BMFA Membership Card

[Darran]

H anyone else not able to get to www.bmfa-rewards.co.uk at the moment.

i tried on two windows devices, to Apple ones, one android one and just get cannot open page as server cannot be found.

[Andy Symons - BMFA]

Working here on PC and android

[Darran]

thanks Andy, tried again here now and it’s working, weird.

 

before it was reporting a 503 server error. I’m a software developer, hence I have lots of devices my tracing showed a internal server error being returned. All is good now though so maybe a temporary glitch.

Edited By Darran on 21/02/2020 11:56:28

[Former Member]

[This posting has been removed]

[Andy Symons - BMFA]

Posted by Barrie Lever on 21/02/2020 18:05:49:

Chaps

Looks like there is a heap of money to be saved with the BMFA membership card, seems like you might have to slightly change your shopping habit to using these digital gift cards alike Andy eluded to.

If you can shift your mind on that there seems to be pretty much 5% of at Tesco's on store shopping about the same at John Lewis, Waitrose and M&S.

Seems like this model flying just got a lot cheaper.

Please pick me up if I have got this wrong.

Barrie

You have it about right, we have just got 5% of our weekly shop at tesco by buying a preloaded gift card before we went. Take about a minute to do and just scanned my phone at the till. Really quite simple but just a bit different to normal.

[SR 71]

And if your no good with computers ???

[john stones 1 - Moderator]

Is there anything for poor people on this card ? Discount at food bank or charity shops ?

[Peter Jenkins]

Posted by SR 71 on 21/02/2020 19:04:56:

And if your no good with computers ???

It's just like flying SR71. You have to practice and .... you don't crash if you get it wrong!  

Edited By Peter Jenkins on 21/02/2020 23:42:49

[Nigel Heather]

Posted by Andy Symons - BMFA on 21/02/2020 18:14:52:

Posted by Barrie Lever on 21/02/2020 18:05:49:

Chaps

Looks like there is a heap of money to be saved with the BMFA membership card, seems like you might have to slightly change your shopping habit to using these digital gift cards alike Andy eluded to.

If you can shift your mind on that there seems to be pretty much 5% of at Tesco's on store shopping about the same at John Lewis, Waitrose and M&S.

Seems like this model flying just got a lot cheaper.

Please pick me up if I have got this wrong.

Barrie

You have it about right, we have just got 5% of our weekly shop at tesco by buying a preloaded gift card before we went. Take about a minute to do and just scanned my phone at the till. Really quite simple but just a bit different to normal.

Pretty much the same offers that I can get in the two other schemes that I have access to. But the Tesco one caught my eye as we shop there every week - it’s 4% by the way not 5% but it will still pay for the card 100 times over if I just use it for that.

Unfortunately, no Amazon (as teased in some of the BMFA promotional material) but I was expecting that, no one that I am aware of does Amazon.

What I generally find with these schemes is that they are mostly for stores that I wouldn’t normally use because I can find cheaper and better service elsewhere. A good example, being Currys, wouldn’t normally touch them with a barge pole but once in a blue moon they have a deal that is better than anywhere else - one such case was leading up to Christmas and they had the Nintendo switch cheaper than anywhere else so I used my reward scheme (not the BMFA one) to save another £40 on the package. But those are rare, usually I find the savings don’t even bring them down to competitor prices.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Gary Manuel]

Posted by john stones 1 on 21/02/2020 19:24:52:

Is there anything for poor people on this card ? Discount at food bank or charity shops ?

4% off at ASDA. Does that count?

[Michael Adams 4]

Hi John, I do not think that will happen, I think the ones that do anything will be noted on the card.

I have not received mine yet so I am not able to comment to much.

Sorry Mike.

[Nigel Heather]

My card has just turned up, all seems correct but I notice the validity date

Valid: 1/1/2020

Expires 31/12/2020

 

Now I'm not going to moan about the 52 days use I missed out on and demand a pro-rated 49.7p back (yes I have accounted for it being a leap year) but more to question what happens next year.

I expect the card process to be more mature and established by then but how do BMFA and Vectis intend to handle continuity. The BMFA renewal window doesn't even open up until the first weeks of December - do I believe that even if I pay up promptly on first available day that BMFA will take my order, get it across to Vectis, who will print my card and send it out to arrive before the 1/1/2021 - not really, I would be presently surprised if that could be achieved, but I won't be holding my breath.

