It's been a while since I last got a fast track pass. I don't even recall where I got them from? Can I get one flying ET with a Gold card? And will fast track be open all day during the Olympics? Or just in the mornings as usual?

Do you have a non-EU passport?

Yes as posted above. Bloody foreigner.

I don't think they're given out in ET, shiny card or not. You could try to discreetly request one.

No idea whether open all day during the games.

We had three cabbies refuse, as the trip was too short. After a call to the hotel reception a silver colored, but otherwise black "taxi" emerged in 4 minutes and brought us to the hotel for 40 quid - no cards taken and "sorry all out of receipts"

:rolleyes:

One of a dozen reasons I stay at the Sofitel when using T5.

I just thought I'd report back on what happened.

I asked for some fast track security passes on board the flight and was told they were only for non EU pax. I asked if I could take one anyway and they gave it to me. Indeed it did clearly state it was for non EU pax.

When I got to the border, I saw the queues looked longish, although nothing like the nightmares I have heard about on here lately and there was no fast track for business pax, but the non EU lanes were empty.

So I went up to the non EU lane and showed them the card, when the security guard saw our passports he said we were EU so we couldn't use it, so I said, "but I have a pass". He then looked at us and said, "OK then, since you have a pass" and let us through.

We were in/out of there in abut 2 minutes :D ^^

I should have nicked a few more of those passes for future use as there was nothing specific to our flight written on them ;)

Next time tell them they HAVE to take you. If they still get arsey write their number plate/cab number down and tell them that's fine, you hope they enjoy being reported for this, and also for the smoke test you'll report them for too...

Indeed, they HAVE to take you. I thought at first there was a different rule for LHR, but found this on the TFL website:

What you can expect from the driver:

Unless they have a good reason not to, drivers must:

Accept any hiring up to 12 miles or any hiring up to one hour duration, if the destination is in Greater London
Accept any hiring up to 20 miles if starting at Heathrow Airport
Accept any hiring up to one hour duration, if the destination is in Greater London

Link here: http://www.tfl.gov.uk/gettingaround/...axis/1140.aspx

The only extra they can charge because of the airport pickup is £2.40, details here:

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloa...ares-guide.pdf

I can well understand that a cab driver might be reluctant to take a short fare after waiting a long time in the feeder pool, but the solution to that is simply to have the marshal give the driver a token allowing him to return to the head of the feeder queue after completing the journey.

The trouble with LHR is few cabs drop off there, but otherwise you can always use the trick of going to departures and getting a cab someone's got out of. I do that in Hamburg all the time since our company's office is only 5 mins from the airport.

They do (or did last time I had to get a cab at LHR). For these short trips the driver can jump back up the queue on return. Though late at night I am not sure if that applies, and of course the chance of picking up any fare at the very end of the day would diminish by the time they could get back I guess. So a bit of reluctance I can understand - but refusal is simply not on.

Yes, unfortunately there is is this quote too:

So, for example the Hilton Terminal 5 is one mile from LHR T5, walking distance in fact. It is nevertheless in Slough. Personally I think the first sentence is an abuse of monopoly power and should be stopped.

Terrible queues at T5 immigration again last night – my partner was an hour behind me and only half way along the non-EU line when she decided to go under the rope and go through one of the EU decks.
Apparently there was no one to manage the line and there were people going straight to the front along the left hand side of the hall.
The hall was full and the worst I have seen it.

It was pathetic at 2200. An absolute, sad shambles. 40 minutes EU/70-80 minutes non-EU.

Surely that just means that if you wish you can negotiate a lower fare, but you can insist on it being metered and they cannot then charge more than the metered fare?

I can't see how that means they can refuse to accept you.