News and notes from around the interweb: I’m giving away 5 prizes each of a $200 gift card and top tier elite status with National Car Rental. Leave a comment in the entry thread, that’s all you have to do to enter. Reports of a Citi Prestige 50,000 point signup bonus. Here’s a review of the card and how to leverage its points. Interview with the CEO of a website that lets you buy and sell non-refundable hotel rooms. Brilliant way to get your money back out of a booking you made, or as a buyer to get room nights as a discount by providing this liquidity. No doubt in time hotels will find a way to crack down on the practice. Emirates is dishonoring car service reservations they had previously confirmed for premium cabin…
About Gary Leff
Caesars Entertainment Files for a Very Very Messy Bankruptcy
Caesars Entertainment Operating Group, which owns most of Caesars Palace in Las Vegas, filed for bankruptcy today in Chicago. This is going to be one complicated bankruptcy. Some of Caesars’ creditors sought to force the entity into bankruptcy in Delaware earlier in the week, and the Delaware judge has ordered a halt to the Chicago bankruptcy proceedings. One of the main players at Caesars is TPG Capital Management, the private equity firm founded by Dave Bonderman back in 1993 to acquire Continental Airlines. They invested in Midwest Airlines, ultimately selling out to Republic. They also partnered on an acquisition of Sabre. They acquired the entity with a second private equity firm just before the recession for $30 billion — of which about 80% was high interest debt. Especially controversial is that the entity with this…
Review: American First Class Lounge Chicago O’Hare and Business Class, Chicago – Paris
Previous installments: Introduction: Paris for the Holidays, Saying Goodbye to American’s Old Business Class, and a Suite at the Park Hyatt Vendome I’ve reviewed American’s Flagship first class lounges many times, such as Los Angeles, New York JFK, New York JFK, New York JFK, and Chicago O’Hare. So if you’re interested in more detail these previous reports will be of interest. I arrived at O’Hare with a 3 hour 15 minute connection, plenty of time to visit the small Flagship Lounge at the very end of the K concourse near gate K19. This lounge has seating, a bit of food, a self serve bar, restrooms, and fantastic staff. It’s pretty non-descript. But there’s sushi, as it doubles as the lounge for Japan Airlines. And there’s whipped cream, which I guess if you’ve been outside the…
The Truth Behind Hyatt’s New Diamond Status Challenge Offer
Just before the New Year I shared details of Hyatt’s new Diamond Status Challenge offer. Hyatt used to have a super generous and game-able offer where anyone with even Hilton Gold (through a credit card signup) could get temporary Diamond status complete with confirmable suite upgrades. That long-time offer ended October 31. At the time Hyatt suggested that a simple way to switch loyalty for top elites of other chains wasn’t gone for good. Plenty of frequent flyers want a jumpstart towards Hyatt’s top status tier, and a way to make it as painless as possible to switch chains. But Hyatt doesn’t want to give away the benefits of Diamond, including confirmed suite upgrades, to people who aren’t going to stay loyal to the chain and become frequent guests.
LEAKED MEMO: NCAA Faces a Shortage of Charter Aircraft, Sees Hardship Ahead
Airlines don’t have a lot of spare planes that they’re willing to charter for the NCAA tournament, so in pursuit of a seamless travel experience for collegiate basketball teams there are going to have to be some sacrifices — like: Women’s teams will be required to take departures as late as 10pm. They can fly a day earlier than usual if they wish and will be paid an extra day’s per diem if they do. Men’s teams with an early game time in the second round will be required to fly home the same day they played. Teams with start times after 3pm will fly home the next day — but might have to fly early. But if their travel is late in the day, they’ll get extra per diem and be guaranteed late checkout…
Hyatt’s 40% Bonus on Purchased Points
Hyatt Gold Passport is offering up to a 40% bonus on purchased points through January 31. It’s targeted for those who purchased points in 2014. The system they’re using to verify eligibility looks exactly like the one US Airways uses:
Get a Refund on Exorbitant UK Aviation Taxes, 500 Free Miles, and Which Politicians Fly Coach…
News and notes from around the interweb: Do you remember paying international departure taxes at the airport, when you’d go through immigration on the way out of a country? For the most part all taxes are now collected with tickets, and airlines remit them to the relevant governments. This makes things much easier. Yet the US government has been studying setting up kiosks and websites to collect airport fees separate from tickets. They needed a study to understand this is a bad idea, as if in-airport and ticket-buying experience isn’t cumbersome enough for the median traveler. Flyers on Skyteam member China Eastern opened the emergency exits when frustrated by a delay. Again. This is apparently becoming ‘a thing’ in China. 20% off United economy awards to Hong Kong booked by February 1 for travel between…
Starting Tomorrow United Will Offer Corporate Status Matches — Up to 1K — for 22 Months!
On January 1 I noted that United was waiving their minimum revenue requirement for elite status for some members who had flown enough but not spent enough in 2014. There was some speculation that United was losing too many elites. It’s not that they want low spending elites, per se, but a program certain manages the total number of elites at each tier relative to the total member population and available seats at the airline. Too many elites and they can’t deliver benefits consistently and they’ll turn off valuable customers. Too few, and they aren’t effectively utilizing the marketing muscle at their disposal. It’s why in tough times you’ll see airlines offer double elite qualifying miles. It’s not the total value or mileage or revenue flown that makes a customer valuable in some cases, it’s…
The Most Annoying People on the Plane, as Acted By Patrick Stewart
What passenger types annoy you the most? Regular readers can probably guess my pet peeves… (HT: Johnny Jet) 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 the latest deals. Don’t miss out!
25,000 United Miles for Buying a Used Mercedes, and Someone Read Their Own Terms and Conditions Please!
Just as Delta has with Porsche and American with Cadillac, United has a relationship with Mercedes. Sales site TrueCar is back offering lots of United miles again for Mercedes car purchases. Last year there was an offer for elite members only to receive miles for new cars. This time the offer is open to all MileagePlus members, and is for used Mercedes vehicles. In order to be eligible for the offer you either need to have been a MileagePlus member for six months or have credited a flight to your account. They seem to be afraid of people gaming them, perhaps who were going to buy a Mercedes anyway and weren’t even MileagePlus members before walking into the dealership. Perhaps the concern is that Mercedes’ own sales staff will be the ones gaming the system…
