In early July I wrote a post about the most useful and interesting developments in miles and points over the previous month> It turns out, surprisingly, that the feature was really popular, at least judging by the emails I got — people that don’t read the blog every day really appeciated the recap and not having to dig through all of the posts to find the most enduring ones. I didn’t do a similar feature in August, but I thought I’d revisit the 170 posts I wrote in August. I hope you were happy with some of the posts and got something out of them. These are some that were my favorites from August. Saving money Always enter car rental confirmation numbers into AutoSlash for free and easy savings. Get instant free status from Avis…
Monthly Archives
Monthly Archives for September 2014.
Two New Hotel Sites Get You Better Rooms for Less Money
AutoSlash for Hotels Monitors Prices and Upgrades Point Hacks writes about new pay service Stay Angel which will: Keep checking your hotel reservations for price drops Compare your bookings against better rates at online travel websites to identify opportunities for best rate guarantee claims (and submits the claims for you) Identify when prices of suites drop to close to your room rate in case you want to buy up. They monitor Hilton, Starwood, and Hyatt. And they also flag big price movements, letting you know when hotels that they track are at least 50% below their normal price. (See also How to Find Airline and Hotel Mistake Fares.) There’s a free membership and a free trial for their premium service. The free account only tells you when your reservation has been upgraded, and alerts you…
In the Future, Booking Corporate Travel Will Be as Good (sic) as Airline Websites
Companies use managed travel programs to get bulk discounts and limit the conflicts of interest inherent to having travelers make their own travel decisions. But many of those companies don’t do a very good job of it, and the tools provided to travelers are frequently not very good. Skift interviews the CEO of Concur about the future of booking corporate travel. Bottom line is that employees don’t do what they’re told, despite incentives and even threats if they don’t use corporate travel booking tools. Over 50% of hotels booked by business travelers in managed travel programs are booked outside of corporate policy. Part of this is that employees get better deals outside their corporate booking channels. Travel managers protest that they have booking goals to get big rebates and travelers don’t understand how good a…
You’ll Want to Read These Seven Stories to Stay in the Know (Number 7 is for Real Aviation Geeks Only)
News and notes from around the interweb: The Citi Double Cash Card — which in my view is the strongest cash rebate card — is targeting some people with signup bonuses. There may be a brief window to get a whole lot of extra value from the Citi Prestige card. Why Maui’s Kahului Airport three-letter code is OGG Teachers buy a UK airport IranAir will retire the last Boeing 747SP in November. It flies Tehran – Kuala Lumpur. Assembling an aircraft in a private hanger is actually illegal. So is storing gliders and balloons. Aircraft wheels can’t be stored in an aircraft hangar with the aircraft itself, either. Who knew? You can buy a bed made from a Boeing 747 GE engine nacelle. Or perhaps you prefer a conference table? You can join the 40,000+…
The Qatar Airways A380 Doesn’t Belong to Them, and the Crazy Route it Took to the Gulf
This past week Lucky noted that the first Qatar Airways A380 was delivered. It’s been a bizarre, bumpy road getting there not least of which because of the Qatar Airways CEO’s truthiness problem. Interestingly, Qatar doesn’t actually own their A380, it’s leased through a UK leasing company. And UK regulations required the aircraft to be in UK airspace when the transaction took place. So from Thursday… The Qatar Airways A380 needs to be filed under: Things that make you go hmmm. Last month I asked whether the Airbus A380 is a failure. You can join the 40,000+ people who see these deals and analysis every day — sign up to receive posts by email (just one e-mail per day) or subscribe to the RSS feed. It’s free. You can also follow me on Twitter for…
How Your Wireless Internet Can Get You Arrested at the Airport
Not sure how I missed this story last week. A passenger was detained on a Southwest plane at Seattle-Tacoma Airport after using ominous names for his Wi-Fi hot spot, sources said. Passenger Alayna Keagle said people became concerned Thursday after noticing strange and disturbing hot spot names emerge, such as “Southwest – Bomb on Board.” …“He changed it to ‘the bomb is on this seat,’ and then he changed it to something about the stewardess being hot,” Saldi said. “And so that’s why once we found all that stuff out we realized he was probably just goofing off.” Apparently this happened on September 11th. The plane’s pilot pulled off the active taxiway, police surrounded the plane and then boarded it. The man was detained. All passengers were then pulled from the plane, and all bags…
Travel Loyalty Programs are All About Conflicts of Interest
I was recently engaged as an expert witness for a federal criminal trial. It’s a fascinating story that I plan to tell. But in order to explain how a program member got embroiled in what was seen as a conflict of interest, how this person came to be at odds with her employer, and how the federal government got involved we need to start at the beginning. And that’s that loyalty programs are all about creating an incentive for individuals to choose their product over another — whether the choice comes at the best price, or in the case of purchases using an employer’s money whether or not the individual is acting in the best interests of their employer.
Never Accept a Room That’s Unacceptable
I checked into Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas yesterday. Quickly up to my room and there was a strong smell of chlorine. Back down to the check-in desk. Now, it was noon (so not yet check-in time). The hotel was full. They had no rooms to offer. I could have waited for a room, something was going to open up and they were still cleaning rooms. That would certainly have been a reasonable solution if they didn’t have a room to give me initially. But they gave me a room, it just wasn’t one that was habitable. So I thought it was reasonable for them to find me a solution right away. Some of the Las Vegas hotels are mega-properties, and certainly Mandalay Bay is one of them since it’s a complex that also includes…
A New Signup Bonus for the Fidelity Investment Rewards 2% Rebate Amex
I’m liking the new Citi Double Cash product as the best cash rebate card but the Fidelity Investment Rewards American Express currently has a $50 signup bonus. I favor points over cash back. But I also recognized that if I’m doing any un-bonused spend, I’m effectively buying points at 2 cents apiece, since I could otherwise be earning two cents per dollar spent. I don’t want to do that with most points currencies. So as I’ve long said, a cash rebate like this may be the best option for spending that isn’t going to earn a bonus on a points and miles credit card. Now, Bank of America can get you a 2.625% rebate but only if you put $100,000 on deposit with BofA. For most, though, that’s going to be a bit out of…
San Diego is Cracking Down on Cab Drivers Who Smell
The San Diego airport is requiring cab drivers not to smell bad. And the cab drivers are livid. For years, inspectors with the San Diego Regional Airport Authority have run down their checklist for each cabbie — proof of insurance, functioning windshield wipers, adequate tire treads, good brakes. Drivers are graded pass, fail or needs fixing. Anyone who flunks the smell test is told to change before picking up another customer. The cab drivers say it’s racism and unfair. And indeed, cab drivers do tend to be immigrants. A 2013 survey of 331 drivers by San Diego State University and Center on Policy Initiatives found 94 percent were immigrants and 65 percent were from East Africa. Here’s the thing. Smell can be subjective. But smell can also be bad and if there’s an issue, and…
