American opened its travel API to developers at the SXSW conference earlier in the week. They hosted a contest for the best hacks that folks could come up with. This is what could be done in 30 hours, not an ongoing development project. But I was interested to see what folks would come up with, as a quick window into what creative folks could do if unconstrained by the corporate development process — and what might be possible for airline apps to deliver in the coming years. So I was intrigued by the winning entry: First Place – AirPing: Won $10,000 to split amongst the team and 25,000 AAdvantage miles for each member. AirPing provides users with live updates for flight changes or delays, and estimated travel time to the airport. The app also provides…
About Gary Leff
Doing Well By Doing Good: Making Microloans Available and Generating Credit Card Spend
Lots of folks have used micro-lending site Kiva as a way to earn miles and generate credit card spend to achieve signup bonuses. The idea is that Kiva lets you fund an account by credit card, and Paypal waives the processing fees. You may a microloan, and once it is paid back you withdraw the funds. You generate spend and get your money back. Of course there’s some risk of non-payment, but the vast majority of loans repay (and since those loans are generally small, each exposure is small). You do need to be able to float the funds though for several credit card statements. Now competing micro-lending site Zidisha is temporarily waiving credit card fees as well. There’s lots of discussion on Milepoint about Zidisha. I really like doing well (miles) by doing good…
What Are Your Rights When an Airline Calls You To Kick You Off Your Flight?
Reader Chris B. contacted the Department of Transportation and got a very clear discussion of this issue. Sometimes an airline will call you up — several days in advance – and try to move you to another flight. Uusally that’s because the flight you are on is overbooked and they’re trying o handle things before everyone gets to the airport. Do you have to accept being moved? What rights do you have? Normally in an oversell situation an airline makes offers at the airport to potential volunteers. Sometimes they’ll continually up the offer until they have enough volunteers that will take another flight so that everyone that’s confirmed for the flight gets to fly. If there aren’t enough volunteers (and this can be because the airline doesn’t offer enough compensation) then they have to involuntarily…
More Prurient Spectating in the Parker Meridien/Starwood Lawsuits
The lawsuit between Starwood and the Parker Meridien Hotels is fascinating not just because it’s a window into agreements between loyalty programs and hotels that we don’t often get to see the details of but also because it reveals a ton about how the programs work. In this case it’s alleged that because Starwood pays its hotels a ton more cash for award nights when hotels are nearly fully booked, the Parker Meridien hotels in Palm Springs and New York fudged their books to appear to be fully booked much more often — extracting more than an extra million dollars in reimbursements from SPG. Reader Seth T. emails, I did a little docket-surfing on Pacer and got the full set of filings; they were uploaded via the RECAP project into the Internet Archive for posterity…
Don’t Lose Out on the Best Deals and Frequent Flyer News
I don’t need a link to source the news that Google Reader is going away. I logged in yesterday afternoon and was faced with the bad news that’s been expected for some time. I’ve used Google’s reader tool for a long time to keep up on my favorite blogs and frankly even some of my ‘not-so-favorites’. I need to keep up on what folks are saying and finding in the world of miles and points so you don’t miss out on anything new by coming to View from the Wing. Google Reader has been an invaluable tool, I subscribe to a blog’s RSS feed and aggregate all of the posts so I never miss a thing. Fortunately it looks like there’s a good, seamless replacement for Google Reader: Feedly. When Google Reader shuts down, feedly…
What Court Documents Reveal About Le Parker Meridien’s Alleged Fraud Scheme Against Starwood Preferred Guest
Loyalty Lobby uncovered additional filings in the lawsuit between Starwood and the Parker Meridien hotels over Parker Meridien’s alleged fraud in boosting their supposed occupancy rates in order to overcharge SPG for guests’ free reward stays. There are several items of interest in Starwood’s agreement with hotels on how much hotels pay to participate and what obligations are (.pdf). Hotel pays 5% of eligible charges to Starwood Preferred Guest. This doesn’t seem that much to me, considering projected occupancy by SPG members per the contract is either 40% or 45% of the hotel. If the hotel signs up a new SPG member they don’t pay the fee. Makes good sense, or else a hotel would never want someone to join the program once they’re already on property. Hotels have to go through an extensive process…
Up to 6000 Miles for New Alitalia Frequent Flyer Account
Alitalia has an offer for new account signups through March 30th. You’ll receive 2000 miles just for signing up. (Miles post in April.) You also receive 2000 miles for having your first account activity within three months of signup. And 2000 more miles for flying Alitalia by April 30th. (Miles awarded the month following when they’re earned.) I’ve flagged the strategic value of the Alitalia program in the past for some sweet spots in their award chart and the opportunity (uncommon among many non-North American programs) to use double miles for any seat. They are of course a US American Express Membership Rewards transfer partner.
An Opportunity to Meet Heads of Loyalty Programs and Hear What’s Next
The Randy Petersen Travel Executive Summit is taking place on Friday, April 26 at the Hilton McLean Tysons Corner. Executives in the loyalty industry attending one of their major conferences are paying $149 to attend while folks attending Frequent Traveler University were sent a link to sign up for $99 if they wish. Others in the DC area that day can do so as well. The event will include brunch throughout and have two main sessions: Planes, Trains and Automobiles will include observations from Bob Crandall (former CEO American Airlines), Jeff Robertson (VP, SkyMiles, Delta Air Lines), David Lim (CMO, Amtrak), Avis, National Car Rental, Enterprise Car Rental and Hertz. The Plastic Fantastic features representatives from leading credit card brands and individual cards on how credit cards helped pull loyalty programs through the recent economic…
50,000 Mile Virgin Atlantic American Express is Back
Via MilesAbound, the Virgin Atlantic American Express from Bank of America is back offering: 20,000 points after first purchase 25,000 more after $2,500 spend 2,500 points for each of 2 authorized users added to the account That’s an easy 50,000 Virgin Atlantic miles. You can also earn 7500 more points after $15,000 spend and then 7500 if you hit $25,000 spend within a year. And even though the card earns 1.5 miles per dollar on all purchases I don’t value Virgin Atlantic miles enough (because you can’t mix and match partners, their award chart can be quite expensive, and awards entail fuel surcharges) to justify the spend. So I view it as a 50,000 mile bonus card rather than one that generates 65,000 bonus miles. While Virgin miles are far from the most valuable, I…
50,000 Mile Citi American Airlines Executive Mastercard Offer
The premium co-branded American Airlines Mastercard that can earn elite qualifying miles, offers no foreign currency transaction fees, and comes bundled with lounge access, carries a $450 annual fee. Most often I’ve seen the card offered with 25,000 miles as a signup bonus. But now there’s a 50,000 mile signup bonus offer for the card which requires $5000 spending within 3 months. It’s a lot of money for that annual fee but it’s also a lot of miles, and amounts to purchasing miles at less than a penny apiece (for the first year only). If you are shut out from other Citi cards you might want, such as AAdvantage Visa and the Citi Hilton HHonors Reserve Card (the latter offers referral credit to me) then this is probably worth considering. It’s a no-brainer if you…
