 December 11:09

    Fantastic. Well done . Just to confirm though. I assume the AMS- LHR you could use for the BA voucher as it had to originate from UK ?

    • meta says:

      4 Dec4 December 11:17

      With new vouchers, the tickets don’t have to be from UK. You can book outbound from anywhere in the world.

      • Gianfranco says:

        4 Dec4 December 18:11

        Thanks Meta. I didn’t know that.

• Maciek says:

  4 Dec4 December 07:21

  AmEx travel platinum offer again – two bookings charged on the 29th (last day of the promo) – £120 processed on the 29th, but £290 processed the day after 🤦‍♂️ I guess there goes my £100 off £400. On flights I otherwise would not book through a travel agent 😕

  • LakerDC10 says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:37

    I had the same issue. I called them and they said they would apply the credit. Suggest you call them.

    • Maciek says:

      4 Dec4 December 09:17

      I was planning to do that. I hope I get Brighton and not offshore agents 🙈

  • ShopBig says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:43

    Mine has 28 Nov as date of transaction and 1 Dec as the day it was processed/cleared, I think should be ok?

    • Maciek says:

      4 Dec4 December 10:42

      Mine is showing 30 Nov, processed 3 Dec :/ They took their sweet time to issue the ticket and only did so after the promotion expired.

• Andy says:

  4 Dec4 December 07:36

  Got a flight to HKG booked for the 16th Dec…any thoughts on whether BA will have started flying the route again by then?

  • Andrew says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:04

    They won’t

  • John says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:16

    If you’re going to HK, better get yourself booked on CX or something else otherwise you’ll lose your hotel

    If you’re transiting, I would try to change itinerary, transiting HKG is too risky now

  • Geoff 1977 says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:26

    No idea

  • Polly says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:30

    Andy
    BA have cancelled one of our HKG sectors for late January. Have they not already cancelled yours? Wouldn’t risk it now…

    • Jill ( Kinkell ) says:

      4 Dec4 December 09:23

      BA cancelled our F return seats from HKG ages ago…this was for early Feb.

  • The Streets says:

    4 Dec4 December 09:53

    We’re trying to get to Hong Kong and all quarantine hotels booked out for the next two months! There is literally nothing except for the Mandarin Oriental coming in at £13k+ for a three week stay… this is just madness i really dont know what Hong Kong’s exit plan is

    • meta says:

      4 Dec4 December 10:04

      Exit plan is same as for China, that is being closed off until the whole world gets vaccinated.

      • TGLoyalty says:

        4 Dec4 December 10:18

        But covid will still be around and it’ll still mutate

        • meta says:

          4 Dec4 December 11:50

          I exaggerating to illustrate the lack of a plan…

    • John says:

      4 Dec4 December 11:50

      There isn’t any exit plan. The current plan is to let HKers go to the mainland without quarantine and by extension allow tourists from the mainland to visit and go home without quarantine.

      HK is unable to get their elderly people to be vaccinated because doctors are telling them that the vaccine is risky if you have diabetes or arthritis or whatever (and the risk of getting covid has been quite low because of the extreme travel restrictions).

      My mother lives in HK and she was going for a simple hand operation in August – she was advised not to get the vaccine until 2 weeks after! So she (75) was vaccinated 4 months later than me in the UK (35) even though Pfizer was available at the start of this year.

      China is such a big place that they don’t really need to open to the world, 90%+ of people may never leave the country and 99%+ of people don’t need to leave the country, if they do they can do their 28 days of quarantine on return.

      The problem is that the China vaccines are not much more than 50% effective (against the original variant). Delta defeated Australia’s covid-zero strategy so if omicron which is much more transmissible gets past the extreme China restrictions it is going to be a disaster. Ironically omicron should actually be Xi and the only way for HK to open up is for it to defeat Mr Xi.

      • Andy says:

        4 Dec4 December 12:07

        Basically it’s a redemption flight that I want to cancel…if BA cancel it that saves me £70 so I guess I’ll hold on for now…

• ee says:

  4 Dec4 December 07:40

  Posted this late yesterday, but will repeat as may be useful.

  Randox drive through day 2 PCRs taken at Stansted yesterday morning around 8:30am were in their lab by lunchtime and results came through at 7:20pm and 8:00pm. Test site was fairly busy although only about half of the lanes were open.

• Rui N. says:

  4 Dec4 December 08:03

  Good news everybody! For those missing their Creation cards Curve is on the case! Their response to someone on twitter when asked about the matter: “We’re still in discussion with Creation and we’ll let you know as soon as we have more information available for you!” 🤣

  • Harrier25 says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:06

    What a bunch of Charlatans!

