News and Notes from Around the Interweb: Man falls asleep on a United Express flight, and gets left behind on the aircraft. It’s locked, he can’t get off. Not the first time this has happened, either. Couchsurfing is really about hookups. But you still don’t earn frequent guest points, but then I suppose it doesn’t involve much loyalty! Rocketmiles is offering 2014 bonus miles for a stay that includes New Year’s Eve (on top of regular miles earned for hotel bookings). The one thing the American Airlines-US Airways merger does have is labor’s blessing. Not that peace will last, but many folks get raises. Hopefully everyone works constructively to make the combination, expected to close tomorrow, as smooth as possible (which won’t actually be smooth, at least for a couple of weeks in early 2015).…
Monthly Archives
Monthly Archives for December 2013.
Wyndham Visa Increases Signup Bonus to 45,000 Points
Last month I wrote about how the Wyndham Visa was the only no fee card that allowed points transfers at a reasonable rate to many different airlines. There’s also a $69 annual fee version of the card. And through December 31 it has a 45,000 point signup bonus. Earn 30,000 Bonus Points with first purchase Earn 15,000 bonus points after you spend $1,000 in the first 3 months of account opening The strongest benefit of the premium version of the card is increased hotel earning. So I’d be more inclined towards the free one for ongoing spend for someone that doesn’t do a ton of credit card spend and thus wants a no annual fee card. And to be sure that’s a bigger bonus than they usually offer for the card. And it is a…
The American-US Airways Merger Will Close on Monday Morning: How Will That Affect Your Travel?
Monday morning the merger between American Airlines and US Airways is expected to close. This much may be obvious to some, but no to others, and this site attracts many any readers of all backgrounds and experience so it seemed worthy of a mention. While the news will report that American Airlines and US Airways have merged, for all intents and purposes that changes absolutely nothing in terms of immediate travel, and travel through the holidays. American and US Airways continue to operate as separate airlines and there’s not even any relationship between the two yet for the flying public. For the next month you will not even be able to earn American miles when flying US Airways (or vice versa). So if you have reservations to fly US Airways, continue to check in with…
What are the World’s Best Airport Lounges?
Scott McCartney‘s latest Wall Street Journal column makes some interesting claims about lounges. Why Are US Airline Lounges So Far Below World Standard? He explains that US airport lounges are below the standards of Europe and especially Asia because they’re populated by low fare domestic passengers rather than high fare premium cabin long haul ones. In other words, the economics are different. (Though I’m not sure why United’s and American’s international first class lounges, then, would be below the standards of their Asian counterparts.) That said, US lounges aren’t below the standard of many European business lounges, and certainly not below the standard for South America, or for that matter India or Parkistan. But in some sense that’s what George W. Bush used to call “the soft bigotry of low expectations.” I’ve spent many hours…
The Real Lesson for Dealing With Weather and Flight Disruptions
Yesterday I shared my experiences flying through significant weather events and some lessons for dealing with them. But I left out one of the most important lessons: avoid them in the first place. When you can possibly pull the plug on the trip before you begin, you probably should throw that option into the mix. Wandering Aramean tweeted at me, I still don’t believe you chose to fly in to an ice storm in Dallas. Seems like a bad decision all around. My response was that I chose to fly the day that US Airways and America West merged their reservation systems, too! In other words while I think I have pretty good strategies and approaches for dealing with problems as they arise, I’m probably too willing to push forward into the middle of situations…
January-March: Up to 7500 Miles Per JFK-LAX Flight Segment on American
Between January 7 and March 31 American is offering bonus miles to promote their new premium domestic product that will eventually serve New York JFK to both Los Angeles and San Francisco. The first new plane begins on the JFK – Los Angeles route on January 7. So this bonus promotes the JFK-Los Angeles flights. (JFK-San Francisco begins to get the new plane in March.) American’s new international business class aboard the 777-300ER is outstanding. We’ll begin to see the new seat on the 777-200 and 767-300s during the first half of 2014. American’s also got a new pimped out A319 but unfortunately it has just half the first class seat of the aircraft its meant to replace — a very tough upgrade. I am very very interested in these new A321s that will be…
New AAdvantage Shopping Promotion 3000 Bonus Miles
Between December 8 and December 22, the amount you spend with merchants through the AAdvantage shopping portal will earn tiered bonuses. One AAdvantage holiday shopping promotion ends, another one opens up and this time with up to 3000 bonus miles instead of 2500. Registration isn’t required. Making exactly $250 in purchases earns the full bonus and amounts to an extra 12 miles per dollar on top of usual earnings. Though fewer total miles, the lower spend thresholds amount to 13.33 miles per dollar. Terms: From 12/08/13 through 12/22/13 11:59 PM EST receive a one-time additional bonus of up to 3,000 miles when you spend a cumulative amount of $250 or more with the AAdvantage eShoppingsm mall. Spend a cumulative amount of $75-149.99 to earn 1,000 miles; spend a cumulative amount of $150 – $249.99 to…
Lessons From the Road: How to Deal with Weather Delays and Cancellations the Best You Can
I’m not sure how interesting this story is, but a couple of folks asked me to share it on Twitter. I think the idea is that sharing how I think about dealing with travel as it happens (and as it goes wrong) could be interesting and useful. There’s rarely going to be a ‘right way’ to approach irregular operations. Bad weather especially, lots of things going wrong, you’re playing percentages and also playing hunches based – hopefully – on years of experience in travel. Yesterday was a bad weather day for an American Airlines flyer, especially one transiting Dallas but really across much of the system because delays and cancellations in a major hub cascade across the whole system. A flight cancelled out of Dallas doesn’t make its next city, and can effect wherever the…
Last Day to Buy US Airways Miles for Just 1.1 Cents Apiece
US Airways brought back their “up to a 100% bonus on shared miles” (miles transferred between accounts) for just this week. So if you want to take advantage of it, today’s your last opportunity until and unless the bonus returns. And since it’s been a US Airways practice but not an American AAdvantage practice, the merger with American makes future such bonuses somewhat uncertain. You can earn up to 50,000 bonus miles with the offer, which should appear instantly with the transfer. The cost for this is “$0.01 per mile plus a processing fee of $30 and a tax recovery charge of 7.5%” — transferring 50,000 miles from one account to another will deposit 100,000 in that account at a cost of $567.50. Since that’s a net increase of 50,000 miles you’re buying miles at…
Supreme Court Justice Conflicts of Interest in their Current Airline Miles Case
This week the Supreme Court heard oral argument in the case of the Rabbi who complained too much and Northwest Airlines (now owned by Delta) shut down his frequent flyer account as a result. The Rabbi sued, and one of the crucial questions in whether his suit is permissable is whether a state court’s view of contracts as having to be made fairly and in good faith is an acceptable overlay in light of the Airline Deregulation Act’s prohibition on states regulating an airlines prices, routes, and schedules. I’ve covered the major arguments in this space already. And having taken an eye to the knowledge (and in some cases lack of knowledge) that the Justices appear to posses regarding frequent flyer miles based on the questions they asked on Tuesday, I thought it worth noting…
