Another explore gold (Flybuys) offer

[galend]

Hi all,

Just came across this forum, what a great resource.

I've been a VA member for quite a number of years, but started flying this financial year a lot for work. I was at silver with 393 status points, and I flew yesterday and have another flight in early July which would have got me over the 500 points for Gold.

With that said, I logged in to my account yesterday and noticed I was on "Explore Gold" and my status credits have gone from 393 to 93.

I didn't receive an email (I just double checked junk mail and Office365 clutter), and I didn't opt in. I had to search to find out what happened, which is how I ended up here. Like I said, I was going to get gold anyway, but I guess I'll just use this offer as I'll get the 80 required status points with ease in the next couple of months.

- Does anyone think it's worth making the call to see if this offer is accepted in my account, or is the fact that my account is reporting "Explore Gold" good enough?
- Do Virgin send out new Gold cards for the "Explore Gold" period, or do you only get these after the "explore" period has lapsed and if you met the criteria to become full Gold
- I'm curious as to why my status points went from 393 down to 93. Any ideas? There were no flights I took 12 months ago that would have expired the status credit period

Cheers!

 

[Icy]

Hi all,

Just came across this forum, what a great resource.

I've been a VA member for quite a number of years, but started flying this financial year a lot for work. I was at silver with 393 status points, and I flew yesterday and have another flight in early July which would have got me over the 500 points for Gold.

With that said, I logged in to my account yesterday and noticed I was on "Explore Gold" and my status credits have gone from 393 to 93.

I didn't receive an email (I just double checked junk mail and Office365 clutter), and I didn't opt in. I had to search to find out what happened, which is how I ended up here. Like I said, I was going to get gold anyway, but I guess I'll just use this offer as I'll get the 80 required status points with ease in the next couple of months.

- Does anyone think it's worth making the call to see if this offer is accepted in my account, or is the fact that my account is reporting "Explore Gold" good enough?
- Do Virgin send out new Gold cards for the "Explore Gold" period, or do you only get these after the "explore" period has lapsed and if you met the criteria to become full Gold
- I'm curious as to why my status points went from 393 down to 93. Any ideas? There were no flights I took 12 months ago that would have expired the status credit period

Cheers!

Hi Galend,

Welcome aboard. I've only recently joined the forum also so still finding my feet.

That is very strange that you were automatically put onto Explore Gold as the offer that I (and all others that I know of) received was subject to applying by a specific date.

My status credits also suddenly went from 300 to 35 when my status changed from Silver to Explore Gold. I'm curious of the reason also as all those status credit points were earned in the past 12 months also. Upcoming travel would have seen me qualify for Gold in September in any case.

It would interesting to know why you automatically went to Explore Gold without an offer and what basis/formula they use for deducting the SCs.

I received a new Gold card about a week after going to Explore Gold.

 

[Robbo3]

Hit 80 status credit in the first week. Went on to get >600 in the 3 months of explore gold and now it says. "[FONT=&quot]We are currently assessing your activity over your membership year. You will still have access to your current benefits until 07 Jul 2017. Your new card will be with you shortly." [/FONT]I am not sure what needs assessing other than to kick off the 12 months of Gold but was hoping it was something good. Noticed last night upon selecting seats for a Virgin flight that Mrs Robbo3 has been comped Gold. We are family pooling to me. Assume it must be related to explore gold, as with the family pooling she has no status credits or points in her account. [FONT=&quot]
[/FONT]

 

[MrPlow]

Hi All,

I too have received the explore gold offer and need to meet the 80 status credits. On my card that turned up in the mail it says my review date is the 31st August.

With all my planned travel and expenditure at Coles I will meet the 80 status credits on a flight I am taking on the 31st of August. My question is can the status credits earned from this flight on the 31st of August count toward the 80 or do the 80 have to be earned before the 31st?

 

[dairyfloss]

Hi All,

I too have received the explore gold offer and need to meet the 80 status credits. On my card that turned up in the mail it says my review date is the 31st August.

