Five UK Marriott hotels, mainly country clubs, are to leave the chain

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• the real harry1 says:

  4 Jul4 July 12:47

  There IS a way to transfer the ring-fenced Avios over to avios.com/ BAEC – but it relies on you having a balance of Avios in your IB a/c before you got the 90K.

  Because I had 500 points in my IB a/c, I could if I were so inclined shift over the entire 90K in 500 point chunks.

  Ie 180 different combine my Avios transactions of 500 points each.

  Or 360 different transactions for myself & Mrs Harry.

  Not planning to do that as I don’t want to run the risk of a -90K balance on Dec 1st.

  But those of you who fancy shifting them out of IB and had an existing IB balance, this is how to do it.

  • oliver says:

    4 Jul4 July 13:27

    yep i can confirm this works. shame i only had 50 points in there. its gonna be a long night

    • Jeff says:

      4 Jul4 July 15:18

      You can transfer a chunk in to IB and then transfer out in that sized chunks. Tried and tested, but can’t promise it will work for you. I had double the incentive you have – only 25 points in there pre offer.

      • the real harry1 says:

        4 Jul4 July 16:06

        they’ve broken the CMA machine again for now, maybe it’ll come back later

      • the real harry1 says:

        4 Jul4 July 16:18

        ah Jeff I get your drift, I’ll try that later if CMA comes back

  • Djou says:

    4 Jul4 July 17:28

    I did it using the old avios I had there …later transferred 20000 in Iberia first then back again into avios account in 20000 chunks and it WORKED! then from AVIOS acc to BA account. now all 90k in my BA account. Thanks lot!

    • the real harry1 says:

      4 Jul4 July 17:52

      they seem to have plugged that hole 🙁

• Elijah says:

  4 Jul4 July 12:47

  I have two accounts, two passports etc. one in my Gaelic name and one Australian. Got 180000…

  • Anna says:

    4 Jul4 July 15:51

    Before anyone else jumps in, it is not fraud nor in any way illegal to have two passports. Having two accounts may contravene Iberia’s terms and conditions though!

    • RussellH says:

      4 Jul4 July 16:21

      Having passports for two different nationalities used to be frowned on here, but is not any more. When I moved to Switzerland in 1978 I needed a new UK passport, and, for the first time, obviously wanted a Swiss one too.
      I applied for the UK one first, thuis being able to declare truthfully that I did not hold any other valid passport. I applied about a month later for the Swiss one, and it still arrived before the new UK one. (It would not happen now – in those days Swiss passports could be issued by the embassy in London. These days I have to go to London to get the photo taken at the Embassy, who then send all the data off to Switzerland.)

      There are a number of countries, however, that do not allow their nationals to have more than one nationality

      • Anna says:

        4 Jul4 July 22:00

        Yes – Spain is one. You have to relinquish your UK nationality in Spain to get a Spanish passport, however it’s no big deal as the under UK law there is no actual mechanism for giving up UK nationality.

        • Rob says:

          4 Jul4 July 22:08

          Germany lets you have two EU passports. However, come next March, that won’t be allowed. If we moved to Germany after next March I’d need to surrender my UK passport to get a German one (kids can get one automatically of course, wife has one by default).

      • the real harry1 says:

        4 Jul4 July 22:07

        no dual nationality if you want to be an Aussie MP https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017–18_Australian_parliamentary_eligibility_crisis

      • the real harry1 says:

        4 Jul4 July 22:37

        my 3 kids have dual nationality, so has my wife (2 passports, ker-ching £1000! 🙂 )

        I’m the sad mucker lol

• Jamie says:

  4 Jul4 July 12:54

  I’m getting a message “You can only move Avios from British Airways to Iberia Plus – you cannot move your Avios back again.” when i try to transfer out. Anyone know any way around this?

  • the real harry1 says:

    4 Jul4 July 12:59

    Household a/c? That messes up IB—> BAEC

    Trick is to transfer IB—>avios.com—>BAEC (and pull from avios.com, not push from IB)

    • Jamie says:

      4 Jul4 July 13:10

      Ah that will be it. Have now tried moving them to Avios.com and got “Combine my avios was unsuccessful” will try it again later

    • KingK says:

      4 Jul4 July 13:23

      Tried that. still unsuccessful moving the promo bonus avios!
      Non promo-avios transferred straight away….

      • the real harry1 says:

        4 Jul4 July 13:29

        try moving exactly the same total of promo Avios as you just moved successfully in non-promo Avios

• Adam says:

  4 Jul4 July 13:06

  Does anyone know if the bonus avios “activate” a new Iberia account? I want to transfer additional avios from BA to IB in three months time for a redemption.

  If not, what’s the easiest / quickest way to activate it without flying?

  • the real harry1 says:

    4 Jul4 July 13:11

    transfer in 1000 MR points

  • Will says:

    4 Jul4 July 14:09

    Can confirm this works. Doing transfers in 4k.

    • the real harry1 says:

      4 Jul4 July 14:13

      cheers for confirming

      360 transactions coming right up! 🙂

      anybody feel like writing ma a script? 🙂

      • matt says:

        4 Jul4 July 14:16

        lol. ditto. still they think they will claw back

      • Mark says:

        4 Jul4 July 16:20

        I’m assuming Harry is joking based on what he said above 🙂

        Anyone seriously contemplating trying to work around this particular restriction should probably consider the risk of Avios accounts across platforms being combined in the future. If you are planning on holding a long term Avios balance with BA you may want to think twice about the risk of losing 90K Avios in the future, or being left unable to earn/redeem Avios.

        Not that I really want to dissuade too many people from diverting their redemptions away from Iberia and sucking out all the availability….you can of course still redeem for BA flights (or other Oneworld flights if you’re not worried about them being non-refundable) directly from Iberia+.

