Some Changes to Family Pooling from 27/4/16

[clipped_wings]

It doesn't. Still 4 times per year for family points transfers

Apologies, my bad. Read the terms wrong

 

[Bolthead]

You are correct and thanks, however we do have other family living with us (4 other members) however they don't contribute anywhere as much. Every little bit helps. Perhaps I was too harsh but it just irks me when companies enhance a product because it suits them more that the customer. Why don't they just tell us the truth and say that we are changing the rules because people have been abusing the system and we need to pull them in.

When I am not please with a service I will let them know or vote with my dissatisfaction by taking my business elsewhere. I did that recently with all our car insurance when AAMI put up our car insurance (3 cars - for no reason as far as I can tell). In the end by changing I saved $1000 per year (over 3 cars). They wouldn't even discuss it with me.

VA haven't totally pee'd me off yet... I still like their product. So I will be staying...

Just thinking about your situation

It seems you have 4 members ( You and your wife and 2 daughters ). Change number 1 is ( a.) A beneficiary will be permitted to have a maximum of 5 Contributing Accounts in any calendar year). So this should not affect your current circumstance.

Your wife is the "sacrificial lamb" in this equation. Change number 2 is b.) A contributor may contribute to a maximum of two Beneficiary Accounts in any calendar year. My reading of this change is that your wife can still contribute to both you and your older daughter. Your younger daughter can still contribute to both you and your older daughter.

All 4 of you should be able to still stop and start as needed as you don't breach the T&C's

I am not sure this change will impact your current circumstance as much as you may think.

Just my thoughts

 

[MH_fan]

I think that what they're doing is not unreasonable. QF doesn't allow you to pool SCs so this is a wonderful benefit of the Velocity programme. Seriously, we can't have our cake and eat it too.

 

[Pleb Status]

With the lower status thresholds in addition to family pooling, earning status on VA is magnitudes easier than on most other airlines.

If you do not like these very modest changes, please go elsewhere and see how you go....

 

[mlob]

Struggling a little to understand the changes. We are a family of 5 with three over 18 year olds. Everyone pools to me. The only changes I ever make to our pooling set up is to swap between the other two adults as contributors to me depending on who is flying. Will I still be able to do this?

 

[anat0l]

Struggling a little to understand the changes. We are a family of 5 with three over 18 year olds. Everyone pools to me. The only changes I ever make to our pooling set up is to swap between the other two adults as contributors to me depending on who is flying. Will I still be able to do this?

I don't use Family Pooling, but my understanding is:

• Obviously, given your family, you can only have one beneficiary (you) and one contributor, since every family pool can have at most two members who are over 18 years old.
• Since it seems you (as the beneficiary) have up to four different contributors per year, this is OK under the new rules. You could even have one more contributor in a calendar year and that is fine, too. But once you hit five different contributors in a calendar year, you can't add any more contributors until the new year.
• Each time your family pool changes under the new rules, you will need to specify the relationship between the beneficiary and contributors.

In short, I think you're in the clear.

The latest round of changes seems to really only to crack down on "false relationships" where a bunch of completely unrelated members were essentially moving points and status credits around by imitating false family beneficiary / contributor relationships, and doing it rather often (e.g. a beneficiary having a dozen or so friends contributing points and status credits).

The latest changes also allow Pilot Gold members to be part of Family Pooling. I guess it was prevented previously so that Pilot Gold members actually had to earn their pilot status properly rather than have it "contributed" in by other members, however now it seems VA doesn't mind.

 

[CJEMNMAC]

Struggling a little to understand the changes. We are a family of 5 with three over 18 year olds. Everyone pools to me. The only changes I ever make to our pooling set up is to swap between the other two adults as contributors to me depending on who is flying. Will I still be able to do this?

This year I will be in the same position as you.

I think it is fine. The changes are minor as I read it.


The first change about 5 contributors. You have 4 contributors so it seems ok

The second change. My reading is each of your 4 contributors can each contribute to 2 accounts only. So each of your 4 can contribute to YOU and only 1 other account in any calendar year.

To me it really seems pretty fair if I understand this correctly

 

[Bolthead]

Hate to bring up an oldie however I just tried to change family pooling and I got this message...



It says: Contributing members of a Family Pool may be changed a maximum of five times per calendar year.

However when I checked the rules there is no mention of this in the terms and conditions. It does however say this:



I have had only 3 contributing accounts to me in the calendar year. (to date) This one would have been my forth.

There is however this point that says:



I tried to contact the Velocity team but they are closed on the weekend so I will wait until Monday however, has anyone else experienced this problem when trying to change Family Pooling?

Thanks in advance

Bolt

 

[kpc]

Hate to bring up an oldie however I just tried to change family pooling and I got this message...

View attachment 76800

It says: Contributing members of a Family Pool may be changed a maximum of five times per calendar year.

However when I checked the rules there is no mention of this in the terms and conditions. It does however say this:

View attachment 76816

I have had only 3 contributing accounts to me in the calendar year. (to date) This one would have been my forth.

