New Hilton and American Express hotel cashback promotion launched

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

• Shoestring says:

  4 Jun4 June 10:38

  I’ve been checking the £1 car rentals from https://www.hertz.co.uk/p/hertzone

  There is quite good availability from a smallish number of locations to LHR, Gatwick, Luton, Stansted. Depart from Newcastle, Plymouth, Exeter, Edinburgh, Bristol, Glasgow, Aberdeen, Southampton, Inverness, Cardiff.

  I might be able to get Plymouth to work for me for my summer hols outward flight from LHR, fingers crossed, dates currently until 30th June so a bit too early to book.

• Bill says:

  4 Jun4 June 11:36

  After using curve for a couple of years I contacted them with an enquiry. The response was unrelated and that they will close my account due to my address being isle of man. So irritating!!

• Craig says:

  4 Jun4 June 11:55

  OT: Green to Plat upgrade; first statement just presented, is there any benefit in waiting a few days before trying the upgrade?

  • Michael says:

    4 Jun4 June 12:00

    Possibly – i know a few people said they’d been caught out and had the points refunded from the plat upgrade.

    • Grant says:

      4 Jun4 June 13:13

      I’m not sure if you are trying to dodge the annual fee (worth bearing in mind the fee increase coming on 11th June), but as a data point I applied to upgrade to Plat on the day my Green arrvied – no spending on the Green at all. I’ve just ticked over the £1k spend and my 20K MR have posted. This was in month 2 of having the Plat card and the £450 annual fee was charged to my first statement.

      • Grant says:

        4 Jun4 June 13:14

        Sorry – this was meant as a reply to Craig, not to Michael’s comment

    • Craig says:

      4 Jun4 June 13:24

      I’m not trying to ‘dodge’ the fee as such, I can make the numbers work either way. My wife has a plat with me as a supp, we have a big family holiday coming up and could do with 4 x PP. The plan will then be to cancel my wife’s and possibly keep mine going. If I can avoid 2 x fees then great, if not it will only be a 5 month overlap.

      • Grant says:

        4 Jun4 June 14:06

        Apologies, dodge probably wasn’t the correct word, but I think you know what I meant. Anyway, if you’ve had first statement on Green and been charged the £60 fee, now would seem as good a time as any to do the upgrade – there is a chance you will be spared the annual fee and if you’re not it will be £450 if you get your skates on, as opposed to the £575 post 11th June.

        • Craig says:

          4 Jun4 June 15:48

          No apologies needed Grant, I wasn’t offended in the slightest.

• AJA says:

  4 Jun4 June 12:26

  O/T I am BA Silver but couldn’t check in online 2 days ago for my flight LGW-TFS yesterday, booked 6 months ago and pre-allocated seats 5A and 5C. My booking was an Iberia flight no on an IB/BA code-share operated by BA. When I clicked check in via BA exec club got message saying unable to check in as flight operated by Iberia so went to Iberia site where it also said online check in unavailable as flight operated by BA with a link to BA website.!!!

  At BA check in was allocated very last row of CE in row 9 and told by surly check in staff that my pre-reserved seats were only a request not a confirmation and because flight was full there was nothing she could do.

  Spoke to cust services in BA lounge who said it happens all the time because BA and IB systems don’t talk to each other. Wasn’t able to confirm if pre-reserved seats on return flight are actually allocated to me as flight is more than 7 days ahead.!!! Not happy at all.

  I suggested that BA has a pop up window saying” be aware you will not be able to reserve seats if you book this flight with IB flight no”

  Anyone else had this problem?

  • Shoestring says:

    4 Jun4 June 12:50

    we flew SH on BA over half term – same situation ie booked on the IB90K cheap Avios but flying BA metal.

    No problem checking in online – I had previously switched over the FF numbers to BAEC. Did you do this yourself or leave it as IB’s FF number? Just thinking that might be part of the problem.

    • Shoestring says:

      4 Jun4 June 12:51

      oh that isn’t exactly your situation on reflection, it *was* a codeshare with IB but booked with IB Avios.

    • AJA says:

      4 Jun4 June 14:59

      Hi, no I entered BAEC FF no at time of booking and worse I paid cash for the flight! Wouldn’t have been so upset if it was an avios redemption. I also noticed once on board the plane that my FF no does not appear on the boarding pass so now wondering if I will have to chase for tier points and avios as well. Flight not yet credited to BAEC account though it was only yesterday so will wait a couple of days.

      It seems that BA and IB systems don’t talk to each other which is pretty poor especially as they are both part of IAG. It’s not like it wasn’t either carrier’s metal. Just fobbed off at check in.

  • marcw says:

    4 Jun4 June 13:08

    I think you need to find you BA booking code. With that one you should be able to choose seats, firmly. It happened to me once as well, but in my case it was on an A380 from SFO to LHR, it was booked with an IB code, i thought i did book seats… ended up in the last row in economy. Maybe finnair manage my booking might be your best friend to find that “ghost” BA locator/PNR.

    • marcw says:

      4 Jun4 June 13:19

      I believe if you attempt to select seats on the finnair website, it shows you the BA and IB specific PNR/locator.

    • AJA says:

      4 Jun4 June 15:10

      I’ve never tried using Finnair to do that, interesting tip. Thanks for sharing. I actually tried BA locator code as that appears on my booking via BAEC. Also tried IB locator code as had that too and neither worked.

      I just hope my seats for flight home are not re-allocated. Sitting last row of CE with curtain divider is not pleasant. Euro Traveller cabin crew kept coming into CE with trolley in order to serve 1st row Euro Traveller passengers.

      Also my choice of meal wasn’t available by the time they got to me. Little point in handing out a menu card.

