Additional Benefit on Velocity Earning Cards: 40K Points, 6 Months Gold or $300 Travel Bank

[GSP]

I just received my email also. Nothing further to do other than a confirmation.

Time to apply for the Westpac Platinum.

 

[Brizz]

Mine and the missus arrived in around 24 hours, given the comments on here I was expecting a few days at least...

 

[Rebus]

My card arrived last night. I ended up having to call Virgin Money as something went awry during activation but was quickly sorted out. I asked the agent to confirm my statement date in order that I could manage the target spend for the bonus points. He went on to say that certain transactions did not count towards qualifying spend and mentioned insurance payments as being one of them. I can find no mention of this in the T&Cs. They are clear that payments to the ATO and other government agencies e.g. council rates are excluded but nothing regarding payments for insurance.

I was intending to switch one of my larger monthly insurance payments across to assist with easily making the spend target so it will be a bit of a pain if it is ineligible.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

 

[MooTime]

My card arrived last night. I ended up having to call Virgin Money as something went awry during activation but was quickly sorted out. I asked the agent to confirm my statement date in order that I could manage the target spend for the bonus points. He went on to say that certain transactions did not count towards qualifying spend and mentioned insurance payments as being one of them. I can find no mention of this in the T&Cs. They are clear that payments to the ATO and other government agencies e.g. council rates are excluded but nothing regarding payments for insurance.

I was intending to switch one of my larger monthly insurance payments across to assist with easily making the spend target so it will be a bit of a pain if it is ineligible.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

I'd be calling them back and making the point that insurance isn't excluded according to the T&C's.


Push them on it I mean you can't just exclude things that aren't in the T &C's.


You may well hit the spend target anyway, $4k in 90 days is pretty easy for most.

 

[Mr H]

You may well hit the spend target anyway, $4k in 90 days is pretty easy for most.

Isn't Virgin Money a spend of $3,500 per month for four months? That certainly wouldn't be a given for me without manufacturing spend.

 

[aikman]

He went on to say that certain transactions did not count towards qualifying spend and mentioned insurance payments as being one of them. I can find no mention of this in the T&Cs. They are clear that payments to the ATO and other government agencies e.g. council rates are excluded but nothing regarding payments for insurance.

The way I've tried to identify a government transaction is that if you don't have a choice of supplier, like rates and water, then it probably is a government transaction.

So for things like insurance, I don't think they are government transactions.

Are there any flaws to this theory?

 

[GSP]

Isn't Virgin Money a spend of $3,500 per month for four months? That certainly wouldn't be a given for me without manufacturing spend.

That is for the Virgin High Flyer Card. The Virgin Flyer Card is only $1500. It is strange that now both provide the same bonus points. Having had this card on a number of occasions, the bonus points for the "Flyer" card has been a lot lower, so the 100k points was very welcome. Essentially, the High Flyer has a higher earning rate and probably a few other things I'm not interested in.

Ironically I just closed my Flyer card to make my WBC Altitude application a little more attractive.

Post automatically merged: May 14, 2022

My card arrived last night. I ended up having to call Virgin Money as something went awry during activation but was quickly sorted out. I asked the agent to confirm my statement date in order that I could manage the target spend for the bonus points. He went on to say that certain transactions did not count towards qualifying spend and mentioned insurance payments as being one of them. I can find no mention of this in the T&Cs. They are clear that payments to the ATO and other government agencies e.g. council rates are excluded but nothing regarding payments for insurance.

I was intending to switch one of my larger monthly insurance payments across to assist with easily making the spend target so it will be a bit of a pain if it is ineligible.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

I have (or had until this morning) this card and I can confirm AAMI (and some council charges) transactions earnt points.

Edit: I just noticed the AAMI payment was in the 5th month, so my bonus points had all been paid so than cannot confirm that it contributed to the $1.5k monthly spend to receive the 25k. The council payment was in the 4th month but I was a few hundred over the $1.5k spend for that month and the transaction was $77, so hard to say - I think you would be OK. FYI, the only reason I went the 5th month is to see if they would give me another 25k by mistake as they did that do me once before.

 

[antycbr]

That is for the Virgin High Flyer Card. The Virgin Flyer Card is only $1500. It is strange that now both provide the same bonus points. Having had this card on a number of occasions, the bonus points for the "Flyer" card has been a lot lower, so the 100k points was very welcome. Essentially, the High Flyer has a higher earning rate and probably a few other things I'm not interested in.

Ironically I just closed my Flyer card to make my WBC Altitude application a little more attractive.

Post automatically merged: May 14, 2022

I have (or had until this morning) this card and I can confirm AAMI (and some council charges) transactions earnt points.

Edit: I just noticed the AAMI payment was in the 5th month, so my bonus points had all been paid so than cannot confirm that it contributed to the $1.5k monthly spend to receive the 25k. The council payment was in the 4th month but I was a few hundred over the $1.5k spend for that month and the transaction was $77, so hard to say - I think you would be OK. FYI, the only reason I went the 5th month is to see if they would give me another 25k by mistake as they did that do me once before.

