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The real Swiss Tony wrote:

So just had an offer of an extra 2500 avios if I spend 5k on my bapp by the start of November.

I haven’t spent 5k on it since May! This just seems like a pitiful excuse of an offer!

/end rant

Understood – drama – luckily it’s a free world – try Visa and Mastercard, safe journey!

And just say no to drugs.

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sloth wrote:

Professor Calculus wrote:

Thanks to everyone did get access to lounge IMHO was quite basic no hot food was served which was surprising as it was 08.00 Sunday .

They don’t serve hot food but the breakfast is usually reasonable, granola, croissants, bread and jam etc, juice tea and coffee. perfectly adequate for free

Agree with that – the breakfast is decent, the rest of the food well below airport lounge standardards (even low standards) – the standout are drinks, excellent smoothies in the morning and excellent cocktails in the afternoon/evening. Don’t go there for the food, do go there for the drinks. Most people only stay for much shorter than in an airport lounge, so the drinks focus makes sense.

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Royback wrote:

Just returned Booked 4 single nights. Got the benefits in each…..
Bellagio. Upgraded to biggest suite ever
Waldorf Astoria. Best food.
Crockfords (my fave)
Palazzo. (least fave)

What’s wrong with Palazzo / right with Crockfords? Planning a trip soon, so any feedback appreciated – thanks.

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Andrew J wrote:

tbtb31 wrote:

Eurostar lounge staff seem to be getting more educated on the Amex Platinum benefit than before – on my last visit they checked that the Amex Platinum card was issued in one of the in-scope card countries/jurisdictions (UK/F/B), as they won’t provide the benefit to cardholders whose card was issued anywhere else (e.g. US). Ditto on single-cardholder entry without any guest allowance.

That’s good to hear as the lounge is crowded enough as it is, without allowing people in who shouldn’t be there, or their extended families.

I agree (and am a father of 3 children). The t&cs are very clear that there is no guest allowance for Amex Platinum card holders, so I don’t understand the complaints about Eurostar staff – Eurostar has a contract with Amex to provide a certain service and is doing so. I quite enjoy the Eurostar lounges – the Paris one has a fantastic setting & view over the historic train terminal, and the short time one usually spends waiting for the train means the somewhat average food offering doesn’t spoil it. Both London and Paris have very decent cocktail bars.

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Eurostar lounge staff seem to be getting more educated on the Amex Platinum benefit than before – on my last visit they checked that the Amex Platinum card was issued in one of the in-scope card countries/jurisdictions (UK/F/B), as they won’t provide the benefit to cardholders whose card was issued anywhere else (e.g. US). Ditto on single-cardholder entry without any guest allowance.

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I second Luca M – Plaza Premium, use your Amex (not your Priority Pass card), no need to pre-book and better than the other lounges.

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Interesting – for me it worked at 4 different Plaza Premium locations without even asking, just presenting Amex + PP card to enter as a family of 5 (with 2xAmex & 2xPP cards), no questions asked.
I believe the one boarding pass to one entry rule is part of the individual terms & conditions of the entry method, and there are separate t&cs for Amex entry and PP entry, so no violation of the respective policies, and I’m not aware of an overarching policy which would overrule bind them together. DXB, SIN, LGW Plaza Premium lounges were all fine with it.
I should have clarified – the way Plaza charged was 2 x (Amex cardholder+1 guest) plus 1x (PP cardholder + 1 guest) for a family of 5, which sounds strange (6 visits between 5 humans) but is correct – the fifth person (child) is not a cardholder of either Amex nor PP so had to be assigned guest status of a cardholder, hence the PP cardholder+1 guest entry. Conceptually – not in real life behaviour – it is equivalent to one cardholder entering with Guest1 on Amex, leaving and later entering with Guest2 on PP.

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or do this

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Also, it is now possible for one Amex Cardholder to enter a Plaza Premium lounge with 2 guests without extra charge, once with the Amex Platinum card and once with the PP card, each time +1 guest. I guess that’s possible because the t&cs for Amex and PP visits don’t interact, and Plaza Premium is happy about the incremental revenue. I guess it’s equivalent to entering with Guest A on Amex, then leaving and entering with Guest B on PP, although this was never physically required.

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One small difference is that in most (all?) Plaza Premium lounges, the shower fee is waived when you enter with Amex Platinum (but not when you enter with PP), e.g. DXB, SIN.

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sloth wrote:

plumped for Plaza premium and was perfectly ok, last month. they did a reasonably nice laksa

perfect, thank you @sloth

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revisiting – are the T3 sleep’n’fly lounges worth it?

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lacucaracha wrote:

Thanks Rob. I don’t earn 50k, but our household income – allegedly taken into account – is a lot higher than that.

Household income is either completely ignored (and sourced as an fyi data point only) or assigned a minimal value in the credit scoring process, given that lenders have no legal recourse on such household (e.g. partner) income when they most need it (i.e. in a failure to pay event by the cardholder), unless it comes from a formal guarantor. So chances are you did get rejected on the basis of your personal income.

