Why the British Airways ‘triple Avios’ offer is worse than we thought

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• Simon says:

  9 Sep9 September 07:45

  Whilst its possible that a myriad of things have gone wrong with the preperation of this promotion, I suspect its probably one (or combination) of these three that caused it;
  – it was horribly rushed
  – gross incompetence
  – they just don’t care

  In any event, You don’t need to be a lawyer to get this sort of thing right, although running it past one before publication is always a good idea!

  BA really does need to stop the rot across a number of fronts.

  • Nick says:

    9 Sep9 September 08:01

    Quite frankly, is it any surprise, with the number of people leaving school, and indeed higher education today, who can barely write in anything more than text-speak?! 🙂

    • harry says:

      9 Sep9 September 08:09

      m8 r u serus? 🙂

      Marketing people are usually pretty literate, esp senior marketing people – looks very rushed to me.

      I’d say the IT failures are more serious.

      • Rob says:

        9 Sep9 September 08:13

        If you don’t FULLY understand how Avios works you cannot write this copy properly. And as there are only about 100 people who do ….. 🙂

• roger says:

  9 Sep9 September 08:20

  Can anyone please shed some light on buying TF gift vouchers for amex offer?

  • Rob says:

    9 Sep9 September 08:41

    If bought in a TF shop it would almost certainly be ok. Online, you never know.

    • Roger says:

      9 Sep9 September 10:44

      Cheers Rob.
      I guess online limit is £500 GC, so it must be used in store to benefit from the offer.
      For flight bookings would TF match the same fare as you would get from OTAs likes of opodo, expedia?
      If so it’s a no brainer to buy GC now and use it for flight bookings for next few flights.
      I have offer on 6 different cards so not sure whether to max out on that and use it for flight bookings later on.

      • Mr Ignorant says:

        9 Sep9 September 13:04

        What is TF, please?

        • Brian says:

          9 Sep9 September 13:19

          Trailfinders

      • John says:

        9 Sep9 September 13:07

        Yes the pruce will be the same but they have a booking fee (

• Mark says:

  9 Sep9 September 08:24

  It’s the sort of thing the litte coffee shop down the road would get wrong but you’d expect someone as big as BA to have things like this wrapped up before release.

  Do they get the kids on work experience to know this stuff up and then don’t bother to check it.

  I’m sorry but if one of my staff organised a shambles of a promotion like this they would be getting a rather quick demotion or the option to go to evening school!!

• Toby says:

  9 Sep9 September 09:06

  O/T

  Does anyone know if priority pass allows access to “Aspire Plus” sections of Aspire Lounges?

  At ncl the aspire lounge is essentially now an extension of the main terminal with every tom dick and harry using the lounge. The aspire plus section which is a lounge within a loung is more befitting of a typical airport lounge but is unbelievably charged at £15 per head.

  • John says:

    9 Sep9 September 13:09

    When anyone can get a PP (like yourself) it’s no wonder that every tom dick and harry can get in.

• James says:

  9 Sep9 September 09:23

  O/T: Re Virgin’s miles booster. Finished call with them. Only base miles included and only on VS operated flights (so Delta doesn’t count). Normal miles and TP apply of course. However, anyone who booked Chicago for next year (mine is April) will find that they can’t do the miles booster offer because that flight number doesn’t yet exist in VS’s system! Am on hold while supervisor works out what to do to let me participate…

• Colin says:

  9 Sep9 September 09:45

  I booked a first class flight to the USA yesterday on the strength of this offer. The BA operator who took my booking said it was a very generous one. I am now totally confused about how many Avios I will receive. If it’s triple the economy amount, I will be seriously unhappy.
  I will contact BA for clarification and if my worse fears are confirmed I will let you know.

• the_real_a says:

  9 Sep9 September 10:00

  Its rather more serious than just poor communication, because something like this can persuade someone to make a booking that otherwise would not with BA

  It rather illustrates the point, that we should all be taking screenshots of T&C`s when booking through offers.

  • Nick says:

    9 Sep9 September 10:17

    Without wishing to stray in to hyperbole, one can imagine that if a dispute ever arose because a customer made a booking on the basis that the 300% offer would apply to the cabin bonus, BA might have a bit of difficulty explaining that it does not.

    Of course I don’t imagine anything like this would ever get that far, but para. 8 is pretty clear, in isolation. And if memory serves, BA have in the past awarded these uplifts on the cabin bonus too.

    What is so annoying is that this is still a pretty decent offer really. I am beginning to wonder if BA did actually include the cabin bonus in this to begin with, just to give them something to “enhance” my removing it the next day!

  • harry says:

    9 Sep9 September 10:19

    yep I was kicking myself that I did not screenshot the Sunday Times Travel offer – fortunately all worked out OK 🙂

    • Peter Taysum says:

      9 Sep9 September 23:46

      I have had 4500 Avios posted to BAEC and Avios in the last few days

  • Colin says:

    9 Sep9 September 11:14

    I agree. I have started taking screenshots of this offer. I had a reply from BA saying I would earn triple points on my 1st class booking. I had asked them to quantify the figure, but they didn’t, so I have sent them another request.

• Paul says:

  9 Sep9 September 10:52

  OT Anyone know if you can pay npower bills at paypoint?
  Thanks.

  • harry says:

    9 Sep9 September 11:46

    ISTR only if you have a pre-payment meter

    ie they want to facilitate payments from those who need extra help but are unwilling to give this option to standard metered customers

  • Boris says:

    9 Sep9 September 13:09

    Just don’t go there.

    Even if npower gave you a gold bar every quarter, it would not be worth the hassle you may receive.

    When I tried npower as a switch they grabbed my neighbours gas and my electric, and it took well over a year to resolve.

    • Genghis says:

      9 Sep9 September 13:46

      On the topic of energy switches, the MSE collective switch comes out 13 Sep. Register beforehand to get notification and to be able to participate.

      • harry says:

        9 Sep9 September 14:38

        I was just able to pay in £1000 to my EON a/c (BMI DC VISA 1000 Avios) – they don’t like you to go more than £300 in credit but I did it on the phone, nae problemo

  • John says:

    9 Sep9 September 13:11

    Don’t they give you £100 off if you have a direct debit set up?

    • mark2 says:

      9 Sep9 September 16:23

      I use Scottish Power as they are cheapest for us and have a direct debit. I greatly overpay pref using Go Spend It with money off coupon from Tescco and then ask for a refund. I have has £300 twice to bank
      in the last few months. It is all done online nut they may notice eventually.

      On the subject of energy comparisons you need to check the assumptions that they have made about your current supplier. If your fixed price finishes in the next year they may assume that you will move onto an expensive standard rate. There is an energy equivalent of Apr which will be hidden somewhere.

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