With all my planned travel and expenditure at Coles I will meet the 80 status credits on a flight I am taking on the 31st of August. My question is can the status credits earned from this flight on the 31st of August count toward the 80 or do the 80 have to be earned before the 31st?

If the flight commences on or before the 31st you will be fine. Just make sure any other SCs that you need are in the bank by then, as well... e.g. the Coles grocery SCs, which post according to some schedule I'm not familiar with!

Cheers,
Matt.

 

[MrPlow]

If the flight commences on or before the 31st you will be fine. Just make sure any other SCs that you need are in the bank by then, as well... e.g. the Coles grocery SCs, which post according to some schedule I'm not familiar with!

Cheers,
Matt.

Thanks Matt, relieved to hear that as I didn't really want to have to make a trip for the sake of retaining gold for another 12 months.

From my recent experience with Coles grocery SC they are processed on the 2nd or 3rd of the month for the previous months spend. It does show that they are earned on the last day of the previous month though. On a couple of occasions in the past it has taken 2-3 weeks for the SC from Coles shopping to be processed. I'm not sure how long the velocity team wait after the review date for status credits to be processed before they review a members level of membership. Maybe someone else has had experience with this?

I plan on having the status credits I need from my grocery shop in my account at the start of August though as you have mentioned above so will only need the status credits from the flight on the 31st to meet the 80sc required.

 

[Oneworldplus2]

Got it today too.

Would have made Gold in 2-3 weeks anyways, was only 1 trip away from Gold,.

Need 80SC by 16th September, which l should be able to do.

Anyways, glad l got it.

 

[Fantic125]

Hi all,

Just came across this forum, what a great resource.

I've been a VA member for quite a number of years, but started flying this financial year a lot for work. I was at silver with 393 status points, and I flew yesterday and have another flight in early July which would have got me over the 500 points for Gold.

With that said, I logged in to my account yesterday and noticed I was on "Explore Gold" and my status credits have gone from 393 to 93.

I didn't receive an email (I just double checked junk mail and Office365 clutter), and I didn't opt in. I had to search to find out what happened, which is how I ended up here. Like I said, I was going to get gold anyway, but I guess I'll just use this offer as I'll get the 80 required status points with ease in the next couple of months.

- Does anyone think it's worth making the call to see if this offer is accepted in my account, or is the fact that my account is reporting "Explore Gold" good enough?
- Do Virgin send out new Gold cards for the "Explore Gold" period, or do you only get these after the "explore" period has lapsed and if you met the criteria to become full Gold
- I'm curious as to why my status points went from 393 down to 93. Any ideas? There were no flights I took 12 months ago that would have expired the status credit period

Cheers!

I'm the same as in not receiving any email invite. I checked my account on Friday 15th June to find I had been upgraded to Explore Gold, and my SC balance had dropped from 407 SC's to 165 SC's. With the flight's I had done just before the 15th my SC's have now increased to 210, and there's still another 30 SC's yet to credit (again from prior to the 15th).

So as of now, where I should be in a position to obtain Gold under my own steam with only needing 18 SC's (which I will get from flights next week), I now need to earn 80 SC's in the next 3 months to obtain Gold. I've got enough flights to get the 80 SC's, but if I didn't have enough flights to achieve the 80 SC's and dropped back to Silver after the 3 months of Explore Gold I would be pretty peeved.

 

[MattA]

For all those who have noticed a seemingly random number of missing status credits on starting Explore Gold, I think I can shed some light.

I believe it is a bug on the website -- if you look through your activity statement you will see that your status balance when you start Explore Gold now only includes SCs earned during the last 3 months. i.e. the website is using the validity period of your current status (3 months), and using that to work backwards to count up your SC balance.

The same thing happened to me when I started Explore Gold 3 months ago -- my balance dropped to only include SCs from the previous 3 months (and it's a rolling 3 month "expiry" throughout the Explore Gold period, i.e. by the end of it before my review it was only showing SCs earned during the 3 month Explore Gold period).

But, I've just completed Explore Gold and my status review finally posted yesterday. My SC balance on the website has gone back up -- it now shows the total earned during the last 12 months (which is the validity period of my new full Gold status).