A credit card is a loan agreement. It would be irresponsible by a bank lender to lend money to someone who doesn’t have direct and stable means to support repayment. A partner or family member who can just walk out anytime is not a stable source of income. No need to walk out even, there is no legal obligation to stand in for someone’s debt only because they happen to live under the same roof. Assigning any value to moral goodwill to voluntarily support someone else’s debt is not something we should ask lenders to do, it would just open the door to irresponsible lending and the next credit bubble. The effect of irresponsible lending could be seen 15y ago in the US subprime bubble, where mortgages were extended to people who could never afford even the first repayment instalment cheque, and it ended in tears for everybody, banks/borrowers/world economy.

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S879 wrote:

Joint income of over £100k.

That.

Joint income isn’t assigned much (if anything) value by lenders. The driver of the decision is your personal income, any partner income is supplemental and nice to have but given the partner isn’t a formal guarantor to your debt it’s incidental.

In other words, it makes a big difference whether your “Joint income of over £100k” is split 90k+10k or 10k+90k.

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Will also be passing through DXB T3. Are the Sleep’n’Fly pods worth it, and if so, which ones are best (there are multiple at DXB, both in T3 and other terminals)?

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zxydxdm wrote:

masaccio wrote:

zxydxdm wrote:

I recently have my BAPP approved.
Should I get extra travel insurance?

Yes if you are a scuba diver.

ouch, I do frequently dive. guess I need extra cover

The Amex Platinum travel insurance does cover scuba diving, all the way down to 30m, in case you’re considering a card switch sometime in the future.

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mzb wrote:

tbtb31 wrote:

Can the gift card be bought instore or online online?

It can definitely be bought at the store – have done it many times. But I think I read many reports that online works just as well.

Thanks! And does reloading the gift card online with additional funds trigger the offer, too?

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Can the gift card be bought instore or online online?

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Does Amex ever offer a retention bonus to supplemental cardholders to retain them (as supplemental cardholders)?

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Blair Waldorf Salad wrote:

That UK link doesn’t load for me. Does it look the same as the webpage I sent?

Try https://global.americanexpress.com/lounge-access/the-platinum-card?locale=en-GB&extlink=va-uk-CPS-LFfindalounge

When you select the relevant lounge it will show you the UK card-specific access policy, rather than the US one.

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tbtb31 wrote:

Blair Waldorf Salad wrote:

Crafty wrote:

Andrew J wrote:

Correct – you show your Platinum card rather than your Priority Pass and access is for you and guest.

Sorry for resurrecting this old thread. But assuming this benefit remains, then my question is does it work for supplementary cardholders too? Can my full family of 4 thus gain access from: my Platinum, plus one guest; my wife’s supp, plus one guest?

We are going from T2 next weekend and keen to ensure we’ll get into a lounge (12 hour flight to Thailand).

Everyone needs to have this webpage bookmarked as it explains entry rules per lounge. https://global.americanexpress.com/lounge-access/the-platinum-card-idc-en?locale=en-US

For UK cardholders the correct link is

There are plenty of differences to the US lounge policy, e.g. numbers of complimentary guests.

https://global.americanexpress.com/lounge-access/the-platinum-card-idc-en?locale=en-UK

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Blair Waldorf Salad wrote:

Crafty wrote:

Andrew J wrote:

Correct – you show your Platinum card rather than your Priority Pass and access is for you and guest.

Sorry for resurrecting this old thread. But assuming this benefit remains, then my question is does it work for supplementary cardholders too? Can my full family of 4 thus gain access from: my Platinum, plus one guest; my wife’s supp, plus one guest?

We are going from T2 next weekend and keen to ensure we’ll get into a lounge (12 hour flight to Thailand).

Everyone needs to have this webpage bookmarked as it explains entry rules per lounge. https://global.americanexpress.com/lounge-access/the-platinum-card-idc-en?locale=en-US

For UK cardholders the correct link is

There are plenty of differences to the US lounge policy, e.g. numbers of complimentary guests.

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jeff228 wrote:

@reximus I happened to go onto my Amex account last week, the suspended message was never there so I thought maybe it was back to normal now but they hadn’t notified me. I tried to use the card and to my surprise, it worked. I then called Amex the next day to ask to extend by bonus point collection period as the card had been suspended for 2 months for them to only re-suspend the card and them tell me that it wasn’t meant to be like that and that my card is still under review. I have given up hope and changed to the Barclays Avios card.

Did you make any paypal payments funded by your Amex card?

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Kelvin K wrote:

think I’d gone a bit heavy on paypal F&F in all honesty

@Kelvin K, I salute your honesty. x2 thanks for sharing.

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Amazing! Thanks for those tips. Great shout with the £100 HN credit. Can’t believe how profitable this is. Surprised they do pro rata refund and no stricter criteria / larger spend requirements for this offer… it’s so good (but not for Amex)

If you really wanted to play the game then you could speculate that the 60k Sign-up offer returns towards the end of the year, then sign up and use 2 calendar years’ worth of 150,- local dining + 150,- dining credit abroad + 50,- Harvey Nichols credit either side of New Year’s … that’s 700 quid of credits (plus the sign-up bonus) over the span of a few weeks.

Or you figure out that the Platinum card is actually good value to keep and don’t cancel at all.