Barbara DeLollis reports on a new Santa Monica, California law outlawing hotel doormen from enforcing kickbacks from cab drivers. Apparently the ‘cut’ is about 10% and is referred to as a ‘cookie’. My suspicion is that cab drivers pay because regulated taxi fares in many cities are set above market clearing prices. Or at least because on average pickups of passengers from hotels reduce waiting times, so they are more lucrative at the regulated fare (since fares cannot legally vary by location of pickup in most jurisdictions) than trolling for rides. So it’s worth it to them to do so. Hotels tacitly condone the practice because they see the cab drivers as compensating their doormen, so they pay those employees less. Further, the kickback schemes kelp retain employees, it takes time to cultivate illicit kickbacks…
Monthly Archives
Monthly Archives for April 2011.
On Bringing the Road Back Home, Instead of Making the Road Feel Like Home
Some hotel chains try to recreate stay experiences to make their guests feel as much at home as possible. But many regular guests feel more at home in a hotel than they do when they’re not on the road. I know I’ve certainly brought the hotel feel home, and I enjoy experiencing new things from design elements to foods and even glassware. The bathrooms in the condo I own and now rent out was designed to feel like several of the modern hotel bathrooms I’ve seen, my wife found the perfect glass vanities with bowl sinks, the shower tiles we like, and shower systems that we’ve liked the best. When I was staying at W hotels more frequently I started using Bliss products at home, though I’m now less enamored (most recently preferring L’Occitane). And…
Two Great Miles for Flowers Offers
The Continental mileage mall is offering 25 miles per dollar plus 100 miles per order for shopping at 1-800-Flowers.com through May 10 (with promo code CNT67. If you have a Continental Mastercard (even if you don’t pay for the purchase with a Continental Mastercard) you earn double points on shopping through the Continental portal. That makes this offer 50 miles per dollar plus 200 miles. Meanwhile, FTD.com is offering 30 American Airlines miles per dollar. Sadly shipping charges don’t earn miles. Now, these lucrative mileage offers should tell you something. The markup on these flowers is ginormous. But it’s sure easy and convenient to send flowers this way, and if you have any business gifts to give you’re really giving something to a client or prospect and to yourself. Hah! These offers aren’t as good…
Should I Transfer My American Express Points to Continental Before Their Partnership Ends?
One of the questions I’ve been frequently asked lately is whether or not someone with American Express Membership Rewards points should transfer their points to Continental before the partnership ends September 30. I’ve been averaging at least 2-3 emails a week asking what to do. And it’s actually a riff on a larger question which is, “what should I do with my American Express points?” because folks seem to have a natural urge to transfer them somewhere. I’ve just answered a similar question on Milepoint, so I thought I’d share it here as well. Here’s my reply: Definitely not ‘now’ — you have through September 30 to transfer to Continetnal. So might as well wait at least that long to see what needs you have in the meantime, or what other bonuses come up. For…
1000 Free US Airways Miles Just for Asking
A week ago US Airways emailed a large number of the members to say that they were being given 1000 free miles. The subject of the email was “They’re waiting in your account!” Miles make you smile… …And they get you where you want to be We know you love award travel…and we love seeing you happy! So, we added 1,000 bonus miles to your account.* We hope these miles get you a little closer to your next award trip. Keep flying and using Dividend Miles partners and you’ll be on your way in no time! Only they weren’t waiting in my account. Or just about anyone else’s. And at the end of the week they sent a follow up email titled “Oops!” Earlier this week, we inadvertently delivered an email message to many of…
1000 Free American Airlines Miles for Registering for their Shopping Portal
Via the Points Guy if you aren’t already registered with the American AAdvantage eShopping portal you can earn 1000 miles if you sign up by May 13, accept their emails, and watch a short video. I am, sadly, already registered for the site so won’t benefit from this. But if you aren’t it’s a great easy 1000 miles.
Come Meet Jeff Robertson, Head of the Delta Skymiles Program, April 29 in New York
I’ve previously shared the details of the Randy Petersen Travel Executive Summit. The heads of the American AAdvantage, United Mileage Plus, and Hyatt Gold Passport programs have been slated to be there for a lunch, where Randy offers comments on 30 years of frequent flyer programs and these leaders add their own insights. A great opportunity to meet the people who run the programs (and if it were me, I’d be thinking, get their cards and figure out how to follow up with theirs assistants whenever my miles fail to post – hah!). Well, the news today is that Jeff Robertson is now joining them as well. Here are my past posts on Jeff Robertson, who has always struck me as a candid guy. He may not always say things that I like, but when…
50,000 Mile Signup Bonus for Lufthansa’s Miles & More U.S. Credit Card
Via Milepoint (here and here, the Lufthansa Mastercard issued in the U.S. by Barclays is offering a 50,000-mile signup bonus: 20,000 miles after first purchase and 30,000 more miles after $2,500 in spend within the first 90 days of account opening. (In case it’s useful, here’s a direct link to the card application, without specific mention of the bonus, per the Milepoint thread.) So another co-branded airline card jumping into the megabonus game. This isn’t as big as Citibank offering 75,000 or 100,000 miles for its American Airlines cards, or Chase offering 100,000 for its British Airways card. But like recent offers for the United and Continental co-branded cards, 50,000 does seem to be the new entry-level in order to get attention or be taken seriously as a signup bonus. I don’t really play with…
View from the Wing in Other Media
The current cover story of Inside Flyer discusses how to go about booking award travel, from constructing the itinerary with available seats and the websites you can use to find those seats, as well as preparing for and making a successful call to the airline. It features many of the suggestions and techniques that I offered at the Chicago Seminar back in October, and outlines the pluses and minuses of the KVS Availabiltiy Tool, Expertflyer, and Award Nexus. My criticism of Nate Silver’s New York Times take on fairness and disparity in airfares leads their roundup of online reaction to his writings. While it’s certainly interesting to do statistical analysis of airfares, I take issue with the conclusions he draws from the data analysis. As one of my commenters observed, how can Fedex be taking…
Free American Airlines Miles ‘Fortune Cookie’ Promotion
Via Deals We Like, American Airlines is giving away miles with a few easy clicks. Through May 29 you can go to the promotion website, click “Don’t Have a Code” and enter your email address. Once you submit, the site will tell you whether you’ve won anything, and if so how many miles. You can win up to 25,000 miles. But you might win nothing. You can keep trying using a unique email address (and refresh the promotion code) until you get a mileage offer you like, you don’t enter your mileage account number until the screen where they tell you if you’ve won and how many miles. I admit, I got nothing my first three tries and gave up patience at 200 miles. But others have reported greater success, and it just takes a…