So yes, you will get these missing SCs back at the end of Explore Gold (or at least you will get the ones from the last 9 months back at the end, because the status review will happen in 3 months time). Of course at this point they are only relevant for achieving Platinum -- my target to maintain Gold is 400 and I'm currently at 0 on that counter as you would expect.

Interestingly, I have the iPhone Virgin Australia app -- the SC section in that showed the correct SC balance throughout the entire time I was Explore Gold.

 

[Icy]

For all those who have noticed a seemingly random number of missing status credits on starting Explore Gold, I think I can shed some light.

I believe it is a bug on the website -- if you look through your activity statement you will see that your status balance when you start Explore Gold now only includes SCs earned during the last 3 months. i.e. the website is using the validity period of your current status (3 months), and using that to work backwards to count up your SC balance.

The same thing happened to me when I started Explore Gold 3 months ago -- my balance dropped to only include SCs from the previous 3 months (and it's a rolling 3 month "expiry" throughout the Explore Gold period, i.e. by the end of it before my review it was only showing SCs earned during the 3 month Explore Gold period).

But, I've just completed Explore Gold and my status review finally posted yesterday. My SC balance on the website has gone back up -- it now shows the total earned during the last 12 months (which is the validity period of my new full Gold status).

So yes, you will get these missing SCs back at the end of Explore Gold (or at least you will get the ones from the last 9 months back at the end, because the status review will happen in 3 months time). Of course at this point they are only relevant for achieving Platinum -- my target to maintain Gold is 400 and I'm currently at 0 on that counter as you would expect.

Interestingly, I have the iPhone Virgin Australia app -- the SC section in that showed the correct SC balance throughout the entire time I was Explore Gold.

Thanks for the info MattA. That will be great as I should be able to make Platinum by the end of the year if that occurs.

Regarding the iPhone app, where exactly are you seeing the correct SC balance? I can only find the details for maintaining Gold (ie. the 80 SCs).

 

[MattA]

Regarding the iPhone app, where exactly are you seeing the correct SC balance? I can only find the details for maintaining Gold (ie. the 80 SCs).

On the home page of the app there's a big coloured box in the middle showing your current status -- to the right of that when I was Explore Gold were two boxes, one showing my points balance and one showing my status credit target (it said something like "maintain gold - x of 80 SCs earned"). Tap on that box and it takes you to a list of all status activity -- at the top of that list it shows your target to maintain as well as your current SC balance (and there's a list you can scroll up and down to see when SCs posted to the account). The number at the very top was my "true" SC balance. i.e. Balance of SCs earned during the last 12 months.

For example, last week for me that number said my SC balance was 200. The website said it was 184. Following my review the website now reports my balance as 200.

Now my app has changed and I have a points box plus two SC boxes on the right of the main screen -- the first says "Upgrading to Platinum - 200 of 1000 SCs earned" and the next says "Maintaining Gold - 0 of 400 SCs earned"

Hope that makes sense...

 

[Icy]

Yes, that all makes sense now thanks MattA. The iPhone app is showing the SCs I have earned since the last proper review while the website is just showing the SCs earned in the past 3 months. The website should therefore reset to the correct balance once the 3 month Explore Gold review has been completed.

 

[galend]

So, I'm a little confused and actually wondering if I'm worse off by being automatically opted in to this "explore gold". Details below.

In summary:
- On the 14th of June, I had 393 status points and was put in to the "explore gold" promotion
- My review date for "explore gold" is the 14th of September
- If I didn't get put into this promotion, I likely would have upgraded to gold normally in the week of 3rd of July
- Between being placed in to "explore gold" and the "explore gold" review date, I'm going to earn somewhere around 330ish status points
- From what I'm seeing and if I understand correctly, these will effectively all be reset on the "explore gold" review date, and none of these will contribute to my maintaining gold for the 12 months following "explore gold". Is this correct, or am I misunderstanding? Hopefully the latter.

