Apr 25 2015

The single greatest sandwich at any airport can be found at Tortas Frontera, at Chicago O’Hare (terminals 1, 3, and 5).

The only downside is that they make the sandwiches fresh, and while they’re generally ready in about 10 minutes I’ve turned up.. had to wait in line.. and been told to expect a 15 minute wait once I’ve been able to order. That can make things dicey on a quick connection – a choice between a delicious choriqueso and risking having to gate check a bag.

Now you no longer need to make that tradeoff…

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Apr 25 2015

Traveling on separate tickets is sometimes necessary to save money, or to put together award travel. But it presents risks.

If you’re connecting on different airlines with separate tickets, neither airline may be responsible for getting you to your final destination if things go awry. And you may not even be able to check your bags all the way through, either.

Here’s how different US airlines approach the problem, and what you can do to protect yourself.

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Apr 25 2015

An underappreciated benefit of the Citi Prestige card is that you get your 4th night free on any hotel stay — as many times as you want during the year. Here’s how to take advantage of that benefit, which still gets you points, stay credit, and elite recognition.

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Apr 25 2015

Size of a city alone isn’t enough to support international air service. Size of the metro area, primary destinations from that area, available aircraft, and concentration of business are much more important. And that’s why Phoenix – the 6th largest city in the US – gets only a single transatlantic flight (and a marginal one for British Airways at that).

Here are key factors airlines use in choosing international flying. And it’s why even when the idea comes up for Phoenix, it gets rejected…

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Apr 25 2015

Congressman Bill Shuster is in the pocket of the airline industry. And in bed with them, too. Congressional rules allow him to ‘fall in love with’ whomever he wishes. But he shouldn’t continue on as Transportation Committee Chairman.

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Apr 24 2015

Last week I wrote “No, I Do Not Trust IHG Rewards Club.”

IHG Rewards Club is the loyalty program for Intercontinental, Crowne Plaza, Holiday Inn, and related brands. And my ire was prompted by their announcement that they would be changing the redemption categories of a subset of their hotels, but weren’t telling us which ones.

They were doing this at the same time they were announcing there would be changes to their elite program — most of which they wouldn’t tell us until later, but we should trust them those changes will be good — and they announced that points will begin to expire after 12 months of inactivity when in the past IHG Rewards Club points did not expire.

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Apr 24 2015

Ironically, I write about the current state of my RSS feed and plans for the blog and this is merely an excerpt of the post rather than the full post. So you’ll have to continue for more. Thank you for reading!

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Apr 24 2015

Delta didn’t just eliminate their award chart. They didn’t just impose three week advance purchase requirements on saver awards across a majority of their routes. And award seats aren’t just hard to get.

They also impose a practice known as “journey control” — a given Delta flight may be available to some customers as a saver award and not to others.. and it has nothing to do with their elite status.

Here’s what “journey control” is, and what it means for your miles.

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