    • TGLoyalty says:

      4 Dec4 December 08:48

      Did they steal you lunch money at some point? You seem to have nothing but negative things to say.

      Creation are at fault here not curve.

      • Harrier25 says:

        4 Dec4 December 09:04

        What are you on about TG? My point is that Curve are doing nothing…and in answer to your far left question, Curve are not blamless in all this, Creation weren’t responsible for all the MS going on by themselves. Curve turned a blind eye to it all until such time they no longer could.

        • TGLoyalty says:

          4 Dec4 December 09:15

          “ Curve turned a blind eye to it all until such time they no longer could.”

          Well obviously and thank you to them for doing that.

        • Harrier25 says:

          4 Dec4 December 09:22

          Whatever TG. If the serious offenders had been stopped earlier then we wouldn’t be here now. Surely you can see that? There are plenty of cards where you can save on FX fees, you don’t exclusively need Curve for that.

        • TGLoyalty says:

          4 Dec4 December 09:47

          which other card gives me the flexibility to use whichever underlying credit card I want for free fx transactions?

        • TGLoyalty says:

          4 Dec4 December 09:50

          “ If the serious offenders had been stopped earlier then we wouldn’t be here now.”

          Both Curve and Creation did as per comments from the likes of urbanite saying he was S12’d in early 2020. Ive heard of curve cards shut for too much MS to one source in the past too.

          Some may have had access to multiple cards so got away with it for longer but this indiscriminate action from creation is purely off their own back!

      • Yorkieflyer says:

        4 Dec4 December 09:05

        Err Curve dibbed us all in to save their skin

        • TGLoyalty says:

          4 Dec4 December 09:15

          Curve bent over for NSI but creation did all the snitching …

          @Harrier25 you’re always here saying they’ll finally get what they deserve, they’ll be closed soon enough etc etc

          I’m still extremely happy to be saving fx fees on my foreign spend and have the flexibility to use whichever card I want.

  • Anna says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:18

    Weren’t they also still in discussion with Amex last time we heard anything? 😂

    • Mr(s) Entitled says:

      4 Dec4 December 08:48

      Given the monthly fee, at what point does a ‘positive spin’ become obtaining money by deception?

      • Andy says:

        4 Dec4 December 12:19

        In what way are they deceiving you? Metal is 5£/month extra compared to Curve Black for a set of additional benefits, including no fronted fee. As long as these things work as advertised, they are fulfilling what you pay the fee for. If the underlying card issuer is not happy with the way you use your card, that’s your problem and not Curve’s…

  • Chas says:

    4 Dec4 December 18:42

    They said that about Amex when that stopped working (3 years ago?)…

• Vish says:

  4 Dec4 December 08:05

  Is anyone else not able to log into BA Exec club? I get the message;

  There is currently no access to your account while we upgrade our system. Please visit the information page to find out how this may affect you. We apologise for any inconvenience caused and thank you for your patience.

  • Toppcat says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:21

    Same issue here. Seems to be working intermittently.

    • Kathy M says:

      4 Dec4 December 17:55

      Same for me. I have had that message, but also sometimes I can log in, then when I try to access my ‘statement’ it tells me I have had no recent transactions. I have had several transactions recently using the BA shopping site- got the e-mails saying the Avios have come!
      I need to cancel a flight with my 2-4-1. Last time I did this (to extend my 2-4-1 duration) I could do it on line and got my future travel voucher. This time it is because my holidays booked for July 2022 has been cancelled already! , I am concerned to cancel on line if my account is not working properly.

• David says:

  4 Dec4 December 08:11

  Anyone had their cancelled IHG Creation card Free night posted?

  • Anna says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:28

    Oddly enough, no.
    They are taking a very long if they’re just going to reiterate that no one will be getting anything!

  • JonD says:

    4 Dec4 December 08:29

    No. Only thing that might make them change is lots of complaints.

• a270 says:

  4 Dec4 December 08:16

  Transfered points from Amex to Virgin Flying Club. Account was linked before and transfer is usually instantaneous but I logged in and they haven’t transferred. Is there a delay these days?

  • meta says:

    4 Dec4 December 09:25

    It was instant last weekend for me.

    • a270 says:

      4 Dec4 December 10:18

      Just my luck! Amex chat said no issue from their end. Been waiting on my call to Virgin for 1 hour 17 minutes. What a waste of my Saturday. Virgin call centre is an absolute nightmare. Same experience last month!

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