Avios Upgrade Voucher
 

Recently I changed a credit card (Lloyds Duo from Standard to fee covering Foreign Exchange charges).

I've received a letter to say that I now have an Avios Upgrade Voucher with a one year expiry date.

As this is on my Avios account what happens when everything moves to ba.com? Will the voucher transfer too?

See the FAQ here that contains the answer.

https://www.avios.com/gb/en_gb/about...me-is-changing

Will I still be able to use my Lloyds upgrade voucher?

Yes you can you can still book online with your voucher until the programme closes. After this you’ll need to contact us to book on 0344 49 333 49. Please make sure you use it before the expiry date.

Yes but you'll have to call 0344 49 333 49 to use it. Make a note of the expiry as it's not clear whether it will show online on BAEC. (Also just to be clear the expiry is a book-by date, not travel-by.)

Thanks
I had tried their online chat but got no response. Then saw the 0844 number. By changing it to 0344 it worked.
They told me that it is somewhat confusing. I have to see availability on BA, then phone them and they will do something(!). Perhaps they advise ba. Then I book through ba. Clear as mud :)

"Them" won't exist once the transition occurs, though in reality at least some of the telephone agents have long been taking calls for both avios.com and BAEC. Once avios.com is closed, it will be a case of calling BAEC agents directly to make the booking, either having looked for seats on ba.com beforehand or speculatively.

Slightly hijacking this thread here but as 1 of seemingly many card holders who have yet to see a single Avios credit to their accounts since signing up almost 12 months ago, I would be grateful if somebody could let me know what the usual period of time is for the voucher to be activated after making the requisite spend? I crossed that line 3 months ago and Lloyds tell me that I can trigger it whenever I like but will have to wait AT LEAST 30 DAYS for it to usable. Is that the same for those whose accounts actually operate as they should?

Definitely complain about the lack of avios if you haven't already done so. I got £200 for 'my inconvenience' and all of the avios eventually arrived.

I have had 2 vouchers now. On both occasions they appeared in my avios account almost as soon as I had made the spend (maybe at the time the statement was raised) and appeared to be useable online immediately, although I didn't actually try it. The letters congratulating me on the voucher arrived a couple of months later.

Thanks for that. I did complain way back and received an immediate payment of £150 and then another for £100 when the promised credit after 180 days didn't happen. It's nice to receive the money and I'm assured the avios are safe and secure (wherever that might be!) but I have zero faith in them delivering on any promise now. Although I don't have any immediate use for the voucher I reckon that I should trigger it and what I'm owed because I fear another shambles when avios.com goes.

It's a very bizarre process to redeem a voucher now.

I transferred my Avios over to BA when the closure notice came out. Last week I rang to use my voucher. They had to transfer back the required points and then use them to buy the seats and apply the upgrade voucher. I'm guessing they won't need to do that once Avios.com is shut down.

FWIW I just called Lloyds to trigger the upgrade voucher and have been promised it will show on my avios account within 48 hours along with the outstanding avios I have earned since I opened the account. Perhaps more interesting was an assurance that the wider problem would be resolved in the next 2 months for all accounts at which point those in my situation will be credited with an additional amount of avios equivalent to that earned since the problem arose "at the bank's expense". In other words, we will receive double what we have earned and double any bonuses.

Of course, I have had other assurances over recent months which have proved valueless but I will try to be optimistic.

That's really not bizarre. The closure hasn't happened yet so your voucher should be used via avios.com: you moved your avios out so it was nice of them to move them back for you!

I'm interested to know if we'll be able to use our BAEC HHA avios for a voucher redemption post-closure (my wife has a card/voucher but not usually many avios). If it is going to be done somehow manually from the BAEC end I would hope this will be possible but, if they will stick to hiving some of her own balance back to the old platform for the redemption, perhaps not.

So when Avios inevitably closes I reckon it will just migrate to a non Avios Lloyds card with a likely pro rata refund of the annual fee.

But what do you think their position will be if you have done say 5k of the 7k spend required to trigger the upgrade voucher?

I actually purposely go slow on mine so it hits as late as possible if I don't have an immediate need for it

I have a similar problem. The spend to trigger the voucher was made towards the end of last year. No sign of the voucher yet. The only Avios I have received were by a manual adjustment made a couple of months after first getting the card. I've had £450 compensation so far, made in three chunks.
I received an unprompted letter in February, which states:
"We intend to provide you with a final fix date, or confirm that your account has been fully fixed, by the end of April 2018"

Needless to say it hasn't been fixed and I haven't received a final fix date. I've sent another complaint, so hope to get another £££ compensatory payment before any final fix is made. It's a cash cow.

Since my post Lloyds have called me back to confirm that they have now calculated the outstanding avios. They claim that they did in fact fix the problem for a number of accounts by the April target date but not all those they hoped to. They threw in a further £50 compensation for that which was a another nice bonus. Given that they will double whatever avios I earn before the problem is fully fixed and I will have my earned avios and voucher in the next 24 hours, they can take as long as they like now.