You can buy more than one seat if you want extra space (ghetto premium economy or business class). The major US airlines let you do this in fact it’s one of the very best, least well known tricks in travel.
What’s surprising is how cheap it can be.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
Saturday afternoon Cathay Pacific flight CX360 from Hong Kong to Shanghai took off just in advance of the worst of the region’s storms.
Lightning was filmed from inside the cabin striking one of the aircraft’s wings. It also damaged the plane’s nose. Reportedly the plane “was rattled by turbulence for a solid 15 minutes” flying through the storm.
Chase’s points normally transfer one-to-one to their airline and hotel partners. However Chase is offering a 30% bonus on transfers to British Airways through June 16. This is significant because I believe it is the first time Chase has run a bonus on transfers to one of its loyalty program partners.
Cathay Pacific is now cracking down on flight attendants stealing from their aircraft and the list of items they’re interested in — from pens to ice cream — is surprising. Several flight attendants have been ‘caught red handed’ in searches of employees on arrival in Hong Kong.
My wife and I spent our first night together alone since our daughter was born. We escaped to Chicago and made plans to revisit Kyoten, an absolute favorite restaurant of ours and certainly one of the most acclaimed openings in Chicago over the past year.
The restaurant in Logan Square and I decided to stay at The Robey, a Design Hotel in the Wicker Park-Bucktown area about a mile away. We didn’t have a need to be downtown in the Loop area, this is an interesting trendy neighborhood, and it would be my first Design Hotel. What’s more I could use Marriott points because of the relationship launched in 2015 with Starwood.
A roundup of the most important stories of the day. I keep you up to date on the most interesting writings I find on other sites – the latest news and tips.
When your miles are expiring there are plenty of ways to extend them, depending on the program. In general programs let you extend your miles by earning miles in an account or by redeeming miles.
I frequently use Magazines for Miles to keep family member accounts alive without spending any money. I had forgotten there’s a newspaper redemption option, too. And there are some options I’m finding useful on their own merits, not just to deal with expiring miles.
Regular readers know that it’s almost always a good idea to pre-order your meal in American Airlines domestic first class, if you’re in the cabin at least 24 hours prior to departure. They have special meals you can order in addition to the two choices that’ll otherwise be on board. For lunch I’ll often take the kosher meal or the muslim meal (I do not like the kosher meal at breakfast).
Since launching a partnership with Zoës Kitchen American Airlines has introduced a pre-order charcuterie plate.
In November American Airlines revamped their first class meal lineup and included a cheeseburger option at lunch.
My initial reaction was that it looked very similar to United’s cheeseburger, right down to the Sir Kensington condiments, however it appeared to have a proper bun rather than United’s pretzel bun. On Tuesday I finally got to try the cheeseburger.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
