About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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The Starwood American Transfer Bonus Didn’t End! Extended Through August 31

Aug 07 2015

While the most obvious thing to do with Starwood points is use them for hotel stays, I think the most valuable thing to do with them is transfer them to airline miles.

The 20% bonus on transfers to American AAdvantage — every 20,000 Starpoints you transfer will get you 30,000 American miles — was supposed to end but has been extended through August 31.

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Review: American Express Centurion Studio, Seattle

Aug 07 2015

American Express’ first ‘Centurion Studio’ opened a month ago at Seattle’s international airport, across from gate B3.

Overall it was a nice space, where I enjoyed spending a couple of hours. I definitely prefer it over the Alaska Airlines Boardroom (but no pancake machine) and over the United Club there. But make no mistake, it’s not a Centurion Lounge if you’ve been to one of those in another U.S. airport.

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American Didn’t Just Leak New Elite Status Rules

american and us tails
Aug 06 2015

Several months ago the American Airlines website erroneously listed the miles required for top tier Executive Platinum status as 120,000 instead of 100,000. That was quickly corrected.

Yesterday an American AAdvantage member posted a message they received from AAdvantage Customer Service on Flyertalk with that same ‘mistake’.

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