Maximise your Avios, air miles and hotel points

Bits: Iberia competition winner, Kaligo.com bonus, 10% off Melia hotels

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News in brief:

HfP reader wins Iberia’s Facebook competition

A couple of weeks ago I mentioned a competition that Iberia was running on Facebook to win 120,000 Avios points.

There were only 188 entries when I wrote about it, so I was fairly sure that – after a couple of thousand HfP readers had entered – the winner would be from here.  I was right – reader Ed was the winner.  Well done!

He already has the 120,000 Avios in a new Iberia Plus account but, due to the rules of the scheme, he can’t transfer them to BA for 90 days!

Kaligo 350 2

1,000 extra miles with Kaligo.com

Hotel booking site Kaligo.com is running a ‘new user’ promotion until 8th May.

If you are a new user of Kaligo.com (defined as ’email, loyalty account, billing address and payment card not previously used’) and spend over $300 equivalent, you will receive 1,000 additional airline miles.  This is on top of whatever base miles you receive for your booking.

What is interesting about this offer is that it applies to ALL of the airline partners Kaligo.com has.  This may be an opportunity to pick up a bonus in a niche programme where you are collecting, such as Alaska, Aeroflot, ANA, Asia Miles, China Eastern, China Southern, Malaysia, Etihad, Eva Air, KLM / Air France, Garuda, Hawaiian, JAL, LATAM, United, Jet, Turkish, Alitalia, Air China, PINS, Qatar, Royal Jordanian, Thai, Saudia, Ethiopian, Airberlin, FlyDubai etc etc.

You need to book via this special landing page to get the 1,000 miles deal.

Remember that Kaligo.com bookings are treated as ‘third party’ bookings and so do not earn points or status benefits with the hotel’s own loyalty scheme.  It is best used if you are booking an independent hotel or a chain hotel where do not have status and are not collecting their own points.

Gran Melia Palacio De Los Duques Madrid Bed Bath

Get 10% off Melia hotel bookings

Spanish hotel group Melia has launched a 10% discount code, valid until the end of the year at all of their 350 properties.

You need to book via this landing page and enter code 0393-MELIA10 in the Promotional Code box.

We’ve reviewed some impressive new Melia properties recently including INNSiDE Manchester (review), INNSiDE New York (review) and Gran Melia Palicio de Los Duques in Madrid (review and photo above).  Remember that Amex Platinum cardholders receive Melia Rewards Gold status as one of their benefits.

How to get MeliaRewards Gold status from American Express

How to get MeliaRewards Gold status from American Express (April 2024)

Do you know that holders of The Platinum Card from American Express receive FREE MeliaRewards Gold status for as long as they hold the card?  It also comes with Marriott Bonvoy Gold, Hilton Honors Gold and Radisson Rewards Premium status.

We reviewed American Express Platinum in detail here and you can apply here.

You can discover the benefits of MeliaRewards Gold status on the Melia website here. It includes three vouchers per year worth 20% off any booking.

The Platinum Card from American Express

40,000 bonus points and a huge range of valuable benefits – for a fee Read our full review

Small business owners may want to consider American Express Business Platinum instead:

American Express Business Platinum

40,000 points sign-up bonus and an annual £200 Amex Travel credit Read our full review

(Want to earn more hotel points?  Click here to see our complete list of promotions from the major hotel chains or use the ‘Hotel Offers’ link in the menu bar at the top of the page.)

Category

British Airways and Avios, Iberia and Iberia Plus, MeliaRewards

Comments (41)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Roger says:
    30 Apr30 April 05:59

    Short poll Re: Amex Platinum fees.
    Hope Rob wouldn’t mind this

    Q. If you applied for a brand new card – Amex Platinum (could be a referral but not an upgrade from PRGC), when did you see fees (£450) hit your account?

    1. Within first couple of days
    2. Within first week
    3. Applied to first statement
    4. Not yet even after first statement is generated

    • Melvin says:
      30 Apr30 April 07:22

      I was approved this month so hope this helps.

      Applied: 18/04
      Activated: 21/04
      Fee: 24/04
      Statement: 24/04

    • Akkers says:
      30 Apr30 April 08:22

      3. Doesn’t count towards qualifying spend to trigger voucher.

    • Kipto says:
      30 Apr30 April 09:35

      I had the fees put on to my account a day after activation last month.

      • JeanLuc says:
        30 Apr30 April 13:52

        I wasn’t charged the platinum fee after having upgraded my gold card. Lucky me 🙂 I cancelled after a few months and never heard of any fee since then

  • Alan says:
    30 Apr30 April 06:48

    As a Melia Reawards Gold member (via Amex platinum or otherwise) you get a 20% off code which can be used up to 3 times in a membership year.

    One of the more useful and tangible benefits in my opinion.

