Cathay Pacific will start Boston – Hong Kong service in May of next year. This is exciting because Cathay Pacific is my overall favorite airline, and their Hong Kong – New York JFK service is my favorite flight in the world. When I first saw the news I thought it would be like the Newark and Toronto, with three classes of service — Business, Premium Economy, and Economy. Instead it’s like New York JFK, Chicago O’Hare, Los Angeles, and San Francisco with 4 classes of services — the three above plus a first class. The plane, a Boeing 777-300ER, will carry 275 passengers and offer first class, business class, premium economy, and economy cabins. Here’s the schedule: The 16-hour Hong Kong flight is scheduled to run four days a week, leaving Boston on Tuesday, Wednesday,…
Monthly Archives
Monthly Archives for August 2014.
HOT DEAL: Free 2-Day Weekend Car Rental from Avis
A week and a half ago I wrote about how you can get instant and free car rental status from Avis and from National. PointsCentric points out that when you sign up for your Avis status you will be given a free 2-day weekend car rental. [W]hen I got my confirmation email from Avis above, notifying me of my Avis First status, it included the perk of a free weekend rental! No previous rentals required! That email happened a few days ago but I waited to blog about until I received the coupon code and could test whether it works and it does. Sign up online for Avis First status. You’ll need to enter a MasterCard credit card as your payment choice. Just pay attention to the welcome email! You can join the 40,000+ people…
United Adding First Class Meals to Flights of Just 800 Miles
As American and US Airways split the difference on meal service and eliminate meals from nearly all flights under 1000 miles, United decides to go the opposite direction. Scott Mayerowitz reports that United will add back meals in domestic first class for flights of 800 miles or more. That would make United the most generous of the big 3, since Delta is sandwiched in the middle at 900 miles.
How Important Are Elites to Starwood? Uber to United and Hyatt? and Hyatt Bonuses
News and notes from around the interweb: The importance of loyalty to Starwood: 2% of guests deliver 30% of profit, and over 50% of guests are SPG members. Another underscoring as well of customization to meet guest needs. (HT: Alan H.) In addition to Hyatt’s 50,000 point bonus offer there are several offers between 2000 and 10,000 points that you may be eligible for. I apparently wasn’t targeted for any of them. Win 140,000 Hawaiian miles plus stays at the Royal Hawaiian and Moana Surfrider. What do people remember when their plane almost crashes? (HT: Hans M.) United’s mobile app now integrates with Uber Hyatt now embeds Uber in its app, too. I wasn’t totally impressed by Hyatt’s 40% bonus on purchased points so I’m not jumping on the offer of up to a 30%…
The Death of FEBO: American’s New Meal Ordering Procedure Starts September 1
When the US Airways and American merger finally got the go-ahead, airline President Scott Kirby promised that US Airways would adopt American’s higher standards. For meals, though, what’s actually happened is that the two airlines are splitting the difference. Roughly speaking American served meals on two hour flights and US Airways on three and a half hour flights — they’ll settle in the middle at two hours forty five minutes. Here are the specific time, distance, and offering standards that go into effect on September 1. One additional September 1 change that I hadn’t seen reported before, but that is being discussed on Flyertalk (HT: Jeremy F.) is a change to the order in which meal preferences will be taken from customers.
What are the Largest Airlines – in the US and in the World?
The winner of the crown among the World’s Largest Airlines – such as it is, since it’s hardly as meaningful a metric as ‘best airline’ or ‘most profitable airline’ — is American Airlines, now that they’ve merged with US Airways. When Delta merged with Northwest it became the largest airline in the United States. Then United merged with Continental and overtook Delta. That left American at number 3. Now, by most measures, things have shaken up again: American and US Airways merged to create the nation’s – and world’s – largest airline by a comfortable margin. United has struggled and Delta has grown. Delta has overtaken United as number 2 by aircraft, daily flights and passengers carried. (United still flies to more destinations than either American or Delta.) Now, if you’re going to include American…
The Most Lucrative Free Rental Car Day Promotion — National Car Rental One Two Free – is Back!
Back in June I said that National Car Rental would bring back their 1-2-Free promotion. And indeed they have. You earn a free rental day for every two qualifying rentals (mid-size or larger for 2 days or longer) between now and the end of January — that’s more than a five month earning period. And of course it is on top of the usual credits earned. Registration is required. And there are opportunities to earn points towards additional free days. Each qualifying rental earns 300 points, 600 points is a free rental day. Lots of small point activities, hard to earn the 300 points needed for a credit. I’ll get 50 points for connecting to Facebook. Add virtual credentials, downloading and making a reservation via the mobile app, and that only gets to 200 total…
The Most Lucrative Hotel Elite Status Now Has Published Criteria
Intercontinental’s Royal Ambassador elite level is in some ways the best elite status of any hotel program. It’s also one of the most vexing. The positives are remarkable. On top of the usual elite level benefits one finds with the major chains, they offer: Guaranteed 8am check-in, not just 4pm late checkout Complimentary free drinks from the mini-bar The minibar thing is ultra-cool. But after a few times over-indulging, and hosting parties in your suite, at least I find that you really just appreciate it for always having a bottle of water handy. 8 a.m. check-in is huge for arrivals in Europe and even some parts of Asia — knowing you’ll have a room after a long flight and without having to pay for the previous night.
A Credit Card Signup Bonus So Convoluted It Needs an Infographic!
Through August 31 — less than two weeks left! — ANA’s co-brand credit card a whopping 10,000 bonus miles for signing up. Now, ANA has a pretty good frequent flyer program. It’s distance-based. Chicago-Tokyo roundtrip, for instance, is just 90,000 miles in business class. New York – London roundtrip is 63,000 miles roundtrip in business. They do add fuel surcharges to most awards. Here’s the thing. Just to get 10,000 miles has to be the most convoluted process I’ve seen. It involves signing up for a TV subscription. And you have to submit your first bill to get credit. It’s so complicated, in fact, that they’ve developed an infographic to try to make sense out of it. Personally I think you’d be better off churning DirecTV subscriptions across different members of your household. But I…
The Monumental Importance of Hotel Coffee
Lots of hotel coffee in the U.S. is bad, but tends to be so much better in Asia. Coffee is important to me, a basic that I expect to be well provided-for by any full service hotel. I was frustrated when the Andaz Wall Street got rid of their 24 hour complimentary espresso machine in the lobby as a cost-cutting measure. Without coffee machines in the room, and without 24 hour room service even that can be a big deal when you wake up at 5 a.m. I always thought that the W brand’s ‘Whatever, Whenever’ concept was a good one though execution hasn’t often measured up. Like when the Whatever, Whenever line at the W San Diego couldn’t get me coffee at 5 am. The whatever part should have been easy since all I…
