Marriott is sending Air France-KLM Flying Blue elite members an offer to sign up for a new Marriott Rewards account with instant gold status. The offer includes triple Flying Blue miles through June 30. Gold status should last for the first program year of enrollment. Signing up through this offer will generate an account number right away, but the actual signup will that 3-5 days to process, and it won’t be possible to create an online account until that’s completed. So perhaps there is a process in place for checking Flying Blue accounts against elite status, although this isn’t clear, so it remains to be seen whether anyone can use the link to sign up with Gold status. As they say, “your mileage may vary.”
Monthly Archives
Monthly Archives for March 2008.
Beijing’s New Teminal 3
Thursday, March 27, 2008 After breakfast in the lounge we checked out (removing the 8RMB opt-out charitable donation, as I’ve noted elsewhere I take my charity seriously and make gifts on my own, and don’t participate in these sorts of arrangements; separately my understanding of the empirical research is that the corporate giving level remains the same independent of guest participation, so the contribution really amounts to a contribution to the company rather than providing incremental dollars to a charity) and left for the airport around 8:30am. Traffic was bad getting out of the city, but clear afterwards, and we pulled up at Beijing’s new Terminal 3 at about 9:30am. Cab was 103RMB. Beijing’s new terminal is certainly impressive. It’s an architectural marvel, if a little bit sterile, and it’s opening was certainly smoother than…
One Day to Tour Beijing
Beijing Tour in One Day: Ok, I grant you most will find it crazy to fly up to Beijing to spend just one full day. But we packed a good bit in, had a nice time, so why not? At the suggestion of Flyertalk.com member AZ Travels the World we booked a lovely and knowledgable tour guide named Alice. He had warned me that she wasn’t especially responsive to e-mail, but actually if I waited a couple of days she’d get back to me. I really do prefer to work by email rather than phone. She called us at the hotel the night we arrived, and confirmed the time we’d be meeting in the hotel lobby. She did ask something we hadn’t discussed earlier – whether I’d have a car. I rather assumed she would! No problem,…
Aloha Airlines Ceases Operations
Well that was quick, they just went back in bankruptcy on March 20th. Joe Sharkey points to United’s statement about their partner’s collapse. For customers who are flying on a United ticket, United will rebook them on an alternate flight where space is available, for no additional charge. For customers traveling on an Aloha ticket, United is offering discounted one-way fares through the end of April that will make it easier for them to return home.United will continue to honor reservations that AlohaPass frequent flier members have on a United flight. United will refund frequent flier miles at no additional charge to United Mileage Plus members who have an award ticket reservation on an Aloha flight. Apparently Aloha’s cargo operation remains profitable and will continue operation, being auctioned off in April. Update: Hawaiian is making…
Delta Double Elite Qualifying Miles
Delta is offering double Medallion Qualification Miles for Delta-coded flights booked at delta.com between March 31 and April 30, for travel through June 30, 2008. Registration required. With three months to fly under this offer, (the next level of) elite status will be a gimme for many. With just 75,000 qualifying miles for top tier, and with elite qualifying miles available to high spenders on both the personal and small business co-branded American Express card, Delta right now is the easiest top tier status to obtain among major US carriers. On the one hand, their program has gotten increasingly unfriendly. I’ve long said the only reason to focus on Delta is if you’re living in Atlanta and more or less captive. But top tier elites get many of the unfriendly fees waives (such as award…
Accessory for Concealing Cash While Traveling
I’ve been known to wear a discrete money belt when traveling, a regular belt with a zipper lining on the inside that lets me conceal perhaps 15 bills. But if you really want to be sure that no one takes your stash of cash, well, this may be the most brilliant (and truly frightening) invention ever. Dirty underwear, complete with skid marks, to hide you funds. I’m truly speechless, and yet in awe.
Westin Beijing Financial Street
About 1h15m in traffic, the cab deposited us at the Westin for 118RMB. I had had a map to the hotel with the address in Chinese (which I had emailed the hotel for), but the dispatcher simply asked us our destination and communicated it to the driver and all was fine. Upstairs to the club lounge to checkin (since Platinums have access to the lounge, they can necessarily check in there). I had reserved the hotel on a cash and points award, US$60 + 4000 points a night. 500 point Plat amenity has already posted, along with points from two room service coffee orders, but no points for the cash portion of the rate – will have to followup. We were informed the hotel was full (and it certainly was, with a huge American tour…
Thai Airways First Class, Bangkok to Beijing
Tuesday, March 25, 2008 Bangkok, Thailand (BKK) to Beijing, China (PEK) 11:05 am Thai Airways 0614, Boeing 747, First Class, Seats 2J, 2K Scheduled flight time: 4h 25m We left the Novotel around 7:45am and took the shuttle over to the airport. Another couple was on the shuttle with us, heading to a domestic destination, so we were both dropped off at the same point – Royal First/Royal Silk checkin comes first, right before domestic. We got out of the shuttle, had only our carryons, so none of the porters stirred. We approached the Royal First check-in room and as soon as we entered we were greeted and brought inside to sit down. We turned over our passports, paid our departure tax (they dispatched a staff member to pay it and brought us our receipts),…
bmi Wants You To Know That They Don’t Operate Out of Heathrow Terminal 5
bmi is gloating over British Airways’ problems with the new Terminal 5 at London-Heathrow. bmi, London Heathrow’s second largest airline, is continuing to operate all flights as scheduled from its main hub at Terminal 1 despite disruption at the newly-opened Terminal 5. Problems at Terminal 5, which opened to passengers yesterday (Thursday 27 March), have resulted in significant delay and disruption to BA flights operating from the new facility. In contrast Terminal 1, which now has 40 per cent less passengers to accommodate following BA’s move to Terminal 5, is running like clockwork as is bmi, the principal competitor to BA at Heathrow. New bmi Diamond Club members receive 4,500 miles just for enrolling. That’s enough for a one-way flight within the U.K. or betweek the U.K. and Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Netherlands, Ireland, or…
Bangkok Overnight at the Airport Novotel
Novotel Suvarnabhumi Airport With the time change it was about 9pm local time when we got out of the BKK airport. We were heading back to the airport for a morning flight, wanted to get there early enough for the first class spa, and so decided not to head into the city and instead spend the night at the Novotel on the airport grounds. While the in-room materials describe the walkway from the terminal, that isn’t built yet. Instead there’s a shuttle that runs every 15 minutes. After clearing immigration and customs, there’s a Novotel representative standing by door 4 ready to assist you into the hotel’s van. A quick loop around the airport access roads and you’re at the hotel. Contra several reports, check-in was a breeze although there were curiously many forms to…
