Last week I noted that Travelocity was cancelling bookings made with their $200 off air and hotel coupon. The discount had been offered in conjunction with the National Federation of the Blind convention in Dallas. NFB tweeted it out, and Travelocity even re-tweeted it. The terms and conditions of the coupon did not require NFB membership, but many folks who took advantage of the deal joined the National Federation for the Blind — only $10 and it was either in honor of the offer, or to be ‘on the safe side’ since it is members of that organization who were ostensibly supposed to benefit. But Travelocity hadn’t really anticipated that since it could be used to book hotels in completely different locations from where air travel took passengers to, it would be possible to spend…
Bits ‘n Pieces for August 9, 2012
Around the travel, points and deals world in one post: United 4 Mile Hong Kong Award Ticket Glitch Update: CBS News New York says that United gave $200 credits to customers who had booked the 4 mile Hong Kong mistake award tickets. (“Last July, United mistakenly offered $40 flights to Hong Kong. It dealt with the problem by issuing $200 gift certificates to some customers.”) I didn’t get a credit, I haven’t heard of anyone else that did. I wonder whether it’s misreporting (as is common) or whether anyone out there reports receiving a goodwill gesture from the airline? American Bankruptcy Update: American’s pilots rejected a new contract, which puts the airline back in the position of asking their bankruptcy judge to unilaterally impose new terms. Meanwhile, American’s mechanics approved an agreement. And flight attendants…
Free $40 and 500 Miles
This Slickdeals thread discusses how to make the most of Nationwide Bank Visa Buxx cards: $43 profit and 500 miles for a little bit of effort. (If you pull the cash off the card your profit will be $40.) Their prepaid Visa cards have a $50 bonus promotion. The initial load of the card needs to be $25 or more, with a maximum of $500, and earns a $50 bonus. The account setup fee is $5 and loading the card costs $2, so you’ll make $43. You can set the card up to be able to pull out cash, up to $200 per withdrawal at a cost of $1 as well. Go to the Visa Buxx page and enroll. Sign up as a parent. Select yes to the option to withdraw cash from an ATM.…
Will Debit Card Merchant Agreements Prevent Credit Card Surcharges?
Apologies if this is a little bit inside baseball, but the world is waiting to see how the multi-billion dollar settlement agreed to last month between Visa, Mastercard, some banks and retailers will affect the credit card industry. In addition to payouts and reduced processing fees, the settlement allows merchants to impose surcharges on credit card use. On the one hand, since they can already discount cash, it seems economically a non-issue. And yet such surcharges have stuck in some markets where they are permitted (and they remain illegal in several states). I personally have predicted that they would arise in air travel, not because those fees will net more money from consumers to airlines (my guess is that the airfare plus fee will equal what airfare would otherwise have been) but because the surcharges…
UsingMiles Free Lifetime Premier Membership
LufthansaFlyer is offering free lifetime Premier membership to UsingMiles.com. Now, I haven’t used UsingMiles, I manage my miles with Award Wallet and haven’t heard of features that would be enough to move me over. But UsingMiles does offer their ‘premier’ membership for a fee usually. And this isn’t just one year of premier for free to get you to move over (and incur the switching costs of entering your account information), it’s lifetime premier for free. So I figured I would pass it along, anytime you can get ‘lifetime’ something for free in travel (which is usually lifetime of the travel provider, rather than your lifetime, cough) it’s worth passing along!
Jet Airways Asks Government Permission to Join Star Alliance
Via Online Travel Review, Jet Airways has requested permission from its government to join the Star Alliance. In May of 2010 I wrote about the possibility, and then noted back in January that the Indian government was pushing back on the idea. Air India was supposed to join Star, but the state-owned airline is such a basket case that they became the only carrier ever to have their invitation revoked. The Indian government is exceptionally protectionist in favor of its flag carrier, not just against foreign airlines (which is common throughout the world) but even against domestic Indian upstarts. No doubt the government doesn’t like this idea. Jet Airways clearly has been looking to Star, its Delta partnership ends October 15th, so it’s no longer playing footsie with everyone. Jet is the largest carrier in…
Who Else Is Giving Away Starpoints?
The Points Guy compiled a list of the different blogs that are handing out Starwood Starpoints. If you’re reading this blog presumably you know that I’m one of the folks doing so, I’m giving away a total of 60,000 points (30,000 to each of two winners). If you entered yesterday remember to enter again today (and tomorrow, etc) until the contest ends this coming Tuesday — you can enter once every 24 hours. I think it’s interesting to speculate on the reasons why different blogs were chosen by American Express to offer up points, on the different amount of points being given away by each, and on the reasons why some blogs have more entries than others. This last presumably has to do with size of readership, and with how much effort is required to…
Milepoint Premium is Back!
A couple of weeks ago I shared the opportunity to get in on Milepoint premium membership while it was soft launched in a testing phase. It was only available for a few hours to make sure systems are working. As of this afternoon it’s back, in limited quantities. And there are even more benefits that hadn’t been revealed during the soft launch, like free upgrade to National Car Rental’s Executive status. One year of Milepoint premium membership is currently just $59 and comes with the following benefits: 2,000 United MileagePlus miles Hyatt Gold Passport Platinum status through Feb. 2014 or 2,000 Hyatt Gold Passport points One year of ad-free viewing on Milepoint.com Free 1-year subscription to InsideFlyer.com One Free Gogo Inflight Internet 24-hour pass Free 3-month trial of Clear Free upgrade to AwardWallet Plus account…
I’m Giving Away 60,000 Starwood Starpoints
Key Links:Starwood Preferred Guest American Express card Starwood Preferred Guest Business American Express card I mentioned yesterday that I was going to be giving away 60,000 Starwood Starpoints — 30,000 apiece to two lucky winners. American Express offered the points to help you “stretch your summer” with a last-minute getaway. Two summers ago American Express introduced a 30,000 point signup bonus on their Starwood cards for the first time. I got the card for the first time in 2001 — with no signup bonus at all. Way back in May 2002 when I first started this blog I wrote, “the credit card I recommend most often for earning miles is the Starwood American Express, because points transfer 1:1 into most airline programs and you get a 5k mile bonus for transferring 20k points — equivalent…
1000 American Airlines Miles Per Day with Budget Car Rental
Two weeks ago I posted about a big rental car mileage bonus running through the month of August: 3000 American miles on a 1-day rental or 5000 miles on a 3-day rental with Avis airport locations in the US and Canada using coupon code MUAA035. Pizza in Motion highlights a deal that’s even better for rentals of 6 days or longer and that will be the best offer on most rentals come September: 1000 American Airlines miles per day with Budget through September 30 when renting 2 days or more from airport locations in the US and Canada using coupon code MUAZ013.