It could be possible that they are thinking of the CTP insurance that some states provided where there is no choice of supplier. Just a theory?

 

[Rebus]

You may well hit the spend target anyway, $4k in 90 days is pretty easy for most.

Correct. The spend target on this card is no problem for us, all things being equal. However we will be overseas for 4 weeks during the initial 4 months and therefore won't be racking up the usual spend on food, fuel and activities. I wasn't planning to use the card when we were away and was therefore relying on the monthly bills to meet the target. I have changed my income protection policy to the new card and might call them to confirm that it counts once the first payment goes through.

 

[deangelj]

I assume buying gift cards is included? I'm in the same boat in that I'll be away for 3-4 weeks in one of the months so was planning to buy a bunch of coles cards in the few days of the month I'll be here.

 

[Www]

I currently hold krisflyer gold until Feb 2024. The main reason I went for this was for domestic Virgin Australia benefits in particular lounge. Any thoughts on whether also having velocity gold adds any extra benefit in addition to KrisFlyer gold?

 

[odysseus]

I assume buying gift cards is included? I'm in the same boat in that I'll be away for 3-4 weeks in one of the months so was planning to buy a bunch of coles cards in the few days of the month I'll be here.

Assuming you're referring to Virgin, yes they're fine for normal retail places e.g. Coles.

 

[Stealthflyer]

Correct. The spend target on this card is no problem for us, all things being equal. However we will be overseas for 4 weeks during the initial 4 months and therefore won't be racking up the usual spend on food, fuel and activities. I wasn't planning to use the card when we were away and was therefore relying on the monthly bills to meet the target. I have changed my income protection policy to the new card and might call them to confirm that it counts once the first payment goes through.

Do international transactions not count towards the bonus? I’ll also be overseas for one of the months. Maybe I should just apply for a no fx fee CC instead (It’s a shame the ANZ travel card has such a miserable bonus now)

 

[GSP]

Do international transactions not count towards the bonus? I’ll also be overseas for one of the months. Maybe I should just apply for a no fx fee CC instead (It’s a shame the ANZ travel card has such a miserable bonus now)

They do, however none of the cards that are eligible for this offer have free OS Transactions as a feature.

 

[Rebus]

Do international transactions not count towards the bonus? I’ll also be overseas for one of the months. Maybe I should just apply for a no fx fee CC instead (It’s a shame the ANZ travel card has such a miserable bonus now)

I should have clarified my point regarding being overseas. We have a local bank account in the country we'll be visiting and will use that for most of our spend.

Anyhow, I had to speak with Virgin Money again and asked for clarification on the question of insurance spend counting towards the monthly target. They advised that the only insurance which is ineligible is that which is government issued. For everyday insurance issued by a commercial provider there is no problem with eligibility.

 

[Pele]

My card arrived last night. I ended up having to call Virgin Money as something went awry during activation but was quickly sorted out. I asked the agent to confirm my statement date in order that I could manage the target spend for the bonus points. He went on to say that certain transactions did not count towards qualifying spend and mentioned insurance payments as being one of them. I can find no mention of this in the T&Cs. They are clear that payments to the ATO and other government agencies e.g. council rates are excluded but nothing regarding payments for insurance.

I was intending to switch one of my larger monthly insurance payments across to assist with easily making the spend target so it will be a bit of a pain if it is ineligible.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

I applied yesterday and 2.5 hours later they sent an email saying i was approved. Good to see Citibank's approval and due dilligence is as loose as ever. Only had to provide drivers licence number and two payslips. Nothing at all requested on loans or other credit cards which i declared in the application.

In terms of your billing cycle- did you need to call or could you see that on the app once you have set up your online profile?

Thank you.

 

[GSP]

In terms of your billing cycle- did you need to call or could you see that on the app once you have set up your online profile?

Once you login to your account you should be able to see.

 

[Zanzaid]

May not be the right place to ask but it is related still so i'll throw it out there.

I applied for the Virgin Money Flyer card and have been approved today. However i only noticed today that NAB is likely to have approval by June 1st to buy Virgin Money. I had a NAB card up until a few months ago though, is that likely to affect getting the signup or bonus points? I would be disappointed if so! Partly my fault for not checking though..

 

[Mr H]

May not be the right place to ask but it is related still so i'll throw it out there.

I applied for the Virgin Money Flyer card and have been approved today. However i only noticed today that NAB is likely to have approval by June 1st to buy Virgin Money. I had a NAB card up until a few months ago though, is that likely to affect getting the signup or bonus points? I would be disappointed if so! Partly my fault for not checking though..

Who can say what will happen in the future, but right now the Virgin Money and Qantas Money cards have their own waiting periods for sign-up bonuses that are unrelated to their parent companies.

 

[Zanzaid]

Who can say what will happen in the future, but right now the Virgin Money and Qantas Money cards have their own waiting periods for sign-up bonuses that are unrelated to their parent companies.

Ah well, that's comforting at least. I'll just wait and see now. Hopefully since i've gotten in before it's sold, it's all good!