News and notes from around the interweb:
- Earlier this month Delta announced that flights on Korean Air would no longer count for elite qualifying mile, despite Korean being a member of the Skyteam alliance. They said at the time that each airline chooses their own level of participation with Skyteam. Cranky Flier says that isn’t what happened at all, that it wasn’t Korean’s choice but rather a unilateral decision by Delta possibly to try to force Korean to join a joint business venture.
Bad, Delta, bad but the sort of untruthfulness we’ve come to expect from an airline that claims it isn’t legally allowed to tell its members in advance when it will be increasing award prices.
- Through June 27 American Express Membership Rewards is offering a 20% bonus on transfers to Hawaiian Airlines. Decent offer if you want to use your miles for travel to Hawaii from a Hawaiian Airlines city. Their partner award offerings tend not to be as good, and frustrating to redeem.
- Stuff your Freedom Baggie full of alcohol mini-bottles. Especially useful for Intercontinental Royal Ambassador members.
- You can earn 1500 United bonus miles when you spend $40 within 30 days of joining Rewards Network’s MileagePlus dining.
- You can join the 30,000+ 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. Don’t miss out!
I’m an RA, and the Freedom baggie thing isn’t news to me. 😉
Loved the comments on the mini-bottle post. Hilarious. I’ve done that before for trips in Y, but normally I have hot sauce and a little jar of mustard in my freedom baggie and drink the free stuff on the plane. Never know when you might need condiments.
Hawaiin miles aren’t useful me to mostly because I don’t live in a mainland city that Hawaiin serves. I know a lot of people are down on Hilton points after the devaluation but there are still some sweet spots. This might not be a bad deal to get 2.4 Hilton points for every 1 MR point.
Wow — Classy move by Delta, take away benefits to try to get a firmer relationship. Are they also not responding to Korean’s calls or e-mails until they get what they want?
Tyler,
Only Hawaiian miles earned with Hawaiian can be transferred to Hilton. MR points that are transferred to Hawaiian cannot be converted to Hilton points.
@Seth thanks for the info. I wasn’t aware of that.
I have never in my life actually packed a freedom baggie and have never been stopped by TSA and questioned about all the loose stuff in my bags. Am I a bad person? :0
I’m shocked people didn’t know they could take mini booze bottles on the plane. It doesn’t matter what you put in the bag as long as its under 3 oz. But you can not consume your own alcohol on a plane. I always raid the mini bar before I leave a destination and bring the booze home.
You can bring the bottles on board. Drinking them is another matter: by FAA rule alcohol has to be served by a FA. They need to cut you off before you get drunk. Some airlines allow their FAs to serve BYOB. Most don’t.
love the way you take on Delta, hope a little rubs off on your Boarding Area colleagues
I have not booked a revenue ticket on Delta in over 5 yrs because their freq flier program is the worst among major US airlines. I’ve even pd slightly higher fares on other airlines just to avoid getting Skypesos.