• the real harry1 says:

  4 Jul4 July 13:11

  I’m starting to wonder if this ‘running a negative balance’ on IB if you transfer out the points is a total myth.

  Why would they even bother to try and make that work? Obviously they have managed to tag the ’90K’ in some way so that people with no pre-existing IB balance can transfer them out – this would include all the new a/cs for example.

  If I transfer all 90K points over to BAEC in 500 point chunks, are they really going to keep that tag going? Then give me -90K in IB? Then amalgamate the BAEC and IB avios platforms and grab back the missing 90K Avios?

  They’re much more useful to me in BAEC, I might decide to take that risk.

  • CV3V says:

    4 Jul4 July 13:30

    i dont know if they will be as sophisticated as that. They may just use a simple script to ask:
    1. Did they make a redemption(s) before 1st Dec?
    2. Was it over 90,000 avios? If no, subtract the difference.

  • callum says:

    4 Jul4 July 15:05

    If they’re allowed to take 90,000 miles away from you, and you clearly agreed to it, I think the better question is why on Earth wouldn’t they!

    • Mark says:

      4 Jul4 July 16:39

      Exactly. Given the very generous nature of the offer, and the extent to which long haul J redemptions with Iberia are extremely good value anyway if you can use them at some point next year I can’t see too much incentive not to use them as intended.

      OK so you can’t use them with a BA 241 / upgrade voucher. If it’s a destination that Iberia serves and you manage a connection in Madrid, I would say that often works out better value even compared to BA with a 241 – especially once you start considering things like seat selection fees.

      A really good opportunity in my book to try Iberia LH business class. Maybe that was the thinking all along!

      • the real harry1 says:

        4 Jul4 July 16:53

        There’s not much time for me to use them, I have got all our school hols RFS tickets up until half term May/ June 2019 so I’m only looking to buy Summer hols 2019 out and back (10), maybe October half term 2019 for 2 of us = 4

        Deadline 1st Dec doesn’t allow to buy further ahead.

        Total 14 tickets in Europe = less than 105,000 in economy – which is why I was considering Business or a jaunt to Salamanca

        I’m down to 140,000 now, having transferred out 40K, so feel more comfortable. I’ll close the IB a/cs after using the tickets and there’s little IB can do about getting back points unless they amalgamate the platforms far faster than anybody thinkss likely.

      • Mark says:

        4 Jul4 July 17:14

        There’s always the option of using the rest for hotel bookings. Granted that isn’t the best use of them, but considering what you paid for them it’s not necessarily a bad option.

• MattyS says:

  4 Jul4 July 13:14

  O/T – a colleague has an Amex green business card given to him by the company but with his own name on the card. If he took out a personal Gold / Plat card, is he eligible for a sign up bonus ?

  Rob did a great article back in February which was clear that doing this the other way round (personal to business) would not be eligible for a bonus as he would have a personal MR account. He doesn’t get any MR’s personally from the business card and is not aware of an MR account in his name, although is responsible for settling the statement. He hasn’t held any other personal Amex card before.

  Many thanks,

  • oliver says:

    4 Jul4 July 13:25

    yes have done this

  • JP says:

    4 Jul4 July 13:26

    Possibly, you will not really know until you apply and see if the sign up progress bar is there or not.

    • JP says:

      4 Jul4 July 13:28

      (Also there is nothing lost by applying and the referring person still gets the points, the gold is free for a year and the plat doesn’t charge until the first statement I believe, but would only be minimal charge if cancelled soon after).

  • MattyS says:

    4 Jul4 July 14:23

    Thanks Oliver / JP.

  • the_real_a says:

    4 Jul4 July 17:06

    Yes green card is underwritten by his company regardless of whoever pays the bill. He should NOT have even been credit checked.

• the real harry1 says:

  4 Jul4 July 13:55

  -90K IB: am I bovvered? 🙂 IB Avios T&Cs https://www.iberia.com/gb/iberiaplus/conditions/

  ‘Un-enrolling from the Programme can be requested by the holder at any time and will have immediate effects.

  The Programme reserves the right to recall your card, cancel your account and hold you responsible if you make improper or fraudulent use of the Programme or do not comply with the rules and procedures contained in these General Conditions.’

  Nothing there about repaying -90K (ie forking out money for points), which some people have guessed at. I could just transfer the lot to BAEC then close the IB a/c, it seems.

  • Mark says:

    4 Jul4 July 16:59

    I would suggest it’s covered by “improper or fraudulent use of the Programme”. The practical remedies may be limited, but there will be an obvious link to your BAEC account (via any intermediate avios.com routing) from your use of CMA and I assume similar terms in the BAEC terms and conditions that would allow them to close that for reasons of fraudulent use if it came to it.

    OK, that may be giving a little to much credence to their capability to enact that from an IT perspective, but is it really worth the risk?

    • the real harry1 says:

      4 Jul4 July 17:06

      I can’t see why transferring out Avios to BAEC is improper in any way – their systems allow it and the rules of the promotion don’t forbid it – until a day ago, everybody thought that’s how the promotion would/ could work.

      The T&Cs of the promo just mention cancelling unredeemed special promo Avios

      • Mikeact says:

        4 Jul4 July 18:17

        Too many barrack room lawyers on here…..

• Devin says:

  4 Jul4 July 14:21

  I’m sure the answer is here already, but I’m feeling a bit lazy. Is there a way to just email Iberia out of the blue with a passport scan for a new account setup, or do I have to call them first to do so?

  • Claire says:

    4 Jul4 July 15:21

    email clasica@iberia.es – that’s where I’ve sent my passport scans to. One has been registered, the other account (husband’s) is still blocked 2 days later.

    • Devin says:

      4 Jul4 July 16:00

      Thanks!

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