So what happens then as we become unaccustomed to using the cards - are we going to have to deal with a gap at the beginning of each year when our membership of the scheme has expired.

Cheers,

 

Nigel

Edited By Nigel Heather on 22/02/2020 13:08:03

[Andy Symons - BMFA]

Posted by Nigel Heather on 22/02/2020 13:07:00:

My card has just turned up, all seems correct but I notice the validity date

Valid: 1/1/2020

Expires 31/12/2020

Now I'm not going to moan about the 52 days use I missed out on and demand a pro-rated 49.7p back (yes I have accounted for it being a leap year) but more to question what happens next year.

I expect the card process to be more mature and established by then but how do BMFA and Vectis intend to handle continuity. The BMFA renewal window doesn't even open up until the first weeks of December - do I believe that even if I pay up promptly on first available day that BMFA will take my order, get it across to Vectis, who will print my card and send it out to arrive before the 1/1/2021 - not really, I would be presently surprised if that could be achieved, but I won't be holding my breath.

So what happens then as we become unaccustomed to using the cards - are we going to have to deal with a gap at the beginning of each year when our membership of the scheme has expired.

Cheers,

Nigel

Edited By Nigel Heather on 22/02/2020 13:08:03

Actually that is exactly how it will happen and indeed is happening going forward from now. It was only a week or so before the renewal window opened for BMFA 2020 membership that everything was agreed with the new membership cards, what we didn't realise was they couldn't start producing the cards until the BMFA rewards site was up and running, we had thought that cards would be produced within 7 days of being ordered even before the rewards site was launched, they will be going forward. The rewards site was ready late January, wisely before jumping in and producing all the ordered cards we had a very small run produced (just 2, the CEOs and mine) to check all was ok mine arrived (on a friday) and all looked great, so we gave the nod to start production which was started (the stopped pretty quickly) on the Monday, as thats when the CEOs card arrived and we found an issue (it had my membership number on it, the field used had gone on as a fixed text field rather than a dynamic data field) that issue was corrected and samples again produced then production started again, then another issue cropped up where a member has lots of achievements, I have quite a few but some have more and it was knocking the card layout squiffy. So production stopped, the issue sorted and now all is good. So a fee delays caused by misunderstandings and technical issue, frustrating but no big deal in the grand scheme of things.

The process going forward is that any cards ordered up until Tuesdays at midnight are sent to the printers on Thursdays ( to give time for members to check their data an ensure achievements are all uploaded etc) then they should be printed and posted and get sent out by the Monday. So hopefully going forward they will arrive within 7 to 10 days of being ordered.

[Bryan Lea]

BMFA Rewards scheme
I have used this scheme to make some good savings on my purchases but lately I have come unstuck. I used the Argos website to order a Shark vacuum cleaner and paid with a Giftcloud voucher. About 2 hours after I placed the order I realised that I had ordered the wrong model and cancelled the order. Giftcloud say that since I have redeemed the voucher I am not entitled to a refund but they have taken the money from my bank account and I have nothing to show for it. Apparently 'no refunds' is in their terms and conditions. With the benefit of hindsight what I should have done was let the order for the wrong vacuum cleaner go through then taken it to the Argos store and exchanged it for the correct model. Let this be a warning to other BMFA members, don't change your minds.

[flyless]

I have saved a about £140 with the card

[Michael Adams 4]

HI, Argos web site be careful, I did order a printer paid for it, then was told the time to collect it.

I arrived on time with the numbers, fair play to them as I am disabled they carried it to my car.

That was on the Saturday, on the Sunday a van arrived at 8 AM and delivered a different model

for which I had been charged plus delivery, With a lot of problems getting to contact some one

I had to take it to Sainsburys to return it. All I got for the problems was the price of the printer no

delivery. So beware of their web site. Needless to say I will not be purchasing any thing else.

All the best and please take care.

Mike.

[flyless]

Just saved £4 at Helfords with the Vectiscard 

[Gary Manuel]

2 hours ago, flyless said:

Just saved £4 at Helfords with the Vectiscard 

Well that's paid for the plastic card then.