The British Airways ‘upgrade to First’ offer is back

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• Frankie says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:01

  Who made the Iberia pride seatbelt pic? It’s cool.

  • Rob says:

    7 Jul7 July 11:29

    It was one IB used last year, or possibly the year before – we just had it in the image library and it seemed appropriate today.

    • the real harry1 says:

      7 Jul7 July 16:12

      Let’s hear it for diversity! yay! 🙂 Especially on Pride Day.

      I always respected the right of everybody on this fine planet of ours to determine their own personal feelings & values.

      • Cat says:

        7 Jul7 July 19:03

        Hear, hear!

      • Matt says:

        7 Jul7 July 22:10

        +1M+++++

      • the real harry1 says:

        8 Jul8 July 18:06

        Good to hear the support, I have long campaigned for LGBT rights.

        We are a civilised nation where everybody should be treated fairly and given equal respect.

        It somewhat surprises me that in the World Cup nation – Russia – they have managed to suppress the homophobic Ultras – but whatever, that’s a fine result.

        Come on, England! 🙂

• Lochlann says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:14

  I’m a bit sceptical (possibly unfairly) of the DXB and DOH routes being so lucrative. Wondering how they’ve taken account of the transfer traffic and arrived at the pro data revenue for just the LHR legs.

• Jamie says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:14

  Rob, the first reports are coming in on flyertalk of new iberia accounts being validated for the Avios promotion. The, limited, data points so far are showing Iberia not honoring the promotion and saying they will not award the bonus avios due to ‘inconsistencies’. They are offering refunds on the tickets.

  There is not a single data point, yet, of a new account receiving the bonus.

  Can you get a response from Iberia on this? My partner and I are expecting to be impacted by this. It is not clear what they mean by ‘inconsistencies’.

  Source: https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/iberia-airlines-iberia-plus/1915681-iberia-plus-offer-9000-per-booking-21-jun-24-jun-iberia-com-18.html

  • the real harry1 says:

    7 Jul7 July 06:45

    Well, ‘inconsistencies’ would include 10 flights on consecutive days on the same route – that’s what we booked and is laughably indefensible if IB wanted to play hardball. The good news is: old a/cs got the points; those new a/cs identified as non-compliant are just getting the tickets refunded.

    Play, win/ lose – don’t blubber like a baby if it goes against you.

    All those new a/cs had to do was find 10 different ‘believable’ flights, perfectly easy to do if they spent a bit more time on it, widened the search and spread out the flights a bit more.

    • BJ says:

      7 Jul7 July 07:07

      Priceless Harry 🙂 Forgot your own reaction to the Hunt voucher comment just a few day ago?

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Jul7 July 07:12

        you lost me – Hunt voucher? never heard of it

      • BJ says:

        7 Jul7 July 07:20

        The comment suggesting the 9000 avios were being deposited as vouchers with only one voucher being allowed per redemption. Btw, it was not me who posted that.

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Jul7 July 07:28

        Oh yeah, that was a brilliant gotcha – naturally if true, I (& I guess everybody) would have felt rather cheated by IB.

        As it is, I don’t like the way that IB have broken UK consumer law by retrospectively changing promo T&Cs to the detriment of participants, but can somehow live with spending 180K cheap points by Dec 1st, can live with buying business class flights @ LCC prices, can live with exploring all the great T3 lounges I never went to yet etc.

        Think about this – IB enlisted the blogs (as affiliates) to drum up interest in the promotion & lied to the blogs – who are blameless – about the T&Cs. That’s just untrustworthy and disreputable, no wonder some people feel aggrieved 🙂

      • BJ says:

        7 Jul7 July 07:51

        I am sure if you all knew at the outset what you know now then the vast majority of you would have played regardless and have been satisfied with the outcome. Make hay while tge sun is shining, darker days are coming 🙂 As for me, I prefer to pay cash on other airlines. I only use BA once a year with avios that cost me close to nothing so even 0.2ppa was too high. On hotels, my £200 on two stays totalling 5 nights for accelerate and one other promo netted me 120k+points that I can use at IC BKK for example, easily tripling my return as opposed to double has I played IB game.

