Hawaiian Airlines offers a really frustrating frequent flyer program. Their airline partner redemptions can be really expensive (e.g. Korean Airlines business class between the U.S. and Korea runs 200,000 miles roundtrip — and doesn’t allow connections to other destinations in Asia). They are restrictive — you cannot combine partners on an award ticket, you cannot have a stopover on an award ticket, and you cannot even book an ‘open jaw’ flying into one city and back from another. Talking to Hawaiian Airlines agents can be a frustrating experience. They’re on par with Delta agents, they simply don’t know the ins and outs of their program. One must frequently hang up, call back to get what you’re after. And their call center hours are even quite limited, on the East Coast of the U.S. I have…
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United Offers a 20% Discount on International Upgrades — And I’m Not the Least Bit Excited
Summer, especially for European travel, is all about the coach cabin. Planes fly full. But business travel dries up, which means paid business travel dries up. As coach tickets get more expensive, business class prices fall, the spread is much smaller than usual. United is looking to goose some extra revenue from their business class cabin during the lull in premium traffic by offering a 20% discount on both the mileage cost and the cash co-pay for upgrades requested online by July 28 for travel between July 24 and August 12. The discount applies to travel between the Continental U.S. plus Alaska as well as Canada and Europe, Japan, North Asia, Middle East, Central/Southern Africa or Southern South America. Interestingly the discount does not apply to South Asia. Take a discounted coach fare to Europe…
Asiana’s New First Class and Virgin America’s New Elite Levels
This isn’t quite ‘bits ‘n pieces’ with only two items that I’m sharing, they struck me as worth noting but also not things I was inspired to offer longer treatments on. Still, worth passing along. Asiana is introducing a new first class seat – true suites with doors and a 32″ television. This is apparently going into their 777 aircraft, and the Chicago – Seoul route is having first class re-introduced and award space appears possible. I really enjoy the food, service, and amenities on Asiana but the seat is a full generation behind so this is really good news. Lucky links to a video in Korean that shows off the new seat. Wandering Aramean reports on Virgin America’s new silver and gold elite levels. The co-branded credit card lets you get halfway to silver…
Reader Boston Lobster Roll Challenge
The first two comments on my JetBlue trip report, where I ended by finding a good lobster roll near the airport, were about another lobster roll downtown at Neptune Oyster. So in the interest of research and science, I decided to check it out and compare. Neptune is more expensive, but it’s a sit down restaurant and not a takeout seafood store in a shack. They don’t take reservations, and on a Saturday night the wait can easily be two hours. I went on Sunday afternoon just before 5pm and the wait was 45 minutes. While I waited, I played tourist and walked 3 or 4 blocks to Paul Revere’s home. You’re spared that, since they don’t allow photographs inside. When they had a place at the bar open up they rang me on my…
Checking Out the New Conrad New York
I was prepared not to like the Conrad New York. It’s the old Embassy Suites, given a facelift, and which re-opened in March. I remember staying there for the Freddie Awards in 2004 and paying 35,000 HHonors points for my room, it was my second hotel redemption ever and most of the points were earned changing my email address every quarter. The property is owned by Goldman Sachs and it’s across the street from their offices. The scuttlebutt I had heard was that their partners wouldn’t stay at the property while it was an Embassy Suites. Back before the financial crisis they would stay down at the Ritz-Carlton Battery Park. But now with austerity they want their people nearby at their own property, so it needed to be re-branded. How accurate that is I don’t…
American is Bringing New Premium Cabins to their New York – Los Angeles and San Francisco Routes
I popped into the exhibit hall at the Global Business Travel Association convention and stopped by the American Airlines booth. They were featuring 3D video of the new Airbus A321s that they’ll be bringing into the fleet to replace the 767-200s flying their New York to Los Angeles and San Francisco transcon flights. I admit I was surprised by the announcement of a dedicated fleet of Airbus A321s for this route. They’ve been the only remaining carrier with plans to operate widebodies on their premium transcon routes, and they’re ending that. When American goes to a narrowbody fleet for the route, though, they’re keeping first class. United is getting rid of their first class, and Delta only operates two-cabin planes. It’s interesting that American is keeping first class only on their Boeing 777-300 aircraft, it’s…
The Absolute Highlight of the Global Business Travel Association Convention…
The highlight of being at the Global Business Travel Association’s 2012 convention today wasn’t: Hearing JetBlue CEO Dave Barger talk about going fishing with American CEO Tom Horton, while declaring that he didn’t think it was possible to merge cultures at a company. Watching the American Airlines video on its new Airbus A321 interiors — complete with 3D glasses and with its current livery zapped off the pictures — walking through the 3-class cabin including 1-1 seating in first class and lie flat business class seats. Getting to be the designated maverick, off-the-reservation guy speaking on stage about how corporate travel policies burn out travelers and don’t save companies money — to a bunch of travel managers and suppliers of managed travel solutions Nope. The highlight was definitely getting to meet Deltalina. Now, it’s a…
Some Answers on Hilton HHonors from Jeff Diskin, Sr. VP Global Customer Marketing
I attended a Citibank/Hilton event last week at the Conrad New York which unveiled the new Hilton HHonors Reserve Card. It was held at the rooftop bar, directly across from condos where several top stars live and looking out over the river. They were pouring cocktails, but I didn’t see the executives doing the briefings drinking. So I didn’t visit the bar too often, I wanted to have my wits about me since the event gave me the opportunity to sit down with Jeff Diskin, the head of the Hilton HHonors loyalty program, and Ralph Andretta who runs co-branded cards for Citi. Most of my questions didn’t really center around the new credit card product. It more or less speaks for itself. I did ask another Citi executive earlier in the night, “how can you…
Citibank Introduces Awesome New Hilton HHonors Reserve Card
Monday morning Citibank rolls out a new Hilton co-branded premium Visa credit card, and it looks to be really outstanding. Signup Bonus: 2 free weekend nights after $2500 in spend within four months. These free nights are valid at all Hilton redemption categories including Waldorf Astoria properties. Anniversary Bonus: 1 free weekend night each year after $10,000 in spend. Earning: 10 HHonors points per dollar on Hilton spend, 5 points per dollar on air and car rental, and 3 on everything else. Elite status: Instant Hilton Gold status which you retain as long as you have the card and Diamond status after $40,000 in annual spend. No foreign currency transaction fees. Annual fee: $95 I have the Hilton American Express Surpass card, largely because $40,000 in send on that card earns Diamond status. You can…
US Airways to Stop Interlining Baggage on Separate Tickets
Reader Lane E. passes on a new US Airways baggage policy that I do not like one bit. As a result of a new mandate by the Department of Transportation, US Airways has made the following change (effective 8/1/12) to the interline baggage check procedures: Interline through baggage check discontinued Effective July 24, the DOT has mandated new baggage rules requiring that airline passengers must pay the same published baggage fees[1] and have the same allowances for their entire itinerary. As a result of this new policy, effective August 1, 2012 US Airways will no longer be through checking passengers’ bags when they have been ticketed on separate tickets. For interline itineraries where the passenger has his/her entire journey on one ticket, we will continue our practice as it is done today, but when the…
