In response to news that US Airways and American Airlines won’t actually combine to become one airline until late 2015 (at the earliest), Stuart Falk asks, In the light of this when would you expect one would be able to transfer miles between programs? They may or may not make it possible to transfer points between US Airways and American frequent flyer accounts before programs get combined. US Airways/America West allowed it. Delta/Northwest did too. And so did United/Continental.
American Reserving Fewer Seats for Elites on Some Aircraft
JonNYC reports at TravelingBetter that American has opened up more economy seats for non-elite to assign for a fee on their MD80 and Boeing 777-300ER aircraft. These are seats that previously could only be booked by elites and full fare customers (for free). To determine the demand of Q block seats, American Airlines is conducting a test and has adjusted the Q block levels on LAA S80 and 777-300 equipment types in all markets, effective July 29, 2014. These changes allow our non-elite customers the opportunity to purchase Main Cabin Extra seats that in the past have been blocked for elite customers. “Q block” refers to what an agent sees on the seatmap. If a seat shows up as ‘Q’ that means it is available for assignment to elites and full fare customers. An assigned…
American and US Airways Won’t Combine Until Late Next Year — At the Earliest
I finally had a chance to listen to American’s second quarter earnings call. I’m over a week late to that party, but it’s been a very busy week. After American’s formal remarks, there were a few questions that touched on the integration and mentioned the frequent flyer program (which they see as a key competitive differentiator and how they’ll win competitive business). There was a recurring implication that the US Airways and American programs wouldn’t be combined imminently. I had long assumed that we’d be looking at a cutover to a single program in late February or early March of 2015 — because cutovers usually happen during that travel lull, and because there’s a strong desire to see integration happen quickly, to begin to recognize the ‘merger synergies’ that were the argument for the merger…
Starwood Bonus to Celebrate the 200th Four Points Hotel
This strikes me as a bonus offer meant to get your client or employer to spend a little more on a room to give you a little more. There are apparently now 200 Four Points hotel properties, and Starwood is offering this bonus. Here are the terms and conditions. You have to book rate plan FP200 and stay by December 31. Not all properties are participating. Check rates under this rate plan and also without it to see how much extra you’re paying for breakfast and bonus points. This will only make occasional sense. I’m generally seeing higher rates, but in some cases only a few dollars higher. You’ll need to value the breakfast at some amount for this to work out. In general 200 or 400 bonus points is not at all enough to…
Free Beer!
Rocketmiles will buy you beer if you book a stay by August 4 in a ‘US Brewing Hub’ through this link. They define a brewing hub as: Portland Denver Minneapolis Brooklyn Seattle St. Louis Milwaukee I suspect there are some cities that might lay down some hate over this. How do you feel, if yours was left out? Customers must be 21 years of age or older and have a U.S. address to receive the beer. You can only earn this once, and after your stay you’ll get your beer. The terms and conditions of the offer recognize that not only was August 1 International Beer Day, but they also claim it was “International Girlfriends Day”. If traveling with one, Rocketmiles recommends sharing your beer with her. I followed up to clarify with Rocketmiles about…
A New Bigger Credit Card Bonus for a Frequent Flyer Program You Don’t Know About But Should
Bank of America has a new bigger bonus for the Asiana American Express card. Here are the details of the bonus, for someone who won’t buy an Asiana ticket it’s 25,000 miles after $2500 spend within 90 days. Get up to 38,000 Bonus Miles after qualifying purchases! 10,000 miles after first purchase + 15,000 miles after $2,500 in purchases in the first 90 days + 13,000 miles after purchasing a qualifying round-trip Asiana airline ticket with your new card by December 31, 2014. I first became really interested in the Asiana program five years ago. See The Hidden Value of the Asiana Award Chart and Asiana American Express. The card at the time offered 2 miles per dollar on all spending, and a distance-based award chart. So spend $35,000 on the card for a roundtrip…
$50 More For Your Credit Card Signup, 50,000 Points Down Under, and Fewest Airline Fees
News and notes from around the interweb: Good deal gets even better: The big United Visa 50,000 point bonus (plus 5000 points for an authorized user) has gotten even better — offer uncovered that also includes a $50 statement credit. For avoidance of doubt, adding in a $50 statement credit is better. It’s like when I wish for something unrealistic and so might as well make the wish even better by adding “and a pony.” Airlines that charge the fewest fees For our Aussie readers: ANZ cards are up to 50,000 point bonuses. Avoid wasting Uber credits on your employer: A pretty frequent issue that’s come up at work, an employee signs up for Uber and then needs to use it for work. They wind up burning their signup bonus credit or free ride, but…
Avoid Getting Taken! Plus What’s Killing Prepaid Financial Products?
News and notes from around the interweb: A good overview of Southeast Asia scams you’ll likely run into as a tourist. A good companion to my Common Tourist Scams and How to Avoid Them The taxi industry outspends Uber and Lyft on lobbying 3500:1 Hipster scarf saves an American tourist’s life in Germany The New York Times on how money laundering and fraud are causing the screws to tighten on prepaid financial products. Uber launching business accounts and partnering with travel and expense company Concur. The article notes that Uber’s cut of each fare is 20%. (HT: S.) You can join the 40,000+ 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. You can…
Google Wallet Eliminates Fees on Debit Card Transactions
A couple of weeks ago Google Wallet eliminated fees on debit card transactions. They now allow you to send money to other people, funded by debit card, and won’t charge you a fee to pull the money off your debit card. After all, the Durbin Amendment drove down the cost of debit card transactions. (Which is also why banks have mostly gotten out of the game of rewarding those transactions, and have imposed more burdensome requirements for waiving account fees generally since having a checking account no longer correlates with making debit transactions that are profitable for banks). Here’s what I see when going to make a payment: Adam P. asked me about the usefulness of this yesterday. And since he was wondering, I thought others might be as well (or would be soon). Google…
Miami Airport Lounge Staff Steal Millions
The Club America lounge at the Miami airport is a rather sorry place. It’s moderately better than sitting in the terminal. Actually there used to be 2 Club America lounges at the airport, if memory serves — one in terminal F and the other in terminal J. The terminal J lounge appears to have been renamed for LATAM and operated by LAN now. And now I know why. The lounge is actually owned by the airport authority. There was a contract with a private company to run it (in place since 1999). Airlines pay for use of the lounge. 20% of the checks were deposited by lounge employees into their own accounts, instead of the airport authority’s account. In all at least $2.19 million was taken — although the true amount is likely much higher.…
