About to close Virgin Mastercard account

[LindyLoo]

I’m about to close my Virgin MasterCard I got it to earn points for flights out of Scotland to Orlando, got it all booked, now they have cancelled the Edinburgh flight and we have to fly from Heathrow, by the time they changed it all, there was hardly any decent seats left in Upper class!! It’s that crazy herringbone configuration with your back to the window… what were they thinking! Back to totally BA and Avios, now got my new Barclaycard will drop it down to the 1 point per £ once I’ve earned the bonus… anyhoo, my question is, I was due to pay the Virgin Card fee in January £160, if I cancel now, will I be part charged for the fee?

[stevenhp1987]

Virgin Money do not pro-rata the fees so no refund will be due.

[Andrew.]

Are they putting you on a BA domestic connection to LHR or are they just expecting you to make your own way there?

Did you manage to get one of the decent seats that were left?

Not tempted to switch to a Delta from EDI via JFK?

[SteveJ]

They also charge the annual fee well before renewal date it seems, per the below thread. So I’d suggest get cancelling now if the final decision is made.

https://www.headforpoints.com/forums/topic/virgin-atlantic-charging-annual-fee-well-before-renewal/

[LindyLoo]

Thanks stevenhp 1987, didn’t expect a refund, I assume then I have paid this year in advance, Thanks Andrew. they just expected us to make our own way down, so good ole’ Avios points has us travelling BA in Club Europe, there and back, OK that’s 60,000 points gone but I had them to use, I’m a mega Avios hound!.. but for some reason they charged us an additional £107.78 despite having enough Avios to cover tax etc… It usually is a flat 60,000 and £1 a skull so I have raised a complaint.They have given me 5,000 Avios as a sorry and are looking into it. What I should have done was cancel the whole holiday with them and gone BA all the way, I have paid more for Virgin Upper Class than I would have with BA Club World! (Better seating arrangement with BA as well… I love the new Club World seating, far superior to ‘flying backwards’!) Virgin haven’t even offered a discount as a sorry! I now have to pay for a hotel in London Heathrow as well as covering the flights from Glasgow to Heathrow for my family! I also had to pay extra £220 for their seating in Virgin Premium as the only seats that were left to get them together were ‘preferred seats’! … Another letter of complaint submitted! Preferred seats my ass! They are just bumping up the prices…Virgin! First time flying with them… and the last I can tell you… the seating in Upper Class looks well dodgy in a strange herringbone formation with your back to the window and your feet sticking out in the aisle!

[LindyLoo]

Thanks SteveJ, My Annual Fee is due on the 15th of January, (that’s when I paid it last year) so I’ll just clear it off this month and close it down, that voucher they issued last year is useless! Once I have got all my Tesco points converted to Virgin to reduce the overall cost for the balance, I’m closing down my Tesco Premium MasterCard as well… it was great for Avios until it was stopped. I’ll be working with my BA Amex premium card for £250 a year which is well worth the 2-4-1 voucher. When I get my Barclay card 2,500 bonus for spending £3,000 in the first 3 months I’ll step it down to the free card OK I go from 1.5 points per £ to 1 point per £ but I don’t think much of their upgrade voucher, it’s only for use when they don’t take Amex anyway! Tesco takes Amex and I spend over £10,000 a year there so that’s an extra 15,000 points I wouldn’t have had on my Amex when using my Tesco Premium card. My poor hubby can’t keep track of my juggling act… it drives him mad… but only until he ‘turns left’ on every flight! LOL!

[AJA]

@LindyLoo Did you cancel and rebook the flight from LHR or did Virgin put you on it when they cancelled your original GLA departure?

If the latter Virgin should have rebooked you and should pay for the extra cost of getting to LHR and the overnight accommodation. I would book cash flights and charge them to Virgin rather than use up your Avios. Make sure you do charge that to Virgin unless you actually accepted a refund and started again.

As for the taxes and fees you were charged on top of the 60k avios (which sounds a lot) by BA how many seats did you buy? I assume that is for return flights the taxes figure sounds odd as it is usually a round £ figure. I assume you’ve earned at least 1 Avios in the last year? Otherwise it could be that BA are charging non RFS taxes and fees.

[LindyLoo]

Thanks AJA Virgin did not offer any flights from Scotland to Heathrow or to pay for accommodation, I have submitted a complaint obviously. We Scots are the armpit of England when it comes to flying! I know 60,000 Avios is a lot but that’s the rate now to fly Glasgow to London return Club Europe for 2 people. but I usually only pay £1 a skull, you assumed correctly, I have earned more than 1 Avios in last year. I don’t get flying much, usually 1 big trip a year where I use my 2-4-1 Amex Voucher, next year it is Washington DC Club World, this year it was meant to be Japan but Putin put paid to that! Had to settle to a European tour Venice & back Club Europe and because I had to use Avios for the Glasgow to London flight before flying to Venice, the Avios required was close to our spend to Japan as flying long haul from London, our Glasgow to London are free of Avios, just tax to pay. I know… I peddle like mad to collect Avios, using eStore at every possible chance, paying for group dinners on my card and folks give me the cash, I’m a lowly NHS worker that has acquired a taste for ‘turing left’. Best laugh I had was in 2019 flying first back from San Diego, we walked up to the first class check in which was unmanned at the time, Club world queue had a ‘lady’ standing waiting to be served, (LV bags and all!).. she tapped me on the shoulder and said, excuse me, but that is the first class queue, I said “I know”, She was about to be served when they noticed us and the check-in girl said please excuse me… rushed over to us and checked us in before this ‘lady’… I tried hard to stifle a giggle, we travel in comfortable clothes, jeans and trainers, I suppose we don’t look like First Class passengers, we certainly don’t have LV luggage that’s for sure!