Virgin Traveller

[MrCheese]

Does anyone know what the new requirements are for the virgin traveller scheme? It is now "invitation only" and when I called them to ask they were extremely unhelpful and evasive.

I travel a lot on Virgin trains, intentionally booking economy tickets as it will cost me many thousands of pounds to switch to first. If I did start buying first tickets I'm worried that for some technical reason I might not meet the criteria and will have wasted a lot of money.

It does seem unfair that they won't help me to join after I've spent so much money with them.

 

[ramitamimi]

I would also be very intrested,does anyone have any details?

 

[michael769]

Traveller is an invitation-only programme offered to our most frequent travellers booking tickets through our website virgintrains.com.
Invitations to join Traveller are sent by email so make sure you’re registered to receive communications from Virgin Trains to be sure that you’ll receive yours.
By registering your details here you consent to receive news and exclusive offers from Virgin Trains.

http://www.virgintrains.co.uk/traveller/qualify-for-traveller/
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Their faq is a little more specific

What is Traveller?
Traveller is an exclusive club designed specifically for our regular First Class customers.
back to top

http://www.virgintrains.co.uk/traveller/frequently-asked-questions/

 

[MrCheese]

Thanks for the replies. I did check the FAQ and call them but it doesn't give any indication of the requirements. As I said before they could not be have been more evasive or unhelpful on the phone. It is exactly this kind of attitute to customers that really leaves a bad impression of the company.

 

[MKB]

Before the programme became invitation-only, membership required 16 single (or 8 return) first-class trips on Virgin routes (not necessarily Virgin services) in the 3-months before application. Each ticket had to cost a minimum amount. I forget what the final minimum amount was, but I last re-qualified by spending about £900.

The new system seems crazy. There will be high-spending regular first-class travellers who get their corporate travel department to make the bookings and Virgin will have no idea who they are. So how will they get "invited"?

 

[island]

You have to book with VT to get invited. As a plus it means they are keeping the 5%/9% commission.

 

[MKB]

You have to book with VT to get invited. As a plus it means they are keeping the 5%/9% commission.

Yes, that was my point. Traveller is a marketing initiative, yet it now misses a lot of their highest spending customers. I'm amazed they haven't gone down the route of tracking personal usage, regardless of how it's booked, like airlines and East Coast Trains do.

 

[maddeningcrowds]

I'm amazed they haven't gone down the route of tracking personal usage, regardless of how it's booked, like airlines and East Coast Trains do.

How does East Cost do this?

 

[smid]

Well, I requalified in the in between bit, I started travelling to london just as the franchise was given to First Group, but I knew the previous qualifying criteria (75 pounds min per leg of journey, 3 calender months, 16 legs) and did the qualifying anyway, just as a completely optimistic exercise.

All through that time it said that the scheme was under review (it never really came out of that state on front page), but they got the franchise back in November, and I had my 16 journey somewhere around early December.

Then about January, then contacted me saying I'd qualified again (even though it took about a month to get it going again). Then they took a lot longer than expected to put out the new photo id cards (obviously some people had been abusing it a bit), but I could travel on my old card plus the letter and other photo id.

I might give a try at requalifying using the same criteria again, if I do, I will keep you posted.

Weirdly the online booking system seems to get confused sometimes, like this week it won't allow Friday travel (if not fixed, I will phone it). For a few weeks, it didn't like returns on sunday too...

 

[smid]

Recently got the details from virgin, the qualification terms are the same as they used to be, over 70 quid for advance first single and 100 quid anytime first return or 50 quid anytime first single. Need 16 legs in 90 days.