News: Gatwick strikes and a ban on agency workers, save £10 at World Duty Free at Heathrow

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• captaindave says:

  15 Jul15 July 09:47

  Maybe the Jet2 model of taking the “handling” work in-house is the way to go ?

  • Matarredonda says:

    15 Jul15 July 10:05

    As did Ryanair approximately 5 years ago.

  • Chrisasaurus says:

    15 Jul15 July 11:23

    Only if you treat them well enough…

    At least this way there is presumably recourse for airlines to recover losses from the contracted party

• Alastair says:

  15 Jul15 July 10:12

  Is it just me or do others have a hard time getting the duty free people to scan their Heathrow rewards cards?
  I can’t remember how many times the system has been mysteriously broken, or the self service machine won’t take it, or the staff seem to ignore the card on the phone until payment completes.
  It’s almost as if they’re being incentivised to not scan them…

  • Chrisasaurus says:

    15 Jul15 July 12:49

    I can only suggest not giving them payment until they’ve scanned it and walking away if they don’t

    • Chabuddy Geezy says:

      15 Jul15 July 12:51

      I find Duty Free transactions tend to track, Boots never tracks even though even if you HR number is on the receipt.

  • Catalan says:

    15 Jul15 July 13:11

    I find they usually key it in manually if it does scan. I’ve also found Boot will ask you for their reward scheme card in preference to HR

    • Alex Sm says:

      15 Jul15 July 15:27

      You can use both!

  • SBIre says:

    15 Jul15 July 13:49

    I find that they try to get through the transaction asap, but my assumption is that the majority of passengers do not have HR cards so they just don’t expect them. I always scan my Dufry and HR cards, and they always seems surprised to see both. They never have an issue when I do ask for them to be scanned though, even if they have whizzed to the payment section. Of course – it’s less of an issue now with the awful self check out machines (I don’t have an issue with self check out, but the machines they use at LHR are useless)

    • Alex Sm says:

      15 Jul15 July 15:28

      I am asked on 90% of occasions when I produce HR card: “Do you work at Heathrow?”

      • Rob says:

        15 Jul15 July 16:45

        It’s because they think its the staff discount card. Worth saying ‘yes’ 🙂

        • Charlie T. says:

          16 Jul16 July 20:24

          Call me paranoid (you wouldn’t be the first) but I can imagine this somehow resulting in a very small bit also non-zero chance of being frogmarched out of the airport by cops with MP5s.

  • Track says:

    15 Jul15 July 14:32

    the answer is in the language, “scan their cards…” maybe they scan their own, or send receipts somehow too.

    Also surprised that even after duty free scan Heathrow Rewards, the purchases don’t track!

    Landside shops have separate tablets to scan rewards card AFTER transaction. Those points post right away.

    • Alex Sm says:

      15 Jul15 July 15:30

      You can always email your receipts afterwards to customer service and they will scan. Another question is why you need HR points after all as they are quite useless

      • Chrisasaurus says:

        15 Jul15 July 17:05

        Well they’re not useless are they, they’re airline miles when you convert them

    • johnny_c-l says:

      15 Jul15 July 20:20

      Very often I find that purchases don’t appear despite giving my Rewards number via my phone /app to the cashier/water.

      They have also clamped down on retroactively crediting points – need to claim after 2 months but before a time limit, and a max of 5/6 a year.

      Also withdrawn points for non-prebooked short stay and drop-off.

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