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Jul7 July 07:59

        BJ you’re forgetting that you can also use IB Avios on American Airlines, Cathay Pacific, Finnair, Japan Airlines, LATAM Airlines, Malaysia Airlines, Qantas, Qatar Airways, Royal Jordanian, S7 Airlines and SriLankan Airlines and another 30 affiliated airlines

      • Doug M says:

        7 Jul7 July 09:21

        Harry, you’re shameless, I at least spread mine a little randomly, be it all 10 flights go in one direction with no returns. But I agree, you expect some catch on offers that are too generous, Amex being the exception to this. As for Iberia, the ‘Hunt’ suggestion would have been very nasty and unforeseen. But not being able to transfer them out is sort of expected. I’m still glad I did it, will pay for a hotel or car rental, if not a flight.
        I’m still favouring cash LH flights at the moment, I like my status and the advantages brought to RFS options and seat selection from being Gold.
        Does anyone else wonder if the likes of Mike Hunt are Rob venting 🙂

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Jul7 July 17:20

        Surely not 🙂

        Been a couple of other instances but I am sure Raffles is above that kind of thing for the most part lol

  • Anna says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:15

    The IB Ts and Cs say they can change the Ts and Cs at any time. If you agree to the Ts and Cs, are you therefore agreeing to IB changing them at ant times? Very interesting.

    • Anna says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:16

      Any time not ant time! iPad having a “do”.

    • the real harry1 says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:29

      That’s not compliant with UK consumer law, ie an unreasonable or unfair T&C is simply not enforceable & can be challenged/ ignored.

      • RussellH says:

        7 Jul7 July 11:25

        Is that relevant? I am no lawyer, but surely Iberia are a Spanish company and any test of Iberia’s Ts+Cs would need to take place in a Spanish Court?

        And there ain’t no such thing as “UK law”. There is English Law, and Scottish Law. And in N. Ireland, while the legal process follows English law, there are many significant differences.

      • the real harry1 says:

        7 Jul7 July 14:16

        Sure it’s relevant – which is why most HFP competitions are not open to rest of world. Any company running a promotion in the UK needs to comply with UK consumer law.

      • the_real_a says:

        7 Jul7 July 18:20

        …but your maximum remedy is to be placed back into the position you were in and the contract null and voided. You were induced to contract (via the offer) and when the inducement was removed tickets were refunded putting you back into your original position. So iberia are voluntarily offering you the maximum remedy by law.

        If someone had accrued and could prove other expenses / losses that were caused by the cancellation of the contract then that would be a different matter.

  • BJ says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:17

    True, except I’m sitting on 594k avios at the moment so there was no urgency to add more. Same with hotel, 6 figure balances on all three major schemes. I think Alan posted he did not want to feel compelled to take a trip he doesn’t need, and Genghis seems to favour earn and burn as opposed to hoarding. I have sympathy with both those viewpoints. If cash flights suddenly started to become much more expensive I might change my thinking but I am happy for the moment.

    • Alan says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:31

      Indeed – have got decent balances in quite a few airline and hotel schemes with lots of travel already booked on GUV2, Lloyds Avios upgrade, 241 so didn’t have capacity for further trips just now! Really need to get even better at burning (am too much of a hoarder, esp if not getting quite the value I want out of the points!) so decided not to go for this IB promo.

  • the real harry1 says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:53

    @Jamie – ICanFly! opened new a/c and got the 90K points #1497 https://www.flyertalk.com/forum/iberia-airlines-iberia-plus/1915681-iberia-plus-offer-9000-per-booking-21-jun-24-jun-iberia-com-100.html

• Lax says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:14

  You must book via an agent for the BA offer. Can’t be done on the BA website.

• the real harry1 says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:24

  Whilst the IB 90K Avios are locked to your IB a/c, any other Avios can still be moved out of IB, eg to BAEC. I moved 1000 IB—>BAEC last night.

  • RIccatti says:

    7 Jul7 July 07:13

    Something fishy is going on.

    I transfers from BAEC to IB, but I cannot move those Avios back! Even ones I transferred on top of 90,000.

    I was able to move back and forth as I needed last week.

    • the real harry1 says:

      7 Jul7 July 07:32

      Just keep trying from time to time, I couldn’t move my 1000 non-promo points on 5th July but could on 6th July late-ish.

• roberto says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:44

  OT (Bits) – Logged into my Virgin MBNA card today and its now showing as Horizon with different card numbers. Be interested to see how they deal with migrating the Virgin miles into my account mid billing cycle and even keener to see what happens to those miles if I have to return that large item I purchased.

  • Matt B says:

    7 Jul7 July 07:08

    I still have 2 weeks to go for my usual statement date, was hoping they would deposit my earnt miles from this cycle ASAP instead of waiting as I need them for a redemption sharpish.

