Barbara DeLollis writes about a $6700 New York City marathon hotel night package at the Pierre. [P]ackage provides: a stay in one of the Pierre’s 11 grand suites, a pair of sneakers at turndown (you must provide your shoe size in advance), a 60-minute massage after your run in your room for two, and a pasta dinner for two at the.. restaurant. I’ve often wondered whether anyone actually books these sort of packages, or whether they’re more for the PR buzz than for actual booking. Certainly any time I’ve seen “romance packages” that include a bottle of champagne, they almost never actually say what kind of champagne it is — which tells pretty all I need to know, that it’s not going to be a bottle I’m actually going to want to drink, or that…
Monthly Archives
Monthly Archives for September 2014.
MGM M Life Takes Away a Benefit That Hyatt Elites Should Care About
Last summer Hyatt launched a pretty incredible alliance with MGM hotels. It’s a pretty revolutionary hotel alliance, not unlike airline alliances. Hyatt didn’t have a big footprint in Las Vegas. Their members can earn points and elite qualifying stays and nights, as well as redeem points at MGM’s M Life hotel properties like Bellagio, Mandalay Bay, and MGM Grand. MGM members have reciprocal benefits at Hyatt properties as well. And the deal they struck even includes elite status recognition as well. Hyatt Diamond members get MGM’s Platinum status (even Hyatt Platinum, the level you get signing up for a Hyatt Visa, gets you MGM Gold). The key here is that MGM members get the benefits of Hyatt when staying at Hyatt and Hyatt members get MGM’s benefits when staying at MGM. In other words, no…
Is the Ultra High End Aman Resorts Imploding Amidst Death Threats from a Russian Oligarch?
There may be no more important story about the future of true luxury travel this summer than the epic struggle for control of Aman Resorts. Fortune goes in-depth into the ultra-luxury chain’s dirty laundry. I’ve never stayed at an Aman Resort. I have wanted to for many years, but I probably never will. There’s no points program. I can’t use my miles (other than credit card points that buy any travel at about a penny a point, but that’s not a good value here). They’re simply too much money, I’d never be comfortable spending $1000 a night on a room. I’ve never spent half that (though I’ve come kind of sort of close to half using points redeemed for stay certificates used for a buy up on an award night, hah). Nonetheless, they do appear…
Secrets of Three Letter Airport Codes Revealed
That’s a Daily Mail piece that Alan H. forwards to me. There are three letter airport codes that match the first three letters of their city name, like SYD for Sydney and MEL for Melbourne, Australia. They don’t get to use the first three letters for Detroit Metropolitan Airport, since DET is actually the old Detroit City Airport (now named ‘Coleman A. Young Municipal Airport’ and without scheduled commercial service). New York’s JFK airport is JFK, LaGuardia takes three letters from its name, and Hong Kong (HKG) does as well. Denver gets DEN but many mistakenly or colloquially refer to it as ‘DIA’. What the article taught me that I didn’t actually know: Early airports used two letter codes based on weather stations, and those legacy airports get an ‘X’ (hence LAX, SUX). Canadian airports…
Buying Your Airline Tickets Outside the U.S. to Save Money
Reader Andy G. passes along this article that talks about how you can ‘buy airline tickets international’ — getting the best deal on airfare based on the country in which tickets are purchased. I think it overstates the case a bit (“once I was in Bangkok, that same flight that was once $300 would fall to $30 almost inexplicably”), but it’s worth understanding what ‘point of sale’ means for airfare purchases. It’s often cheaper to buy tickets “in-country” in South America and in Asia than it is to buy those same tickets abroad. The same phenomenon is true for buying train tickets in Europe versus online in English.
UH OH: Here’s How Your Business Travel Expense Reimbursements Could Put You On the Evening News
Barbara DeLollis flags a story about a “point scheme” that “came at taxpayers’ expense.” A county employee in Santa Clara, California supposedly defrauded the local government by… [Using] his personal credit card to pay for his travel expenses as well as the expenses of employees, all of whom are supposed to use a county credit card. In some cases, he would use his credit card to pay their expenses when he was not traveling with them. He’d get reimbursed for the expenses – and allegedly keep the points.. Wait. Say what..?
Free China Visa Processing This Month
Free China Visa: Through the end of the month Allied Passport & Visa is offering to process China visas for free and to discount other services for readers of this blog. Several folks have used their service now, and I’ve gotten universally good feedback. Here’s one email from a reader, Susan. My husband and I are traveling to China later this month to visit our daughter, and when I read about Allied’s offer to process China visas free for readers of View from the Wing, I just had to give it a try. I was concerned that Allied would not be able to process an application from someone in Colorado, so I emailed the company before sending in our apps to be sure they could handle the request. I received a reply the next morning…
The New IHG Free Night Promo Is the Most Generous and Game-able We’ve Seen in Five Years. Here’s How to Play It.
IHG Rewards Free Night Promo: Here’s how it works and why you’ll want to play Earlier in the week I wrote that IHG Rewards – the loyalty program for Intercontinental, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, and related brands – would be bringing back their fun, complicated, and rewarding “Big Win” promotion for the fall under a new name. IHG’s Into the Nights Promotion turns out to be easier and more rewarding than past versions. Registration is required and the promotion period runs through the end of the year. Different members get different offers. Generally unengaged, irregular guests with the chain get easy offers and regular guests get tougher offers. (Members opening a new account seem to get the easiest offers.)
American Express Eliminated Online Message Customer Support
I like doing customer service with credit card companies online, in writing. I don’t like calling. I don’t really like the phone anyway, it’s more of an intrusion. I prefer to compose my thoughts clearly and crisply, and not have to wait in real-time for the company to respond, to transfer me around, to re-explain things. I like a written record of the company’s response. That way if they don’t deliver, I can refer them back to their commitment. They get to record phone calls, it’s not nearly as convenient for me to do so. Unfortunately American Express has gotten rid of their online email customer support leaving chat as the online option. The online ‘secure message center’ – where you log into your account and send an electronic message – is gone. This isn’t…
Is British Airways Going to Move to a Revenue-Based Frequent Flyer Program?
Earlier I wrote about whether American appears to be taking the best approach in integrating airlines first as part of its merger with US Airways and only then evaluating whether to make a shift similar to United and Delta in terms of awarding miles on the basis of money spent on tickets rather than miles flown. In making the case that American should be moving quickly on IT investments (that he suggests would be in the tens or hundreds of millions of dollars!), he suggests that American needs to do this to keep up with joint business venture partner British Airways. If anyone reading this were CEO for the day would you not have the topic on your plate right now? Or would you rather in two years, when you decide to move to a…