Would I have been better off to not get placed into this promotion, and naturally get gold (tick over to 500 status points) in the week of the 3rd of July. And then some of my flights in the week of 3rd July, plus my trip to Las Vegas in August would go towards 'maintaining gold'.

Honestly the promotion would have been much better if it just upgraded you to full gold when you hit the 80 status points, not at a set review date.

My flight details
On the 14th of June, I had 393 status points and was put in to the "explore gold" promotion, review date is 14th September
On the 15th of June, I earned 30 status points
This week (19th of June), I'll earn around 50 status points
In the week of the 3rd of July, I'll earn around 130 status points
At the end of August, I'm going from Tasmania to Las Vegas, I'm thinking this is somewhere around 120 status points as well

 

[MattA]

So, I'm a little confused and actually wondering if I'm worse off by being automatically opted in to this "explore gold". Details below.

Based on my experience, this is what will happen:

- You will remain on Explore Gold status until 14th Sept
- At some point after that (anything up to a couple of weeks) a status review will happen and you will go to full gold
- Your SC balance will now be ~ 723 (based on your figures -- 393 + 30 + 50 + 130 + 120 -- assuming the initial 393 pts were earned post 14/09/2016), target to reach plat will be 723 of 1000 (obviously need to earn the additional 277 within 12 months of whenever you earned the 393, after which your balance will start to drop as the oldest SCs hit their 12 month expiry) and target to maintain gold will be 0 of 400 (need to earn 400 by 14/09/2018).

So yeah, without the promo you would have been at least 120 points further towards maintaining gold. On the other hand you get the Gold benefits earlier than you would have otherwise.

However, given that your 300 "missing" SCs aren't really missing at all, it is possible that hitting 500 SCs in the 3rd week of July will trigger an immediate account review anyway -- I was nowhere near that so can't comment either way. If it doesn't happen, I'd say it's worth a call to Velocity when you reach 500 to see if they can move you to full Gold straightaway. Especially as they seem to have opted you in without you requesting it.

Do Virgin send out new Gold cards for the "Explore Gold" period, or do you only get these after the "explore" period has lapsed and if you met the criteria to become full Gold

I got a new card, yes. Arrived a couple of weeks after my status changed to Explore Gold

I'm curious as to why my status points went from 393 down to 93. Any ideas? There were no flights I took 12 months ago that would have expired the status credit period

As per my previous comments -- if they were earned more than 3 months ago then the Velocity website will show your balance incorrectly. If you have an iPhone try installing the Virgin Australia app and see what it says.

 

[galend]

Based on my experience, this is what will happen:

Hey Matt,

Thanks for the information and input.

I'm wondering if I can opt out of the explore gold, and if that will reinstate me back to where I was and then just go on to earn Gold 'naturally'. Else I might find it hard to hit 400SC next year, post 14th September.

Another complexity, is I had purchased Lounge membership when I was silver, and when I got moved into Explore Gold they gave me a $200 refund. So it could be a bit complex to now opt out and retain the lounge membership as well.

How helpful are the staff in the Lounge? Are they there to assist with enquires such as this, or do I need to go down the path of phoning the Velocity Membership support team to talk some of these options through? I think it would be easier to talk with someone face to face and flesh this out. I'll be sure to ask them if I will get bumped to full gold when I hit 500SC as well, regardless of Explore Gold.

Like I said before, I don't see why Explore Gold isn't just like a normal status bump, and when you get the required points, it ticks over to the next offering, which in this case would be full Gold for 12 months. I'd be happy if that was the case.

 

[xen0n33]

Based on my experience, this is what will happen:

- You will remain on Explore Gold status until 14th Sept
- At some point after that (anything up to a couple of weeks) a status review will happen and you will go to full gold
- Your SC balance will now be ~ 723 (based on your figures -- 393 + 30 + 50 + 130 + 120 -- assuming the initial 393 pts were earned post 14/09/2016), target to reach plat will be 723 of 1000 (obviously need to earn the additional 277 within 12 months of whenever you earned the 393, after which your balance will start to drop as the oldest SCs hit their 12 month expiry) and target to maintain gold will be 0 of 400 (need to earn 400 by 14/09/2018).

