IHG opens a new Hotel Indigo in Madrid – Hotel Indigo Madrid Princesa

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• @mkcol says:

  15 Mar15 March 04:55

  The pollution levels will plummet with so many flights being canx & people self isolating.

  • The Original David says:

    15 Mar15 March 05:59

    Which pollution levels? Particulates at street level in central London? Or global carbon output? Neither of those will be much affected by cancelling all commercial flights worldwide, let alone the proportion that are actually being cancelled…

    • BJ says:

      15 Mar15 March 06:43

      The proportion being cancelled is substantial so the decrease in pollution (by which I assume we really mean those pollutants with GWP in this context) resulting from the aviation sector will also be substantial. The importance of that decrease will not be measured simply in terms of its proportion of overall pollution but in terms of what specific impacts it has at high altitude. Such remains to be seen. What is perhaps more important in the longer term is that the current situation demonstrates that both business and leisure travel are very much driven by ‘want’ not ‘need’. This evidence will be used by those advocating curbs on air travel as a means of slowing global warming. While in some markets they will not care less about this, in other socially and environmentally conscious markets it might well be enough to see new and higher taxes on air travel, frequent flying etc.

  • Andrew says:

    15 Mar15 March 07:54

    As long as they aren’t going home and lighting the wood burning stoves to stay snug!

    • Secret Squirrel says:

      15 Mar15 March 14:22

      Only unseasoned wet wood Andrew.

      • Lady London says:

        15 Mar15 March 14:39

        A touch of petrol to ignite it then?

  • AJA says:

    15 Mar15 March 09:01

    I will be interested to see the drop in traffic and pollution from cars if the schools close and everyone working remotely.
    I think that the impact from no aircraft will be clearer bluer skies as happened in the aftermath of 9/11.
    Let’s hope the XR lot don’t claim any credit for it, then again the stigma of being in crowds works against them.

• Simon says:

  15 Mar15 March 06:54

  Delta have cut so much transatlantic flying it’s easier to publish a list of what’s left – although the following does not reflect the latest UK & Ireland restrictions. Their website also implies that VS, AF and KL will continue their flights which go to the permitted airports of entry. (Does the JV split costs as well as revenues?)
  “Starting Monday, Delta will operate one daily flight between the following cities:
  Atlanta to Amsterdam
  Atlanta to London-Heathrow
  Atlanta to Paris-Charles De Gaulle
  Detroit to Amsterdam
  Detroit to London-Heathrow
  New York-JFK to London-Heathrow
  New York-JFK to Dublin”

• BJ says:

  15 Mar15 March 07:04

  And at moments like this you wish your country was not in debt but unfortunately we have been carrying debt at over 60% of GDP since 2010. Trust the Tories with the economy my a***. Don’t know where all the money is going to come from, we are not the USA, our debt, and thirst for more, will surely not be tolerated indefinitely.

  • Nick G says:

    15 Mar15 March 08:00

    And why/how did the tories inherit the debt eh?

    • Henry says:

      15 Mar15 March 08:03

      Exactly
      Also we would still have our gold if it wasn’t for Mr Brown selling it all.
      Probably one of the worst financial decisions of the last 20 years.

      • Sandgrounder says:

        15 Mar15 March 08:22

        I fear the epidemic is out of control, but I’d mug prefer to go back to the days when we largely avoided non-travel related political debate in this site. The whole left/right gammon/snowflake thing has been done to death elsewhere.

      • BJ says:

        15 Mar15 March 08:42

        Agree on the gold, but better he squandered it on increasing wealth for low earners and boring middle management types than leave it for George to perform one of his magical disappearing tricks with it.

      • Anna says:

        15 Mar15 March 13:18

        Sandgrounder, so true! What’s it come to when a travel forum is beset with comments trying to make people feel guilty about travelling?

