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Bits: Virgin Trains loophole closed, new Crowne Plaza Newcastle hotel opens

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Some news in brief:

Virgin Trains closes a loophole I never knew existed

Last weekend, Virgin West Coast closed down a loophole that, unfortunately, I had never heard about.

It turns out that, if you used a Railcard to buy a ticket on Virgin West Coast, you were charged off-peak pricing on ALL trains.  This meant that you were effectively offered a double discount on peak time trains – you got offered an off-peak price not available to other travellers AND it would be discounted with your railcard.

This was not an error – it was a generous Virgin policy which they have now removed.  More details in The Independent here.

If you ever took advantage of this, you no longer can.  And if you never did, you never will!

New Crowne Plaza Newcastle hotel opens

I don’t cover many new hotel openings on Head for Points but I make an exception for upmarket IHG or Hilton properties, where many HfP readers have points and status, in popular cities.

The new Crowne Plaza in Newcastle officially opens tomorrow and is already in its soft opening phase.  Located directly behind the main railway station, it is a new build four-star hotel which looks pretty good from the website (photo above).

Reward nights are 30,000 points per night.  Cash rates will be pretty low for the first few months, however, so you may prefer to pay – especially if you participating in the generous IHG Accelerate promotion this Autumn.

Remember that new IHG Rewards Club members will get a free night – anywhere in the world – for two paid stays they make under the Accelerate offer.  Click the link above for more details.

I have been told, unofficially, that all IHG status members – Gold, Platinum and Spire – will be upgraded to club rooms or at the least given free club access for the first month.  You may want to reconfirm this with the hotel before you book but it sounds a decent deal.

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IHG One Rewards news

IHG One Rewards update – July 2025:

Get bonus points: IHG is currently running TWO global promotions. You can register for both.

Promo 1: IHG One Rewards will give you your choice of either 2,000 bonus points for every two nights or 8,000 bonus points for every four nights you stay.  The offer period is 20th May to 31st August. Click here to register and learn more.

Promo 2: IHG One Rewards is running a promotion aimed at five brands – Crowne Plaza, voco, Vignette, Candlewood and Garner.  You will earn triple base points for stays at these brands until 30th September. Click here to register and learn more.

New to IHG One Rewards?  Read our overview of IHG One Rewards here and our article on points expiry rules here. Our article on ‘What are IHG One Rewards points worth?’ is here.

Buy points: If you need additional IHG One Rewards points, you can buy them here.

IHG One Rewards is offering a 100% bonus when you buy points by 17th July 2025. Click here to buy.

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

Category

IHG One Rewards

Comments (31)

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

  • Leo says:
    9 Sep9 September 10:41

    and why’s that?

  • Rob says:
    9 Sep9 September 10:49

    He didn’t tell me – if he sees this he may post.

    • Josh says:
      9 Sep9 September 20:21

      You can place unlimited separate orders of 10 coins per household (best to spread them out a bit). I’ve had a fair chunk this way!

      Acceptance is a little more hit-and-miss (I don’t cause a fuss if refused!), but generally Halifax branches near where I live have been quite good with small(er) batches of them. If you have the cash float I’d say buy as many as possible and then “cash them in” bit by bit over the forthcoming year…

  • Gavin says:
    9 Sep9 September 11:37

    Re: The Royal Mint:

    Does a purchase of these coins not count as a cash transaction on credit cards, and is therefore subject to high transaction fees? I believe this was introduced after a similar promotion in the US went wrong, and a lot of people used it as a free way to rack up points.

    • cheekychappie says:
      9 Sep9 September 11:42

      Amex treat it as a purchase

      • Rob says:
        9 Sep9 September 12:01

        ….. although I think the loophole which let you use Amex – which involved fooling the Mint site into thinking you were in the US – no longer works?

        • cheekychappie says:
          9 Sep9 September 13:08

          Ah, I’m not doing it this time so might be out of date. Fairly sure I’ve also used MBNA Visa in the past (Olympic 50ps for the kids) with no nasty surprises

          • Rob says:
            9 Sep9 September 13:58

            I am 99% sure it will be treated as a purchase – it certainly was on Josh’s MBNA card.

  • cheekychappie says:
    9 Sep9 September 12:58

    OT bit – check your snail mail – just got mailing from Tesco with 3 x £8 off £40, combines well with pay.coms

  • cheekychappie says:
    10 Sep10 September 17:17

    Hello,

    The Big British Airways Take Off is in full flight and things are looking up for you.

    Book a cash return flight in economy with British Airways to any destination from a UK or Irish airport and you’ll collect an extra 1,500 bonus Avios. Just book by the 15 September 2015 for travel between 1 October and 31 December 2015 (excluding 23–31 October 2015).

    Do more with 1,500 bonus Avios

    So if you’d like to do more travelling, how about putting them towards a relaxing weekend break, a spot of city sightseeing or catching the last rays of sunshine?

    Hurry, this is a limited offer. Don’t forget to register and book your British Airways flights by 15 September 2015.

    The Avios Team

  • Aeronaut says:
    18 Sep18 September 10:05

    “From why I can see the Virgin Trains railcard easement appeared in December 2011 and was never meant to be a temporary thing.”

    No, it’s been around *much* longer than that – since circa 2000.

    Possibly intended to help attract people onboard when the West Coast mainline was a bit of a mess, with the route modernisation programme just getting going. Also it was maybe a way of softening the blow as Virgin Trains bumped up their peak fares and expanded the peak time window for many journeys.

    It’s bad news that the easement was removed with so little notice, I agree completely with that.

  • ian says:
    21 Sep21 September 15:12

    Anyone found a bank in NW London that accepts the coins? I am struggling.

  • Dom says:
    25 Sep25 September 14:02

    Just tried to cash in one of the royal mint £100 coins at Lloyds. Got told they would not accept it but the post office or the bank of England might. I just called royal mint and they adviadvised that they cannot be cashed in. They can only be sold on the secondary market. Coin collectors, cash converters eBay etc.

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

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