So yeah, without the promo you would have been at least 120 points further towards maintaining gold. On the other hand you get the Gold benefits earlier than you would have otherwise.

However, given that your 300 "missing" SCs aren't really missing at all, it is possible that hitting 500 SCs in the 3rd week of July will trigger an immediate account review anyway -- I was nowhere near that so can't comment either way. If it doesn't happen, I'd say it's worth a call to Velocity when you reach 500 to see if they can move you to full Gold straightaway. Especially as they seem to have opted you in without you requesting it.



I got a new card, yes. Arrived a couple of weeks after my status changed to Explore Gold



As per my previous comments -- if they were earned more than 3 months ago then the Velocity website will show your balance incorrectly. If you have an iPhone try installing the Virgin Australia app and see what it says.

This was my experience as well - the app always showed the right amount of SCs even though the site didn't and once my review was complete all the SCs appeared on the site again. It was comforting to see them again, like having 400 "invisible" SCs that had been floating around somewhere suddenly return

 

[galend]

if they were earned more than 3 months ago then the Velocity website will show your balance incorrectly. If you have an iPhone try installing the Virgin Australia app and see what it says.

Interestingly, the mobile app says I have 363 status credits, where I should be sitting on 418.

Looking in the history in this view, my SCs earned in July 2016 (55 points) are missing from the above total. I didn't travel apart from this in June14-Sep14 2016, but I'd be willing to say these are not being calculated in the total points currently while I am on Explore Gold.

If none of this Explore Gold cough happened, I'd be sitting at 418 points as of today, and none of these SCs tick over until 17th of July. In addition to these 418, I'd be getting around 50 this week, and then 120ish in the week starting the 3rd of July, all prior to any of my current SCs ticking over on the 17th of July, 2017.

 

[galend]

Ok, so an update on the above!

I called the Virgin Membership team tonight, and I actually had a really good customer service rep.

- She fully understood the situation I was in where I was close to gold anyway, and that I would have a few hundred SC wasted due to the Explore Gold
- I asked if I could phone up and have my account manually reviewed when I hit the 80 required SC so I could get moved to full Gold. She checked with support and this was not possible. On the Explore Gold, you need to wait until your review date, even if you were going to hit gold regardless of the Explore Gold promotion
- I then asked if I could be 'downgraded' back to silver, as I didn't want to bury SCs and I wanted them to go towards my maintaining Gold. She worked with the supervisor and put this through
- We were about to hang up, but then she asked if I've made my upcoming bookings, which I have. I gave her the reservations numbers and she put me on hold. She came back to say that she's done a one off upgrade of my account from Silver to Gold, given the flights I've booked were easily going to get me gold. This is effective from today for 12 months
- Even though she upgraded my account, I'm currently only on 418 SC. Because my review date is today, all flights from today that earn SC will go towards my "maintaining Gold", which is an added little bonus

I'm hoping the computer systems are all just catching up, because;

- If I check on the app, I'm back on silver with 123SC
- If I check on the web site, I'm on Silver with 418SC, but there is an activity for today named "Status Review - See Account Details". My review date is 22nd June 2018

So all in all, hopefully things apply in the next day or so and I get shifted to full gold and then any SC earned between today as 22 June 2018 will go towards maintaining gold.

 

[Fantic125]

Hey Matt,

Another complexity, is I had purchased Lounge membership when I was silver, and when I got moved into Explore Gold they gave me a $200 refund. So it could be a bit complex to now opt out and retain the lounge membership as well.

Did you need to contact them and request this, as only two months ago I renewed my Lounge membership? Now I have 'Explore Gold' it no longer shows my Lounge membership in 'My Account'. I was wondering whether this would just get lost....

 

[galend]

Did you need to contact them and request this, as only two months ago I renewed my Lounge membership? Now I have 'Explore Gold' it no longer shows my Lounge membership in 'My Account'. I was wondering whether this would just get lost....

Nope, I didn't do anything. The credit came through within 48 hours. It wasn't even something I was expecting to be honest.