      • BJ says:

        15 Mar15 March 14:47

        @Anna, what comments are making you feel guilty about travel?
        @Sangrounder, the state of the nations finances are currently highly relevant to the state our UK-based travel industry finds itself in given the scale of the challenges both face. Otherwise, I totally agree with you. All the snowflake etc nonsense started in the last few years with some perceiving everything now has to be tribal and polarised. I don’t think I’ve ever used those terms in the comments and I’m sorry if I have because I find it depressing when others do. There is a problem too with discussion of more technical or scientific issues like environmental impacts of travel where some have sought to shut down or ridicule other readers who have at times engaged in interesting, educational, and informative discussion simply because it doesn’t sit comfortably with their political views or the objectives of the party they support.

    • BJ says:

      15 Mar15 March 08:39

      No idea, ask Boris; it hovered around the 40% of GDP mark for all of the Blair/Brown years and still did not exceed 50% after the financial crash IIRC. This, despite a decade absent of austerity and growing wealth for low earners and dull middle management types.

      • Fact-checked says:

        15 Mar15 March 09:37

        No, your “IIRC” is definitely not correct. UK debt to GDP hovered around 40% until 2007, then grew to nearly 80% between 2007-2010, Gordon Brown’s term. It has stayed around 85% since then.

      • BJ says:

        15 Mar15 March 10:42

        @Fact-checked, yes, a quick look at ONS data shows you are correct. It is indeed much worse under the Conservatives since 2010 than I thought despite austerity. Were it not for the financial crisis of 2007/08 it would probably have remained largely unchanged from 40% during the Brown years.

    • Secret Squirrel says:

      15 Mar15 March 14:24

      I remember a note left on the new PM’s desk for him.
      Something along the lines “the country is in a bad state debt wise – good luck”

  • Jamie says:

    15 Mar15 March 08:55

    You realise gilts are yielding negative? Markets *want* more UK government debt. There’s a lot of capacity for this.

  • Andy says:

    15 Mar15 March 17:40

    I didn’t come to the comments section to get some Corbyn propaganda…

    • BJ says:

      15 Mar15 March 19:06

      You didn’t get any propaganda from me, I do not support Corbyn nor his party. I have never voted Labour in my life, and have never been a member of any political party, promoted one, or even attended any event hosted by one.

      • Anna says:

        15 Mar15 March 19:53

        Ditto! Yet the moment one questions an aspect government policy one seems to get branded a seditious lefty.

• Henry says:

  15 Mar15 March 07:44

  OT If Virgin do go bump which could possibly happen without some sort of bailout.
  I assume all Flying club miles get written off and =0
  Does anyone on here have any inside info etc of how quickly it could go bad at Virgin?

  • TGLoyalty says:

    15 Mar15 March 07:54

    I’m sure Virgin Atlantic will survive either Delta (USA) or the UK or both will help.

    However, the loyalty scheme is a separate entity now so they’d just be redeemable on whatever partners are left ie Delta AF-KLM etc

    • AJA says:

      15 Mar15 March 08:50

      What you can pretty much guarantee is that Branson won’t put any money in.

      As for the FF scheme being separate from the airline is there no link at all in the group structure? What value would be a business that holds a virtual currency for the airline if that is significantly downsized? Even if you can now redeem on Delta and KLM.

      And if Virgin were to get cash from.the government wouldn’t it be fair to see every Flying Club member contribute by a devaluation of the scheme, ie it costing more miles to redeem for a flight?

      Delta is also in talks with the US government for support to be offered to it. Not sure the US government will be ok with Delta then handing that money to Virgin (which is how it would be perceived.

      I fear cheap travel will be a casualty of this, in the short term, unless globally the threat is contained.

      • Rob says:

        15 Mar15 March 08:58

        The problem is that Virgin Red presumably doesn’t have the cash required to support redemptions. We saw this with airberlin and more recently Jet Privilege. Red is potentially insolvent if everyone redeemed for hotel rooms etc which involved paying out hard cash.

        • Paul Pogba says:

          15 Mar15 March 09:10

          I know flying is HfP bread and butter but realistically if you’re worried about the solvency of a loyalty scheme aren’t the hotels more resilient? My belief is that they own very few hotels and are more of a loyalty, booking, branding system. The risky capital-intensive side that will be vulnerable to a slowdown is independent or regional franchised groups.

