Reader Ron B passes along an offer for unlimited free calling for a month using Skype. The unlimited calling includes calls to mobile phones in a limited set of countries only and landlines in 40 countries. Signup by November 15, and you must have an existing Skype account that’s been open more than 29 days. They require payment details and will auto-renew the service unless you cancel within 27 days of your start date. The mobile phones are liimited to Canada, Guam, Hong Kong, Puerto Rico, Singapore, Thailand and United States. (They consider Guam and Puerto Rico to be ‘countries’.)
7500 Bonus Club Carlson Points on 3-Day Avis Rentals through December 31, 2013
Avis has been running an offer of 9000 bonus Club Carlson points with a 3-day rental, most recently extended through October 31, 2012. That offer, at the same link as before has been reduced to 7500 bonus points but extended through December 31, 2012. Now through December 31, 2013, Club Carlson members can earn 7,500 total Gold Points on qualifying rentals of 3 days or more at participating locations in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Latin America and the Caribbean, Australia, New Zealand, Europe, Africa, Asia and the Middle East. You need to enter coupon code MUHA018 when making the reservation and provide your Club Carlson account number. There are some blackout dates for this offer when renting outside of North America, oddly enough the specific dates aren’t specified for Asia. And there’s no list of…
Alitalia Tickets to Be Honored: $315 Discount Will Stand For All Tickets that Cost at Least a Penny
Over the weekend I wrote about a discount of ~ $315 that could be applied to any Alitalia tickets as long as the bookings were made on Alitalia’s Japanese website. Plenty of folks booked cheap US-Europe (and Europe-Asia) tickets with this discount. Some booked tickets inside Europe that were literally free, because they would have cost $315 or less to begin with. I wrote at the time that I couldn’t imagine that US-Europe tickets issued under this deal wouldn’t be honored, but that I wasn’t so sure what would happen to the European tickets. Alitalia pushed back and initiated cancellation of all tickets, claiming that the discount was only meant for flights originating in Japan and that their anti-fraud measures prevented the bookings by folks accessing the website from our regions of the world. A…
North Korea’s Air Koryo Adds Online Booking
North Korea’s state airline now offers online booking for its flights to Beijing, Shenyang, and Vladivostok. What I especially love about the airline – besides the Tupolev aircraft – is that the communist state offers two classes of service. Just because you can buy your flights online, though, doesn’t mean you can go to North Korea. To obtain a visa you must hold an “authorisation to travel” issued by a travel company in North Korea. Time to start stalking www.airkoryo.com.kp for mistake fares! (HT: Milepoint)
And So It Begins With Delta: Some Online Travel Agency Bookings Not Earning Full Mileage
In August I noted a change that ‘unpublished fares’ would no longer earn full mileage on Delta. Some coach fares only earn 50% mileage credit, and the lowest coach fares only earn 25% mileage credit — and may not even earn elite bonuses or class of service bonuses for paid premium cabin tickets. The challenge is that they don’t tell you upfront whether any given fare is published or unpublished, although for now everything available at Delta.com counts as published. Delta says that “Unpublished fares are normally purchased through a specialized agent, third party or to a group” but works like “normally” and including “third party” makes the whole thing very opaque, so far corporate travel agency (“third party”) bookings seem to be earning full mileage but it now seems that some online travel agency…
Air Canada Bonus Miles for Lots of Airports Through the End of the Year
Through the end of the year, Air Canada is offering bonus points for flights to and from certain cities in North America and around the world. Registration required. They give an example of a roundtrip from Edmonton to London Heathrow and back, you get 500 points each for your departure and arrival at Edmonton and 1500 points apiece for arriving at and then departing from Heathrow, for a total of 4000 bonus miles on the one trip. The bonus is available for takeoffs and landings at the 31 airports listed above, and can be earned repeatedly and on most fares: [F]or travel between Canada and the U.S. or within Canada: Tango (N,G,P,E,A), Tango Plus (M,U,H,Q,V,W,S,K,L,T), Latitude (Y,B), Executive Class Lowest (D.Z), Executive Class Flexible (J,C) and for international travel: Tango (K,L,T, N,G,P,E,A), Tango Plus (M,U,H,Q,V,W,S),…
Bonus Still Available for Opening a Delta Suntrust Debit Card
The account opening bonus is 5000 miles, the personal card comes with a $75 annual fee and the business version of the card comes with a $120 annual fee. Debit cards don’t earn back nearly the revenue that credit cards do, and most programs have dropped their mileage-earning debit cards altogether. The personal version of this card continues to earn one mile per dollar spent. Back in May there was a 30,000 point signup bonus. It’s hard to imagine that repeats and really did look like a sign of desperation on Suntrust’s part in order to attract deposits after failing stress tests. I’m just happy to see the debit card option remain, since it’s less expensive to make certain kinds of payments like taxes with a debit card and through this card it’s still possible…
The Best Awards Each US Frequent Flyer Program Has to Offer
I’ve written in the past that the frequent flyer program you should use depends on where you want to go. While I have opinions about ‘which program is best’ no single program is best for every destination. There are certainly some off the beaten path programs that are best for some travelers in some situations. But most of the time when people come to me looking for help booking their award tickets, they already have their miles saved up and want to make the most of those miles. Since I often say that the best strategy is to earn miles, use them up quickly rather than saving them for a far-off distant future, and then earn some more I think it’s a great idea to find the best uses of your miles now, travel, and…
Netflix American AAdvantage Signup Bonus Ends November 14
Netflix will no longer be a partner of American AAdvantage effective November 15. November 14 is the last day to earn a 2500 American Airlines mile signup bonus. The offer is available to new subscribers only, and miles take 8-10 weeks to post (during which time you’re paying for monthly service, until you cancel). You can still earn 4000 United miles with a Netflix signup — 2000 for the signup and 2000 for paying with a MileagePlus Visa. Or just a flat 3000 United miles. I do not know whether the end of the Netflix-American relationship signals that they will stop awarding miles in frequent flyer programs to acquire new customers in general, and whether we’ll be seeing a similar end to the United offers soon, or whether the change is contained to their American…
Tracking Missing Miles and Making Sure You Get All the Points That Are Due to You
Back in July Singapore Airlines made tons of first class awards available to their partners. Given Singapore’s history, and even though they’ve been making plenty more first class awards on their Boeing 77W aircraft available to their own members, this was pretty clearly at the time not intentional. And it was short-lived. I booked a whole bunch of tickets, not knowing which ones I would have use for or when I would be able to actually take the trips. Fortunately I had a fairly hefty United mileage balance which allowed me to do that (and a hefty Chase Ultimate Rewards balance I could have made instant transfers from in order to supplement that balance had I needed it). While I made about a million miles worth of bookings, in the end I will only use…
