BA news: Zipcar / Avios deal ends, got any unused British Airways eVouchers?

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• BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

  31 May31 May 04:53

  So what happens to any unused vouchers? Does BA just get to keep the money?

  • Rob says:

    31 May31 May 07:51

    Yes

• Amy C says:

  31 May31 May 06:19

  Even though I’m convinced I’ve used them all and even rung them several times to check, they still send an email telling me I’ve got £500+ to use. 🙄

  • Rob says:

    31 May31 May 07:50

    Easy way to check – do a dummy booking.

    • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

      31 May31 May 13:02

      Not infalable though.

      Last year I checked the 4 vouchers BA said I had via a dummy booking and that system said the ‘details were incorrect’.

      I called and the agent had to check across a couple of systems and told me all 4 had been used. Which I thought was the case but wasn’t sure.

      I asked them earlier to send me a new email of what vouchers they think I have and there was a respinse so they’ve clearly been cleaning up the data.

• Susan says:

  31 May31 May 07:08

  500 €* points won’t get you a free trip but anyone who’s already taken 1 trip is likely to have 100 points and 600 is enough to upgrade from Standard to Plus which can be a real sweet-spot when Standard has an offer running.

  • mkcol says:

    31 May31 May 14:19

    How much time did writing €* save you?

    Definitely not as much as it took me to figure out you hadn’t just slammed the keyboard with a gammy hand.

    • John says:

      31 May31 May 21:56

      But definitely less time than it took for both of us to post these comments.

    • David says:

      1 Jun1 June 03:39

      The irony.

• kevin86 says:

  31 May31 May 07:08

  Surprised by how many people took vouchers when the law says the airlines had to give you actual cash

  • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

    31 May31 May 10:19

    Plenty of people took vouchers when they themselves cancelled flights and not because BA cancelled them.

    My vouchers were generated because I cancelled either due to feeling unwell or because the price dropped.

  • mkcol says:

    31 May31 May 14:19

    What the law says & the airline did are 2 entirely different matters.

    • kevin86 says:

      31 May31 May 17:29

      Could have easily claimed it back from your credit card company if the airline tried to fob you off with a voucher

      • John says:

        31 May31 May 21:58

        BA adopted the American policy of allowing any flight to be cancelled for credit (even when the flight still operated and travel on that flight was not restricted to particular people) and some of us made good use of that

• Lumma says:

  31 May31 May 07:10

  OT but car hire related. If I book a hire car for collection Christmas Eve this year on a pay on collection rate, can they say they haven’t got any cars and leave me stranded or is it guaranteed? Would paying upfront make a difference?

  It’s for Enterprise, if that makes a difference

  • Rob says:

    31 May31 May 07:47

    Nothing is guaranteed in car hire, because they are reliant on cars being returned by others on time.

    • AirMax says:

      31 May31 May 11:33

      They know how to take the reservation but they don’t know how to hold the reservation. And that’s the most important thing

      • SA says:

        31 May31 May 23:00

        Lol. #jerryseinfeldcomedy

  • Andrew says:

    31 May31 May 08:12

    Presumably if you paid by credit card both the car hire company and card provider would be jointly liable for fulfilling the contract. If there were no cars available you could go to any other hire company and pay whatever it cost safe in the knowledge that you’d get the difference back from someone. I’m not sure if the same would apply outside the UK.

    • JDB says:

      31 May31 May 08:50

      This isn’t necessarily such an easy recourse and of course wouldn’t work on a pay on collection rate as you haven’t paid anything on the card.

    • Dan says:

      1 Jun1 June 16:32

      Check the contract / T&Cs. Most hire company contracts say all you’re committing to is a reservation request. There’s no contract to give you a car until they take the money on the day. I’ve been screwed by this a few times in the UK

      (This is for pay on arrival. Some companies treat prepay as a real booking)

  • Londonsteve says:

    31 May31 May 13:25

    Best to collect the car on the 23rd or before lunch on the 24th. The later you leave collection on the 24th, the greater the chance that they’ve run out of cars (not deliberately, but because people have had an accident or a breakdown, or they’re ill and unable to get it back to the rental station on time) and with a pay on collection booking you’ve no right of recourse if they tell you they can’t fulfil the booking and effectively cancel on the spot. It’s no different to booking a hotel room on a pay on departure basis, you arrive and they tell you they’ve double booked the room and tell you to take a hike.

    • Lumma says:

      31 May31 May 16:20

      Yeah, I’ve decided to pay up front for it and collect it at 10am on the 24th. I’m working nightshift on Xmas eve so it’s my only way of getting home on Christmas Day

• DTR says:

  31 May31 May 08:31

  I have a customer service e-voucher from six months ago but no plans to book a cash ticket anytime soon. I have avios flights but couldn’t use the voucher for the taxes and fees. Is there any other way of me using the voucher other than booking a cash flight?

  • Rob says:

    31 May31 May 08:36

    No

  • Limbo says:

    31 May31 May 11:44

    Ask for Avios instead. I have done this before.

    • DTR says:

      1 Jun1 June 15:29

      Thanks will try this

    • Ian says:

      7 Jun7 June 12:31

      And what was the response from BA?

• Londonsteve says:

  31 May31 May 13:33

  My interest in Zipcar evaporated when they abolished T5 as a drop off and collection point. It was hugely convenient, even for people using other terminals. Their ‘free float’ cars never reached critical mass after too many London boroughs refused to allow their cars to be parked in the borough, creating huge black spots on the map. It’s a great pity as identical schemes work very well in many European cities where you have a single city-wide municipal authority that has the ability to grant parking rights across the whole city. Widespread availability of local cars is a great incentive for urbanites to give up car ownership, only paying when they really need one. It also serves to reduce traffic levels as the same people will use public transport when it’s an easy alternative, rather than pay the elevated cost of a carshare car, thus, journeys are reduced to only those when a car is essential.

  • Lumma says:

    31 May31 May 16:26

    I haven’t used it for quite some time too. Elizabeth line opening means I can get to T5 for all but the very earliest flights without needing to drive. Other than that it was handy in my old job when finishing late after the tube shut, usually about half the cost of an Uber to get from Clapham to Whitechapel, but definitely a pain when the nearest is over 15 minutes away.

    It once cost me about 10 minutes when I had to Google where the parking brake was on a Nissan Leaf too

    • John says:

      31 May31 May 22:01

      Had to abandon a zipcar session when we couldn’t work out how to release the parking brake too… only booked it for 30 minutes because my wife had not driven for the 5 years since passing her test and wanted to try it out on a Sunday morning (I was going to take her to an empty carpark 2 mins from the zipcar spot)

    • Londonsteve says:

      1 Jun1 June 01:56

      Since I’ve got a Leaf it’s now second nature (great cars by the way), but I can see that it could be perplexing if you’ve never driven one before. It’s actually remarkable simple compared to some cars I’ve driven with an electronic parking brake switch well hidden in the centre console, but you need to know there’s a latched footbrake hidden in the dark footwell. Other than an older Mercedes, I don’t know of any other cars that employ this arrangement.

• Mister E says:

  31 May31 May 14:56

  I suspect I have a voucher and so emailed BA this morning at around 09:00. So far, no response for what I would have thought would be an automatic process

  How long are other folks waiting? And if you have no voucher, do they email to tell you or just leave you in limbo?

  Thanks

  • Rob says:

    31 May31 May 15:31

    Leave you in limbo (on my test)

  • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

    31 May31 May 18:33

    Last time I ued it it was an instant response

    But it’s pretty clear from the page Rob links to that no email = no vouchers

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