News: Heathrow free bus travel ends, Amazon Kindle Unlimited offer

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• JP-MCO says:

  10 Jun10 June 08:55

  Reading the accounts here I must have been lucky when I used online chat yesterday. We talked about the transaction and they told me I should have used the link provided to signup. I remarked that was unusual for an AMEX offer and that with previous ones it had always simply been a case of using your saved card with the required merchant and not via a specific link. The agent I was speaking to asked if I could wait a few moments whilst they escalated it to the offers team and after 3 minutes said they had convinced them to apply a manual credit. Other than me making the point that the terms didn’t explicitly state that the link HAD to be used in order to receive the credit I didn’t really push the issue hard and was impressed with how easy it was to resolve the issue. I hope others manage to get it resolved one way or another.

• Richard says:

  10 Jun10 June 09:07

  I’ve just gone online with Amex chat, they investigated and came back to confirm after about 5 mins that I will be getting the cash back. I asked if they could guarantee that and they said yes. I’ve got a chat reference. I would like to think Amex will follow thru if one of their own chat people say it’s all good and if they don’t I’ve got them in writing saying they will.

  • David D says:

    10 Jun10 June 09:11

    That sounds promising – Amex have likely been flooded with complaints and could have changed their stance. The proof will be in the pudding.

  • Will says:

    10 Jun10 June 13:19

    Same here!

• Johnny5a says:

  10 Jun10 June 09:11

  Sorry to see the free travel go but doesn’t surprise me as Heathrow will be looking to cutting massive amount of costs. Even if you have to pay it’s just £1.55, so still cheaper than Hotel Hopper. kids still travel free.

• Peter says:

  10 Jun10 June 09:30

  Hundreds of useless offers, and the ones that are useful don’t pay. Even more reasons to stop scrolling through them once in a while..

• Peggerz says:

  10 Jun10 June 09:31

  I potentially have an off site Heathrow hotel stay in October and haven’t done this for 12 years or so. I will be in transit with an overnight stay. Do I use an Oyster card on the bus now (I have one of them!) and do you ‘tap in and tap out’ if that’s the case?

  • Andrew says:

    10 Jun10 June 09:46

    If you still have an Oyster card with credit on it you can use that. Equally, a contactless card (including AMEX) works just as well. The latter may take a fraction of a second longer to authorise but that’s all.

    Probably irrelevant for your single journey(s), but the multi-journey price cap will still apply, and if you want you can link your card to a TfL account for journey history.

  • Rob says:

    10 Jun10 June 09:47

    You just tap in, and a contactless credit card works as well as an Oyster.

  • Peggerz says:

    10 Jun10 June 10:01

    Thanks for the replies.

  • AJA says:

    10 Jun10 June 13:24

    I gave up using the Oyster card three years ago as the Amex contactless works perfectly well and I get Avios on the back of it. At the time I also got 5% back from Amex too. No need ever to top up unlike the Oyster card. Still keep the Oyster card for visitors if they don’t already have one or a contactless card of their own but if I am travelling with them I just hand them my Hilton Barclaycard and they tap in and out with that.

    • Genghis says:

      10 Jun10 June 15:15

      Oyster card is only good for non-Monday-Sunday weekly travel cards where a contactless card only has the weekly cap from Monday-Sunday. Not used one for years.

      • John says:

        10 Jun10 June 16:08

        And if you have a railcard, or a longer season ticket, or you want to reach a spend target…

    • peter says:

      11 Jun11 June 09:07

      If your trip costs £4.40 and you take 10 trips like that, you get 10x 4 points = 40.
      If you top up Oyster with £44 you get 44 points.
      Now it probably doesn’t matter for a few trips, but it did make some difference for someone using it daily for a year. (Plus weekly capping that can start on not-Monday, speed on the overcrowded gate at London Bridge, Amex Shop Small.. )

• Mark says:

  10 Jun10 June 10:08

  is it just me or is anyone else tired of these “promotions” and the effort now required to get any sort of decent points deal, from anything?

  It just doesn’t feel like any of it is a good deal anymore. Probably because it’s hard to see when we’ll ever be able to travel without it being hampered by red tape and unpredictable regulations.

• Chris D says:

  10 Jun10 June 10:31

  I always thought that one reason for the Heathrow free travel zone, is that the airport needs to be accessible to walkers and cyclists. How could such an individual approach the airport without surcharge in the absence of a free bus service of some kind?

  • David says:

    10 Jun10 June 11:27

    Get to T4 or T5, then use interterminal transfer via underground or train (HEX, etc) which remains free.

  • Gavin says:

    10 Jun10 June 13:44

    I once missed the 423 from the premier Inn and walked it’s route to T5, you have to walk through the bus gate which is signposted no pedestrians and enter the terminal as a bus would – past a queue of black cab drivers asleep in the back of their cab.

    No pavement and would have been more dangerous if it wasn’t 4:45am. Could cycle this way too.

    • Tim says:

      10 Jun10 June 18:12

      Exactly. And from that point if you keep on walking you can be at the Holiday Inn T5 15 minutes later and the Hilton T5 about 5 minutes after that. With only hand luggage those two hotels were my preference when arriving and departing T5. Especially for early morning flights you know exactly what time you need to leave the hotel. Plus nice to work up a brief appetite before breakfast in GF.

• NFH says:

  10 Jun10 June 10:48

  Amex cannot interpret its own offer terms in its favour, because of the legal doctrine of contra proferentem, which is codified by Section 69 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015:

  “If a term in a consumer contract, or a consumer notice, could have different meanings, the meaning that is most favourable to the consumer is to prevail.“

  • Andrew says:

    10 Jun10 June 11:43

    In what way does “economist offer available at XXX” have possible different meanings? To argue that you bought it at YYY and amex didn’t say you couldn’t so you expect them to give you £45 is really stretching things.

    By all means complain to Amex, in the interest of good customer relations they may credit your account, but if they don’t all this talk of the FoS or legal action is ridiculous.

    • Genghis says:

      10 Jun10 June 11:55

      Terms don’t say “Offer available at xxx”, just “Available at”.

    • NFH says:

      10 Jun10 June 12:22

      One meaning is that the offer is available at the very long URL (amongst other options). The other meaning is that the offer is available only at the very long URL. These are the two different meanings.

      • Andrew says:

        10 Jun10 June 13:22

        Who would read “save 50p off weetabix, available at Tesco” and possibly think they’d be entitled to the same offer at Sainsbury’s?

        • Rob says:

          10 Jun10 June 13:49

          Terrible example, Andrew.

          It is perfectly normal for Weetabix to run adverts saying ‘Weetabix are great’ and at the bottom put ‘Available at Tesco’, because they can get a few quid off Tesco to subsidise the ad, even though the offer is available in all stores.

          We do it ourselves. If we write about an aviation book we’ll write ‘Available at Amazon’ at the bottom with a link because we can get a few quid off Amazon. It clearly doesn’t mean you can’t buy it elsewhere.

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