  • S879 says:
    30 Apr30 April 07:17

    OT: Is there some way of an Amex Gold sending a referral to someone for Platinum and getting referral points?

    • Melvin says:
      30 Apr30 April 07:23

      Yes, you will get 9k MR (used to be 18k).

      • Melvin says:
        30 Apr30 April 07:27

        I should elaborate. You can only refer for gold but they have the option to select gold or platinum.

        • Polly says:
          30 Apr30 April 08:00

          Melvin, 18k is only for plat referral, always been 9k for gold. Sadly!

          • Genghis says:
            30 Apr30 April 08:15

            I thought Gold->Plat referral used to be 18k?

          • S879 says:
            30 Apr30 April 08:45

            I am a Gold, person I want to refer is also Gold so I wanted to know if I could refer her for platinum while I was still Gold.

          • the real harry1 says:
            30 Apr30 April 08:51

            short answer: no

            the other person could close their a/c then wait 6 months, then yes you could refer them (you being a Gold) to take a new card, which could be the Plat card – and you’d both get points

          • Melvin says:
            30 Apr30 April 08:53

            Absolutely, gold>gold gets 9k but gold>platinum used to be 18k (now 9k).

            Platinum>Platinum still gets 18k.

          • Melvin says:
            30 Apr30 April 08:54

            Just to clear up any confusion, my last reply was to @Polly

          • S879 says:
            30 Apr30 April 09:23

            Thanks all for the clarification. Do we only get 20,000 bonus from Gold to Platinum via the link that’s been going around or could the person wanting to upgrade to platinum just do it by logging in to Amex?

          • Genghis says:
            30 Apr30 April 09:46

            @S879. To upgrade Gold->Plat need to go via the link for 20k on £1k spend. You could try contacting Amex for an offer but it seems likely you’d be told that there is no offer or only get offered 10-15k.

          • Natalia S says:
            30 Apr30 April 10:24

            I sent a message to Amex a couple of days ago asking what bonus points they would do for Gold->Platinum upgrade. I received the exact same (non-personalized) link for 20K on £1000 spend as a reply. So it looks like they kind of standardized it.

  • Gareth says:
    30 Apr30 April 07:57

    Congratulations Ed!!

  • the real harry1 says:
    30 Apr30 April 08:20

    looks like I’ve not been charged the £450 on Plat (points banked/ a/c closed)

    • Genghis says:
      30 Apr30 April 08:27

      Nice one. Straight in, straight out!

    • MattyS says:
      30 Apr30 April 11:12

      Same here, had platinum for 13 days following upgrade from gold to get 20k bonus points and 9k referral. No fee posted even though it went through a statement date and they told me there wouldnt be one when I called to close account.

      • Genghis says:
        30 Apr30 April 13:45

        Best to keep quiet about the lack of fee posting when closing the account, no?

        • MattyS says:
          30 Apr30 April 21:00

          I didnt mention it, they just told me as no fee had been charged there was no refund due. Wasn’t going to argue !

  • zark says:
    30 Apr30 April 08:21

    Does anybody know if Melia Gold still provide a 241 free night for your boirthday?

    • Melvin says:
      30 Apr30 April 08:48

      I was only offered a 5% discount voucher (Earlier this month). I did query with customer services and they seemed to suggest 2-4-1’s were still available but this may have been lost in translation.

    • Gavin says:
      30 Apr30 April 08:49

      They don’t. Instead you get a one time room upgrade voucher which you can apply to your booking at online checkin. Last time it didn’t work for me though as they had no available rooms in the next category.

    • AndyR says:
      30 Apr30 April 09:19

      No I got a choice of 20% off or room upgrade for my birthday.

  • Tony says:
    30 Apr30 April 08:24

    Does Ed have an alter-ego? On Facebook Iberia has someone called Gemma as the winner

  • N says:
    30 Apr30 April 09:10

    Hivemind, is there any chance of me being able to used a BAPP 2-4-1 to JNB, CPT or Tokyo in January 2018? I haven’t started searching yet but wonder if it’s even worth trying! Thanks

    • Genghis says:
      30 Apr30 April 09:14

      Tokyo, yes. Bear in mind the weather will be a bit chilly (may even snow).
      JNB / CPT unlikely but worth checking. I got tickets for Feb 18 but at t-355

    • AndyR says:
      30 Apr30 April 09:24

      Tokyo should be easy to get in Jan. We went end of Jan this year and it was a bit chilly on some days so you need a jacket but it was fine. Jan has the benefit of less rain.

    • n says:
      30 Apr30 April 16:59

      Thanks for input. SA is first choice and would like to be there for the weekend of 28/1. The only option available is to fly our 5/1 and fly back 5/2. Unfortunately not at the part of the life where I can go off like that for a month!

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