• Shoestring says:

  4 Jun4 June 13:01

  Booked RFS tickets for next year’s May half term outward flight this morning – quite expensive for the cash only alternative, as you might expect (peak, start of half term). I went for the max amount of Avios to ‘buy’ in the Avios + Money choice, got 10,000 Avios for £80. As LL mentioned above, it’s getting a bit harder to accumulate chunks of Avios so this wasn’t a difficult choice.

  Value for Avios burned = 5000 to save £199 = 3.98p/ Avios

  • marcw says:

    4 Jun4 June 13:09

    Avios & Money is likely the best option to buy cheap Avios.

    • Shoestring says:

      4 Jun4 June 13:12

      In Economy, yes

      • marcw says:

        4 Jun4 June 13:29

        In Business it’s better to buy them on a BA/IB sale, or Groupon packages.

  • Lady London says:

    4 Jun4 June 13:18

    If Shoestring is saying it’s getting harder to collect Avios, then we should all be worried 🙂

    • Shoestring says:

      4 Jun4 June 13:43

      shame we don’t get the chance to share some great easy Avios earning opps & ideas over @Forbidden Planet! I think it’s not so difficult to get another 100K pa over there through various bonuses on spending.

    • Shoestring says:

      4 Jun4 June 13:44

      but yes, I could easily burn about 300K Avios pa just on regular trips to our place in the sun (5 of us, 4x pa, though I have managed to get my wife to agree to 5x pa for myself + son #1 with the reinstatement of autumn half term hols!). I guess with the slowdown of Amex opps and almost total demise of Tesco opps, that’s not easy any more. So Avios + Money reduces that to a theoretical 100K. Obvs at a cost in my case of 0.8p/ Avios. But with good savings vs cash only tickets (if I stayed with BA as opposed to going back to some of the LCCs).

      • Lee says:

        4 Jun4 June 13:54

        Agree Avios & Money is likely the best option to buy cheap Avios
        Just booked Cathay PE next year for 3 of us, £790 for 110K that’s just over 0.7p/Avios

        • BJ says:

          4 Jun4 June 14:31

          Those would have cost you about £460 with the recent Tesco Mobile promotion.

        • Lady London says:

          4 Jun4 June 20:42

          …..which some of us were abroad for, and missed! Grrrr

    • BJ says:

      4 Jun4 June 14:34

      Nothing to get alarmed about yet provided cheap revenue deals remain available. But my impression is that these are increasing a bit.

• Waddle says:

  4 Jun4 June 15:14

  OT apologies
  Was given IC Ambassador as a gift.
  1. Has anyone booked a stay at an InterContinental via Bon Vivant or similar virtuoso agency and also holds Ambassador status? I know some benefits double up but I’m looking at a property where Bon Vivant can offer among other things club access and breakfast which Ambassador doesn’t offer.
  2. Can the free weekend night benefit be used on a stay longer than just the weekend? Like for example a Thursday to Thursday and I get the Sunday in the middle free?

  • Young L says:

    4 Jun4 June 16:13

    1. I am Spire Ambassador but I use Bon Vivant whenever I can. You get better benefits, as well as the points.
    2. Sure, but you need to separate the week into three bookings.

• Shoestring says:

  4 Jun4 June 16:07

  600 Avios on your first Uber Eats order through the BAEC e Store

  Could make for a cheap snack 🙂

  • Michael says:

    4 Jun4 June 17:10

    Thanks for this. Do you spend your time surfing the web looking for Avios deals or what!? 😀

    • Russ says:

      4 Jun4 June 21:17

      I have a lot of respect for Shoestring. His tenacity to seek out these deals would put a Jack Terrier chasing a rat to shame. Mind you I’ve heard that he owns the world’s first Felix cat food mountain in Spain, so………..

      • Shoestring says:

        4 Jun4 June 21:25

        03/2021

        • Russ says:

          4 Jun4 June 22:45

          Kudos.

          Quick question whilst you’re on, I take it you got points when you payed but did you also get points deducted when the credits hit your account?

• Grant says:

  4 Jun4 June 16:55

  OT – Hotel reward stays

  Has anyone found a decent resource which lists Marriott, Hilton et al properties where family rooms can be booked as standard reward night stays? UK only would be a good enough start. I find the whole process of trying to book family rooms excrutiating, even on cash rates, with the majority of those that advertise family rooms on the website returning errors when searching for 2 adults + 2 children in 1 room, suggesting that they don’t have rooms that can accommodate 4!

  • Rob says:

    4 Jun4 June 17:22

    Easy enough on IHG. Search for 2+2 and ‘Reward Nights’ and, for your date, it will throw up everywhere with availability. You can expand out to a 100 mile radius if you want!

    For London for a mid September date, for eg, you have:
    CP Kings Cross
    HIX Vauxhall
    HIX London City
    HIX Earls Court
    HIX Limehouse
    HIX Wandsworth
    HIX Hammersmith
    HI London West
    HI Brent Cross
    HIX Excel
    HIX Golders Green
    HI Wembley

    Clicking through it seems to work OK, eg they do have reward nights for 4 pax.

    The biggest issue is hotels where, probably for fire reasons, they won’t extend the capacity. For eg, HI Camden Lock always puts its top suite up for redemptions. This is a big studio penthouse. It still only has a capacity of 2 even though you could fit 10 in there!

    • Grant says:

      4 Jun4 June 19:57

      Thanks Rob – I was thinking more along the lines of Domes of Elounda standards than HI Brent Cross, but it’s a start!

      • Rob says:

        5 Jun5 June 00:29

        HI Brent Cross gave me a chocolate orange Jacob’s Club biscuit as a welcome gift last time I was there, so don’t knock it.

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