There is however this point that says:

View attachment 76818

I tried to contact the Velocity team but they are closed on the weekend so I will wait until Monday however, has anyone else experienced this problem when trying to change Family Pooling?

Thanks in advance

Bolt

yes, unfortunately

 

[Bolthead]

yes, unfortunately

Did you question Velocity about it and did they respond?

 

[Bolthead]

I have just got off the phone to Velocity call centre. I originally spoke to the Platinum team here in Australia however they could not fix my problem so it appears they put me through to the overseas call centre (not 100% sure). She said it appeared to be a glitch however she also said that it was going to be a new rule. She did fix my problem for the time being... interesting that the Aussie team couldn't fix it or didn't want to fix it. All is good now except for the fact that it appears that they will further enhance Family Pooling Terms and Conditions... hope I misunderstood her but pretty sure I didn't.

 

[Ausbt]

Can you please elaborate or speculate on that Bolthead as I have some changes to make to my pool

 

[Bolthead]

Can you please elaborate or speculate on that Bolthead as I have some changes to make to my pool

Read my post a couple of posts back... you will see I couldn't pool my father to me. I received an error message stating a condition that at the moment doesn't exist in the terms and conditions. I am guessing that the point 14.7 in the terms and conditions will be modified to 'a maximum of 5 changes per calendar year'. I hope I misinterpreted her.

 

[Happy Dude]

Read my post a couple of posts back... you will see I couldn't pool my father to me. I received an error message stating a condition that at the moment doesn't exist in the terms and conditions. I am guessing that the point 14.7 in the terms and conditions will be modified to 'a maximum of 5 changes per calendar year'. I hope I misinterpreted her.

Too many over-18's at the one address?

 

[Bolthead]

Too many over-18's at the one address?

They are all over 18 but we never pool more than 2 in total at any one time...

 

[blingy90]

Hate to bring up an oldie however I just tried to change family pooling and I got this message...

View attachment 76800

It says: Contributing members of a Family Pool may be changed a maximum of five times per calendar year.

However when I checked the rules there is no mention of this in the terms and conditions. It does however say this:

View attachment 76816

I have had only 3 contributing accounts to me in the calendar year. (to date) This one would have been my forth.

There is however this point that says:

View attachment 76818

I tried to contact the Velocity team but they are closed on the weekend so I will wait until Monday however, has anyone else experienced this problem when trying to change Family Pooling?

Thanks in advance

Bolt

Hi Bolthead, sorry to bring up an old thread - was there any resolution to this?

I've just hit that error on my account with my sister-in-law trying to pool to me. I've only had 2x other accounts pool to me this calendar year - so clearly not reached my 5x contributors // my sister in law hasn't pooled to anyone this calendar year.

And the error message given obviously is incorrect and not in the T&Cs.

Was wanting to see how you handled it / how it got resolved.

Cheers

 

[williamsf1]

Hi Bolthead, sorry to bring up an old thread - was there any resolution to this?

I've just hit that error on my account with my sister-in-law trying to pool to me. I've only had 2x other accounts pool to me this calendar year - so clearly not reached my 5x contributors // my sister in law hasn't pooled to anyone this calendar year.

And the error message given obviously is incorrect and not in the T&Cs.

Was wanting to see how you handled it / how it got resolved.

Cheers

Does she live with you?

[FONT=&quot]14.9 The Beneficiary Account and Contributing Accounts must be held by Members of a family living at the same residential address.[/FONT]

 

[Bolthead]

Hi Bolthead, sorry to bring up an old thread - was there any resolution to this?

I've just hit that error on my account with my sister-in-law trying to pool to me. I've only had 2x other accounts pool to me this calendar year - so clearly not reached my 5x contributors // my sister in law hasn't pooled to anyone this calendar year.

And the error message given obviously is incorrect and not in the T&Cs.

Was wanting to see how you handled it / how it got resolved.

Cheers

Does she live with you?

[FONT=&amp]14.9 The Beneficiary Account and Contributing Accounts must be held by Members of a family living at the same residential address.[/FONT]

As williamsf1 has stated all contributing accounts (i.e. family members) all have to be living under the one roof. As for your question I have not had any issues this year as I have been contributing to my wife all year and part of last year. As I did last year I rang up the Platinum desk and spoke to them. As far as I can tell they then transferred me to the overseas call centre and they promptly fixed it. I would contact your status desk and talk to them. I am sure (although not certain) it is just a glitch. Let us know how you go. ( I am not a computer guru but I would also look at clearing your VA cookies and data. Maybe somebody else could clarify if this might make a difference) . I always do this myself when I get error messages. Just be careful that you don't delete the wrong thing.

 

[blingy90]

Thanks for the reply.

I'll put a call through to the plat desk and see what they say. I'm / we are meeting all the family pooling t&cs so must just be a glitch.

Will report back on how I go.