BP is leaving Nectar on 31st May

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• AndyGWP says:

  16 May16 May 09:02

  OT – Rob, not sure if you’re aware, but you don’t appear to have a review for the Aspire lounge in LHR T5.

  The link in Favourites just takes you to “first photos” of the lounge, and there’s another article I’ve found covering the official opening (which is just a press release really), and there’s also an official entry rules, but no actual review.

  Is it on your list to get a proper review?

  • Michael says:

    16 May16 May 09:22

    The Points Guy do! 😀

    Jokes aside – this is the better blog.

  • Klaus-Peter Dudas says:

    16 May16 May 09:44

    Here is a review – don’t bother going…

    • Rob says:

      16 May16 May 09:54

      Indeed. Problem is that, since my initial visit, I haven’t had the slightest urge to go back.

      You should avoid it.

      If you want to go anyway, I’ll pay if you promise to write it up. Zero chance of getting in via Priority Pass (and zero chance of a table to yourself when inside).

      • Liam says:

        16 May16 May 10:07

        I went recently—around lunchtime on a Thursday—and managed to a) get in via Priority Pass (with two guests), and b) find a table for all of us. I would have gone to the Plaza Premium, but I was the only one of us with an Amex Platinum and, given we only had about 45 minutes anyway, the guest fee for that one seemed steep. I think we were lucky to get a table, though. The lounge was very busy; we spent a few minutes looking for any space that might allow three of us to sit together, and then had a stroke of good fortune when a group of people got up to leave. There was a sign above the table saying that it was reserved for groups who had pre-booked, but no one told us to move.

      • Michael says:

        16 May16 May 10:38

        I’ve probably been in there 4-5 times now and each time it’s been by Priority pass.

      • Lyn says:

        16 May16 May 11:42

        We have got in with Priority Pass over the last couple of years, but haven’t tried so far this year..

        Usually we were able to get in immediately. Once they put us on a waiting list, but cleared us only about 2 minutes later. So it could be worth asking, in case other people don’t bother, which I think is what happened in our case.

        Yes, it is definitely small and crowded. For all their faults, I definitely much prefer the BA Galleries lounges, so I’ll be glad to get my status back again soon.

      • the_real_a says:

        16 May16 May 13:17

        I dont mind Aspire, the buffet makes a change to the slops in galleries. They operate a “wait list” policy (they take your name, go shopping and come back) so i have never waited more than 20 minutes to get in. Obviously larger groups will have more problems. The extension to the lounge last year improved things.

  • Lady London says:

    16 May16 May 11:23

    just read my comments previously.

    they can be summed up as “Don’t bother” and “I’d rather eat in the noisy Pret a Manger in the middle ground floor of T5” and “at anything like walk-in price or even on free Priority Pass, this lounge is a ripoff”.

    Other than that, it’s the greatest lounge in T5.

  • AndyGWP says:

    16 May16 May 13:49

    Ha – thanks all! Looks like I’ll be using Plat for Plaza Premium then… 🙂

• Traveller says:

  16 May16 May 09:09

  For Tel Aviv, it Looks like it’s just for the winter timetable as my various flights booked for April 2020 onwards are still 777’s or a321.

• TripRep says:

  16 May16 May 09:32

  No Hilton discount on my Hilton Barclaycard.

  The app has a “Purchase Offers” section, nothing at all in there.

• Craig says:

  16 May16 May 09:41

  Slightly OT: A few people had issues with Hilton and Amex offers when Hilton used 3C card processing. Was it necessary to chase Amex up for the rebate?

  • RM84 says:

    16 May16 May 09:50

    I did the spend across three hotel bookings. The second two used 3C payment but the offer triggered once the third payment processed with no problem. I had fully expected to have to chase!

  • John says:

    16 May16 May 10:14

    I asked this just before Easter, and nope it credited with no problems. With points promo it worked out to £30 per night incl lounge access and brekkie

  • Craig says:

    16 May16 May 11:10

    Thanks both, I’ll sit back and give it a few days.

    • TokyoFan says:

      16 May16 May 17:37

      Hi Craig – mine posted fine too (I think I asked originally about my stay in Tewkesbury).

• doctorbee says:

  16 May16 May 09:56

  OT – Just wanted to advise of a restriction with the Amex Platinum Travel Insurance.

  We have flights booked to Colombo later in the year, but may be forced not to go because of the ongoing terrorist situation in Sri Lanka. The FCO currently advise against non-essential travel which means travel insurance would not cover the trip if we decided to ignore the advice.

  Even though the flights were booked with Amex travel on the Platinum card before the Easter attacks, the travel insurance does not cover cancellation where FCO advice changes to advise against travel after booking the trip. Therefore we are stuck in a situation where we won’t be covered for the cost of cancelling the flights, nor covered if we did decide to travel against FCO advice!

  Something for Amex platinum cardholders to consider in light of the price increase, as it is not as comprehensive as you might expect!

  • pauldb says:

    16 May16 May 10:18

    Who are you flying with: have you request a refund from them or Amex Travel?

    • doctorbee says:

      16 May16 May 10:36

      Sri Lankan Airlines but the booking is via Amex travel. After speaking to Amex Travel, they advised that Sri Lankan are currently being more flexible with cancellations but only for flights departing latest end of June, so need to wait until later to see if they can help us out.

      Note that Amex insurance will also not refund our hotel bookings either for the same reason as above.

      • KBuffett says:

        16 May16 May 20:26

        They should refund if the advice is still in place nearer the time. Poor show Amex

        • Shoestring says:

          16 May16 May 20:43

          It’s not poor show Amex at all. Contractual terms are clear enough. Amex have decided to take no responsibility for disruption caused by terrorist action, Amex here being both Amex Travel and the Plat insurance – I think this is 100% understandable and it’s there in black & white in the T&Cs.

