News and notes from around the interweb: While I may gripe about poor food in the British Airways Concorde Room, The Deal Mommy was just trying to get to Paris. Along the way she learned that: European airlines are really really non-sensical when it comes to enforcing limits on carryon bags. I’ll never understand the logic in this. British Airways customer service is surly. When you can actually reach a human being. She tried to reach out to the US customer service line when she couldn’t get through in the UK (when call volumes are too high they just disconnect you). But I’ve always found the US-based folks to be worse. In fact, I believe that British Airways customer service in the US is worse than any other US-based airline call center. I’ll never understand…
About Gary Leff
Enjoying a Special Rate at the Ritz-Carlton Grand Cayman
Regular readers know that I offer an award booking service, and it’s gotten quite a bit of attention since I launched it about 3.5 years ago. It’s been covered in the New York Times and in USA Today, for instance. And I’ve been selected by Conde’ Nast Traveler as one of their ‘World’s Top Travel Specialists’ in 2010, 2011, and now also in 2012. Conde’ Nast hosts an annual gathering for this group, the first one I attended was in January 2011. This year’s event was held at the Ritz-Carlton Grand Cayman. I’ve stayed at several Ritz-Carltons, but always on someone else’s dime or once for a night on Marriott Rewards points. This time I’d be paying, albeit as a business expense. The going rate on the Ritz-Carlton website was somewhere in the $700s for…
Air France’s Flying Blue Offering Status Matches
A couple of weeks ago, I outlined how airline status matching works — you have elite status with one airline, which airlines are willing to comp you that same status, or let you fly a reduced number of miles to earn equivalent status in their program? In that post I noted that “It’s rare for a non-US frequent flyer program to offer a status match” but also that Air France KLM’s Flying Blue program offered status matches up to top tier Platinum at the beginning of 2011. It looks like Flying Blue is back with another status match offer although this time only for Gold status. As I noted three weeks back, fellow Skyteam member Aerolineas Argentinas has a status match offer. For most US-based flyers, who won’t actually be flying Aerolineas Argentinas, this just…
Expedia Knows How to Take a Reservation, But Does it Know How to TICKET a Reservation?
My Expedia experience over the weekend reminded me of Jerry Seinfeld renting a car. See, Expedia knew how to take the reservation. They just didn’t know how to ticket the reservation… And really, it’s the ticketing that’s the most important part! I’ve written in the past many times about why I like booking airline tickets through online travel agencies, rather than with an airline directly — not every time, but frequently. I can choose my point of sale. If I want a ticket issued in Germany, Spain, or New Zealand I can use Expedia’s websites in each of those countries to make the booking. That can help for getting the absolute lowest fare at times. (Of course I will use a credit card with no foreign currency transaction fees, since the card will be charged…
100 Free American Airlines Miles for Enrolling with their Shopping Portal
The American AAdvantage online shopping portal is running a promotion with the following bonuses: 100 miles for enrolling in the shopping portal between January 21 and February 3 and remaining opted-in to receive marketing emails until the bonus posts. 300 bonus miles if you make a purchase through the shopping portal during that time period. 600 more bonus miles if you make a second purchase through the shopping portal during that time period and the purchase is for $100 or more. Sign up here if you aren’t already registered with AAdvantage eShopping to pocket the free 100 miles (and more if you actually use the portal). Of course, this portal may or may not be the best for any given transaction, I generally consult EV Reward before buying anything online to see which mileage or…
New Years in Paris: British Airways “New” First Class, London – Washington Dulles
A trip report in five parts Air France A380 Business Class, Washington Dulles – Paris Park Hyatt Vendome Mostly Eating in Paris British Airways Paris Orly – London and the Concorde Room British Airways “New” First Class, London – Washington Dulles I’ve only ever departed terminal 5 from bus gates. But that took me past the Starbucks, and it was going to be an (admittedly short of a Westbound transatlantic) long flight and I really didn’t want to sleep much, I wanted to arrive in DC tired and fall straight to sleep, adjusting back to my own time right away. Which isn’t to say I wouldn’t allow myself a nap – I was happy to for a couple of hours — but I felt like I could conk right out. Here’s an interesting thing about…
United Takes Away Ability to Hold Award Tickets (“Pay By Phone Trick”)
Yesterday morning @hoantran tweeted, is there still a way to hold UA award tickets? I just tried to book w/ the phone option but it didn’t show up. I was walking around San Francisco and couldn’t check on this, but I tweeted back: not near a computer to check. If really gone are there other non cc options? Try non-US website where cc less used This morning I went to the United.com website, and indeed the option to ‘pay by phone’ (which is how folks would put awards on hold for free, and could then go back online and pay by credit card or call up and modify a reservation prior to ticketing) is gone. There’s still the ‘FareLock’ option for award itineraries on United, I checked this morning and was offered 72 hours for…
Bits ‘n Pieces for January 21, 2013
News and notes from around the interweb: Loyalty Lobby says that ‘Crossover Rewards’ may be coming to Starwood Preferred Guest, but no indication what they are. The tip is probably just based on this filing for the service mark. Here’s the graphic filed at the US Patent and Trademark Office and here’s the actual application. I’ve griped about Air France’s angled business class seats, it amazed me when they didn’t introduced flat business class seats when they brought the Airbus A380 into service. It appears that they’re going to roll out Cathay-style business class flat seats, in my view the best seats in the world (and similar to what American has in their new 777-300ER). To borrow from former Continental CEO Gordone Bethune, they’ll go from (almost) worst to (tied for) first. No word on…
New Years in Paris: Air France Business, British Airways First, and the Park Hyatt Vendome: British Airways Club Europe Paris Orly – London and the Concorde Room
A trip report in five parts Air France A380 Business Class, Washington Dulles – Paris Park Hyatt Vendome Mostly Eating in Paris British Airways Paris Orly – London and the Concorde Room British Airways “New” First Class, London – Washington Dulles The return trip was going to start at Paris Orly airport, that’s the ‘close-in’ and some would say convenient airport, which mostly services intra-Europe flying. Really, though, it’s a pit of an airport, old and without modern facilities. But since the goal is to get in and out, and not spend time there, it’s relatively compact. If you can time it so that you breeze through formalities and without much to do airside, it’s a perfectly convenient place. I had checked in online, having learned from my outbound with Air France that I don’t…
United Knows You Better Than You Do, And Will Be Changing Your Name Accordingly
With most airlines you can book tickets and specify your name and then it’s a different set of fields where you enter your TSA ‘Secure Flight Data’ — the name, date of birth, and gender that will be transmitted to the TSA. I especially like this because ticketing done by airline agents sometimes involves name misspellings, no matter how many times you have them go over it and no matter how clearly you spell things out using the zulu alphabet. Which won’t ultimately matter because the TSA at the security checkpoint doesn’t generally create issues over minor misspellings. But you still want to transmit the correct name for ‘Secure Flight’. MileagePlus posted on Milepoint that they will no longer separate ticket name from TSA Secure Flight name. tarting this weekend, on Jan. 20th, we will…
