Someone I know might have been flying on a throwaway ticket over the past few weeks. This is one of the best, most useful techniques for saving money on airfare. Sure, flying to Chicago might be really expensive, but connecting in Chicago enroute to Milwaukee is downright cheap. You buy a one-way ticket to Milwaukee, get off in Chicago, and save money. That’s great until… either you have to check bags (those will go on to Milwaukee) or your flight is cancelled. The airline rebooks you. On a non-stop flight to your destination. That’s the risk. That happened. And not the checked bag part. The airline sent a flight cancellation notice, and it was my job to call and I found that the reservation had already been rebooked. To a city that was in the…
General
Category Archives for General.
Amex Everyday Launches With a Party in New York!
The new Amex Everyday cards went live with applications early last week. The official product launch, though, was yesterday. And I happened to be in New York, so I stopped in on the party. I’m not sure whether it’s super cool or if it makes me an incredible geek for wanting to and being able to crash an Amex party. There are two new cards: Amex Everyday: no annual fee, full Membership Rewards card; 20% bonus on all spend when you make 20 charges in a billing cycle; 2x points at US supermarkets (on up to $6000 of spend per year); 10,000 points after $1000 spend in 3 months Amex Everyday Preferred: 15,000 point signup bonus after $1000 spend in 3 months; 3x at US supermarkets (up to $6000 spend per year) and 2x at…
Be Careful Not to Book the Wrong Date Buying Airfare on the US Airways Website (and an Award Booking Trick)
Reader Nick passed along his experiences trying to buy tickets on the US Airways website. I too am learning the ins and outs of Usair.com and found a small glitch that I thought I would share in hopes of preventing others from making the same mistake. I was looking for a flight from Denver to Hartford on Sunday night April 6th or early in the morning on the 7th. I noticed that US Air offers a 1:20am flight to Charlotte that offered a decent connection. I decided the flight would work well as I could spend all day Sunday in Denver and head home super later Sunday night, but technically “Monday morning”. I plugged in Monday 4/7 as my travel date I found the 1am departure and ended up booking a ticket for Tuesday! …Basically,…
The Supreme Court Limited Your Right to Sue a Frequent Flyer Program: What It Means to You
When the Supreme Court took up the case of the Rabbi whose frequent flyer account was closed by Northwest Airlines because he complained too much, I asked reader, attorney, and Supreme Court watcher Eric M. Fraser to offer his perspective on the case. He joined us again as the case went to oral argument. And I’ve asked for his contribution now that the Supreme Court has ruled unanimously against the consumer in his quest to sue Northwest (now Delta) under state law interpretive rules of contract. Eric M. Fraser is an appellate and antitrust attorney with Osborn Maledon. He is an active flyer and closely follows View from the Wing. * * * The Supreme Court of the United States released its decision and opinion in Northwest, Inc. v. Ginsberg. The Supreme Court held in…
The Cheapest Item in the Minibar, 3000 Bonus Miles for a 1 Night Stay (Bits ‘n Pieces for April 3, 2014)
News and notes from around the interweb: Vodka is surprisingly cheap in hotel minibars: “much cheaper than peanuts and, in some cases, even water.” Ryanair CEO apologizes for a quip about sex with the Queen. Rocketmiles will give new customers 3000 bonus miles even for a one night hotel booking as long as the stay is completed by April 30. Cleveland (is asked to eat) rocks! As though United de-hubbing the city didn’t hurt enough, just two months later they’re cutting even more routes from the city. 1500 miles for signing up for airberlin’s topbonus program. (HT: Ben) Scott Mayerowitz on how to save money on your summer vacation hotels. 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…
Top Ten Reasons I Love the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card
Key Link: Chase Sapphire Preferred You can earn the most bonus points with the Ink Plus® Business Card because it earns 5 points per dollar on telecommunications (cell phone, internet, satellite/cable tv) and at office supply stores (with all the myriad things you can buy there) plus it has a signup bonus of 50,000 points after $5000 spend within 3 months and a $0 fee the first year ($95 thereafter). Here are the top 10 things I love about the Ink Plus card. But for someone looking for just one card, wanting to know which one is best, I recommend the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card. Here are my 10 favorite things about Sapphire Preferred. 40,000 Point Signup Bonus.. Plus 5000 More! At 40,000 bonus points after $3000 in spending within 3 months, it has a…
How Airlines Combat Fraudulent Tickets to Protect Their Revenue
American’s ‘revenue integrity’ team was created in 2008. They search out abusive booking practices by passengers which take up seats that could otherwise be sold by the airline, and that work to get seats cheaper than the airline intends to sell them. Here’s a presentation by that team from 2010 (.pdf). American is not alone in this, and the things that are flags for American are also generally flags for others as well — to greater or lesser degrees. American searches for – and cancels – duplicate bookings. I recently put an itinerary on hold that overlapped with something I already had ticketed. My plan was to call, cancel the existing itinerary and use it as a credit towards the new ticket. By the time I called, the new itinerary I had held was cancelled.…
What Airlines Look for to Crack Down on the Sale of Miles
Last year I wrote what to do if your frequent flyer account gets audited. Here’s a link to a series of presentations on fraud from an airline’s perspective. In particular, reading through a 2011 powerpoint presentation from American Airlines, here are things they look for: Same email address and/or telephone number used on multiple frequent flyer accounts Booking of last-minute award travel Change to travel dates shortly after the ticket is issued Origination/destination not same as the program member’s address on file Confirmation email address does not match program member’s email address on file Logging into several frequent flyer accounts from the same IP address These things don’t inherently signal fraud, often phone numbers will be the same within a family (but do the addresses match?). But they’re still flags for the airline. Last minute…
Can You Get a Refund for a Vanilla Reload Card?
Reader Jim may have been too aggressive in picking up extra Vanilla Reload cards before it’s too late. And he doesn’t have anything to load them onto without waiting a month. At least that’s his story (he may just be asking about another method to ‘unload’ them). So he asks if it’s possible to get a refund for his card purchase, and ideally even to get the money refunded by check rather than refunded to his credit card. And the answer is yes, maybe. Only the store where he purchased the cards would be able to refund to his credit card. And they generally won’t issue a refund anyway. On the other hand, Vanilla Reload itself will, but they do not have to, which means that if you have a good reason to ask and…
United Lounge Access for US Airways Elites Through February 2015 (With 1 Air Canada Flight)
Airlines will often give you elite status if you already have status with a competitor. But it’s rare for non-U.S. airlines to do this. And it’s especially valuable when non-U.S. airlines that are partners of United or American/US Airways do this because that elite status will often afford you lounge access when flying United or American/US Airways. Since US Airways has left the Star Alliance and joined oneworld, Star Alliance member Air Canada is offering status matches to US Airways elite frequent flyers. This is very rare for Air Canada to do. US Airways Silvers get the grandiose-sounding but not all that rewarding ‘Altitude Prestige 25k’ level. While US Airways Golds and above (so including Platinums and Chairmans Preferred members) get Altitude Elite 50k, which is also Star Alliance Gold. That means you get priority…