          Our hotel points will most likely always be redeemable somewhere even if its at fewer locations at a higher rate than currently.

        • Rob says:

          15 Mar15 March 09:15

          I agree, but that wasn’t my point if you reread what I read.

          Hilton etc are fine – very few directly employed staff and a massive stream of franchise income.

        • Henry says:

          15 Mar15 March 09:32

          I think i remember reading that you or your wife have a large amount of flying club miles Rob?
          Will u be moving your miles somewhere safer or keeping them locked in with Virgin?

        • Rob says:

          15 Mar15 March 09:43

          They stay.

        • AJA says:

          15 Mar15 March 10:42

          So despite Virgin Red being hived off from VA its accounts probably are only signed off with a letter of support from the airline. That doesn’t bode well if the airline itself require support oh dear.

        • the_real_a says:

          15 Mar15 March 14:45

          But redemption’s are net positive… revenue earning. They make a profit based on the fee`s that are charged – at least at a marginal cost basis. Virgin can at a minutes notice close redemption’s outside of the group, hence there is no liability (financially) held on the balance sheet for the balance of points (to my knowledge).

        • Rob says:

          15 Mar15 March 15:01

          For the airline, yes. But your points are owned by Virgin Red, not the airline, and Virgin Red probably hasn’t the funds if we all redeem for Hilton points tomorrow which is what happens if the airline goes down.

  • Rob says:

    15 Mar15 March 08:20

    It’s all separate now. Virgin Red owns your miles.

  • Dan says:

    15 Mar15 March 08:27

    Virgin Atlantic are going to be so vulnerable. Given their recent focus to US destinations, this travel ban is probably the worst thing that could happen to them.

    Any news on which flights BA and VS will cancel as a result of this US ban?

    • Marcw says:

      15 Mar15 March 09:41

      That’s a shy happens when you put all eggs in one basket.

• ChrisBCN says:

  15 Mar15 March 08:13

  And I’m amazed that people still think they will be traveling out of the country for the next several weeks!

  • Doug M says:

    15 Mar15 March 09:43

    A comment a completely agree with. People thinking that things might have changed for the better in a matter of weeks are way off course.

  • TGLoyalty says:

    15 Mar15 March 10:53

    Any country with cases already really is just bolting the barn door after the horse has bolted.

    Depending on the reason why they are flying it could be possible, returning home etc. Anyone going on holiday will probably have a crap time if everything is shut and it’s a ghost town.

• Darren says:

  15 Mar15 March 09:14

  Loving the ads today, Maccy D’s and facemasks😷

  • Ali says:

    15 Mar15 March 10:51

    probably based on what you’ve been browsing lately 😉

  • TGLoyalty says:

    15 Mar15 March 11:54

    Nice peek into your search history there 🙂

    • Darren says:

      15 Mar15 March 14:57

      Not me, never been to McD’s in 30yrs. Last time I wore a face mask….many many times but not the piddly ones seen on the tube, think more industrial.

• Adam Baker says:

  15 Mar15 March 09:44

  So, two (rather grim) questions:

  1. Which airlines are likely to go bust/get government support first?

  2. What is the best way to use Avios in your BAEC account if they can’t be redeemed on flights and travel is curtailed?

  • AJA says:

    15 Mar15 March 10:33

    I think Norwegian has to be worried. Alitalia should also be a candidate but ironically I can see it surviving with yet more state aid.

    As for Avios, perhaps buying wine and drowning our sorrows? 🙂

• BJ says:

  15 Mar15 March 11:25

  OT: 8 nectar points per £ on £15 spend at ebay. Hopefully open to all.

  • Secret Squirrel says:

    15 Mar15 March 12:38

    Beat me to it BJ:
    Posted on FT article also!

    • BJ says:

      15 Mar15 March 14:54

      Nectar is being discussed on FT? I haven’t used it since Rob started HFP, I’ve found HFP combined with a quick look at Loyalty Lobby and Business Traveller is sufficient to keep our hobby ticking along nicely for me.

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