    Also I spent £300 on my black card via virgin on Thurs, looks like it will be a day late for it to hit and earn 4x miles.

  • Roger1* says:

    7 Jul7 July 07:32

    Gosh, yes. Mine too.

    The page shows ‘Visa card ending 6780 | Visa card ending 1633’. No AmEx, obviously, though my current AmEx ends in 1637, so close (possibly).

    • TGLoyalty says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:17

      Mine is showing horizon but my two virgin card number. Sure it’ll sort itself out eventually.

      • Michael Jennings says:

        7 Jul7 July 11:46

        Mine is showing Visa card ending 7547 / Visa card ending 1108 

        1108 is my existing Visa card number. 7547 means nothing to me and is not my existing Amex. My guess is that the Amex has been cancelled, and the new Horizon Visa has been issued and ends with 7547, although I haven’t received it yet. Presumably both the old and new Visas will work for a little while before the old one is cancelled.

  • Alan says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:33

    Interesting. I’ve found miles posting after each transaction on AA rather than at end of month, wonder if this is linked?

    • Roger says:

      7 Jul7 July 08:54

      Yes, it has been happening on my account for almost a month now.
      A sign that they are desperate to overpay for AA miles and want to get it done and dusted ASAP

  • Travel Strong says:

    7 Jul7 July 10:55

    Has anyone actually received the horizon card yet? Still not delivered here.

    • Rob says:

      7 Jul7 July 11:18

      You don’t get it until October IIRC. Until then your existing card becomes a Horizon card but is not actually replaced.

• BJ says:

  7 Jul7 July 06:58

  OT bit: Current travel offer on Halifax Extras include 12% on WA and Conrad, and 10% on Etihad. Nationwide Priority Rewards has a one off 10% off at coop up to £30 back for those who like to pay council tax via paypoint.

  • the real harry1 says:

    7 Jul7 July 07:10

    I’ve got 5% max £30 on Co-Op via Halifax as well, shame it’s not 10% (same as a couple of months ago) as I’m fully council taxed this year so not over-paying then getting refund for a paltry 5% though I suppose it amounts to the same £30 discount, just harder to explain £600 over-payment (tip – blame the wife) – with these offers, if you redeem a generous one, then next time you get it, it’s reduced. So worth skipping a couple then you get the 10% offer back again.

    Also 12% Waldorf, 10% Hilton & Europcar (which doubles up with any discount code you might find).

    • BJ says:

      7 Jul7 July 07:29

      I used the Waitrose when it was 10% and my latest version fell to 5% similar to your coop offer so perhaps that is how they do it. This is my first coop offer.

  • Genghis says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:44

    Thanks for the heads up on the Co Op offer. Easy £30

  • Doug M says:

    7 Jul7 July 09:23

    I’m still buying Amazon gifts cards at Esso most days. A nice £5 off each £50 and spend it when I’m ready.

  • Louise says:

    7 Jul7 July 21:28

    Ive got 10% at coop on my first direct visa offers

• RK says:

  7 Jul7 July 07:05

  O/T but I thought the Lloyds Avios Amex was going away. I just received new cards as a regular 3 year renewal and I got both the Amex and Mastercard, valid until 2022.

  • the real harry1 says:

    7 Jul7 July 07:11

    But the cards won’t be valid for 3 years,ie they’ll still get cancelled at the same time as all the others

  • BJ says:

    7 Jul7 July 07:13

    Gone away in its current form for new applicants. Might return in a revised form in line with new T&C posted by a commenter here last month.

  • Alan says:

    7 Jul7 July 08:35

    Card expiry dates don’t mean anything, we found that out before with bmi.

    A friend was charged a forex fee on their Lloyd’s Avios for a spend abroad, Twitter agent denied it was fee free! Suspect just misinformed agent but surprised a charge showed up, hopefully just a momentary glitch.

  • Anna says:

    7 Jul7 July 14:36

    I’ve just received the new terms and conditions. There is no mention of avios or the upgrade voucher, though it confirms the annual £24 fee and 0% FX. Does this mean nothing has changed or does no reference to avios/voucher mean they don’t exist for Lloyds any more?!

    • Rob says:

      7 Jul7 July 22:28

      Odd, given what Lloyds put online recently.

      • Anna says:

        7 Jul7 July 22:48

        I sent them an online contact form and asked for clarification, though they can be quite slow responding to those. Ts & Cs don’t change till Sep 21st, though and I can hopefully trigger this year’s upgrade voucher by then.

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