          Airlines can’t let people freely cancel on ‘noise’ and bear the costs of cancellation when there are not reasonable grounds to justify this. So it sounds as if SL are allowing cancellations until the end of June – but playing it month by month after that. Again, completely understandable from their point of view. If the danger is lifted ‘officially’ by July etc then there would be no grounds to refund someone who didn’t want their ticket after all, because their reasons to cancel would not be supported by the evidence.

• Adam says:

  16 May16 May 10:03

  Last date for collecting Nectar with BP is the 31st May – Confirmed by Nectar on Twitter yesterday, it is a bit confusing as they said Midnight on the 31st which would mean 00:00 but they confirmed that they actually meant 23:59 on the 31st May which would be Midnight on the 1st.

  • John says:

    16 May16 May 10:11

    Having the same problem with Watford council. They’re double dipping on council tax every time I get new tenants moving but low level bureaucrats aren’t the brightest.

    • Qwerty Bertie says:

      16 May16 May 10:40

      Nor are the high level ones. I have it in writing from an LA head of planning that something requires planning permission, despite it being a blatant case of something which cannot be construed as development ergo does not fall within the Act. I’ve done it anyway, and there hasn’t been a peep.

    • Lady London says:

      17 May17 May 01:58

      Maybe they got the idea off the DVLA – the DVLA ensures a single vehicle must pay the tax twice in the same month whenever its owner changes — both the outgoing and incoming owner must pay a full month’s tax. Perhaps your LA think this should apply to homes too?

• GRIMZ says:

  16 May16 May 10:11

  OT, I have an Amex SPG card but not a Starwood rewards account and my points are disappearing from my Amex SPG? I do have a Marriott Bonvoy account but the points are not arriving into my Bonvoy account. Any idea what I need to do to get my Starwood points?

  • Genghis says:

    16 May16 May 11:28

    Call Amex?

  • Luckyjim says:

    16 May16 May 12:03

    I had the same issue. I’d lost access to my Starwood account because of something Marriott did – email address can only be associated with one Starwood or Bonvoy account. Amex were able to provide the Starwood number associated with my SPG amex via chat. I then asked Bonvoy to merge this orphaned account into my Bonvoy account. Only took a couple of days and all my old points came across.

  • BJ says:

    16 May16 May 12:38

    My partner had to resolve similar issues yesterday. Despite having entered his Marriott number they opened a new account for him. A call to Marriott quickly located the new account number for him but they would not merge them, they said he had to use the combine accounts form online himself. To get a little sillier still, he had to enter his old Marriott account details into the old SPG fields in the form. It is not instant, he has to wait about 5 days for it to happen.

  • mark2 says:

    16 May16 May 14:10

    The Marriott number is on the Amex statement where It shows how many points you have earned

• Nick says:

  16 May16 May 10:20

  O/T- I have a few questions regarding a tiny number of IHG points and as I’ve been out of the game for a bit I wanted to check that my logic is still sound.

  I (or the wife) could really use 15000 IHG points urgently. Neither my wife or I have any virgin miles – seems I let them expire. Whoops.

  My wife has about £53 in tesco vouchers (remember those?!) and a meagre 7k MR points. I have no tesco vouchers (let them expire too it seems! Really taken my eye off the ball in recent years) and virtually no MR points.
  Neither of us currently has the IHG credit card but we wouldn’t trigger the spending bonus in time if we were to apply today. I am spire and my wife is the basic level.

  Ideally we would move points into my IHG account as I have 1500 left (it all helps!) but as I don’t want to pay the transfer fee I don’t think that is possible. So my only option, I think, is to convert my wife’s tesco and amex points to her virgin miles account and then transfer virgin miles to her IHG points account. I think I’d need all £53 of the tesco vouchers and about 2500 of the amex points to get 15000 virgin miles which converts to the 15000 IHG points.

  Am I missing a trick here or is that the way to do this? I know the Amex—> virgin bit should be instant but how long should I allow for tesco–> virgin and virgin –> IHG? As an aside it used to be the case that you could “buy” IHG points at very low cost through part-cash-part-points bookings and cancel. I have had a look but cannot seem to get anything like the value that I once could doing this – is that route dead now?

  Two other quick checks:
  – I don’t think I can use points to pay for the room+parking offers they do
  – I think that a cash+points booking is a qualifying stay for accelerate.

  Any help gratefully received!

  • Rooster says:

    16 May16 May 10:37

    -No can’t use points to pay for a parking deal
    -cash+points doesn’t count for accelerate only if your target was to use cash+points

  • Rooster says:

    16 May16 May 10:40

    If you do have a cash+points accelerate target then this is credited very quickly apparently so might be an option

    • Nick says:

      16 May16 May 12:18

      that is a good point – not sure what my wife’s target is… I will check. mine is awesome – 84,400 for 2 weekend stays as long as i do bonus points bookings and the stays are at different brands.

  • pablo says:

    16 May16 May 11:23

    Points + cash is still available but you need at least 5000 points to be able to book. Holiday Inn Express Chicago Rolling Mdws-Schaumburg 5k+$63 ($63 buys you 10k points), Holiday Inn express Bradford 10k+$30 ($30 earns you 5k points)

    • Nick says:

      16 May16 May 12:38

      perfect. thanks

  • Shoestring says:

    16 May16 May 12:58

    ask Tesco CS to check both your a/cs for expired vouchers – they have been un-expiring them on request

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